• The KillerFrogs

OT - Favorite/Specialty Bourbons

Horny 4 Life

Active Member
@Horny 4 Life gave me my first tip on this one. It's my most common purchase and I routinely laud it as the best value in bourbon. I'm not as big a fan of their other mash bills, but that one speaks to me softly. Interestingly, I think I remember from the tour at their rick houses that they have 8 different single barrel mash bills available in barrel picks. I've had 2. One was amazing and the other was just alright. IIRC, one of those was with Horny4Life when I met him half way between Fort Knox and Lexington for dinner and drinks near Heaven Hill. Naturally, my memory isn't as sharp of that night as it is of most nights.

2 mashbills + 5 proprietary yeasts = 10 recipes.

The shelf version of single barrel is OBSV, so if you see a store pick with that recipe grab it.

I know we had Four Roses, but I don't remember the mashbill we had at dinner. That was a fun night!

Edited to clean up confusion.
 
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froginmn

Full Member
Bourbon is insane right now and not getting any better any time soon. The chances of finding one of those bottles just sitting on a Shelf for a reasonable price are astronomically low. Store owners who were not aware of the bourbon bubble got picked over and have nothing left on the Shelf and those who pay attention to the market have raised prices for any of those bottles that they may have in stock.

Just two days ago I walked into a nondescript store that appeared to cater to a low-income clientele and a saw a bottle of Old Rip Van Winkle and Old Fitzgerald 8 year on the Shelf. The Old Rip was $999 and the Old Fitzgerald was $899.

Your best bet for trying limited edition bourbons right now is to find a bar that has some for reasonable prices and buy a pour or two.

If you really want to pursue bottles of allocated bourbon here's how you do it... spend tons of money (probably tens of thousands of dollars) at small stores and develop a relationship with the owner(s) so that you get a call when those bottles come in or get lucky and win a lottery drawing for the right to purchase one of those bottles at something close to retail. Although sometimes even the lotteries require you to purchase large amounts of liquor beforehand. Either way there is likely to be a significant investment of time and money on your part. In the case of the Old Fitzgerald, you might also get lucky and get it at the distillery if you happen to be in Bardstown on the day of a release.

Based upon your list it seems that you enjoy products from the Buffalo Trace Distillery. Unfortunately, Buffalo Trace is probably the hottest distillery in the bourbon market, so it's difficult to get a lot of their offerings off of a shelf. I would recommend looking at A. Smith Bowman products. Bowman ships Buffalo Trace distillate to Virginia and distills it once more. There are still a lot of similarities between the products despite the extra distillation run. If you enjoy higher proof bourbon, they have a cask-strength offering that is pretty good.

Private Barrel selections, AKA store picks, are a good way to expand upon whiskey's that you already like or try quality bottles from other lines that you might not be familiar with. Unfortunately, these are also getting tougher to come by but at least they make it to a shelf. Of the brands you listed as already trying every one offers store picks except Weller 12 and Elmer T Lee. Blanton's is probably the hardest to find and Elijah Craig and Eagle Rare are probably the easiest to find.

My personal favorite bourbon is Four Roses. It's easy to find their core lineup on the shelves and their store picks, while increasingly popular, are not impossible to find on a shelf.

I find Bottled-in-Bond (BiB) bourbons to be the best value in whiskey, even though E.H. Taylor is BiB and it has jumped the shark. Henry McKenna, Heaven Hill, Evan Williams, Old Granddad, and Old Forester all have great BiB offerings that sit on the shelf. A lot of smaller distilleries also have BiB offerings that can be very good, although pricier than the ones above.
Holy ship

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WIN

Active Member
Bourbon is insane right now and not getting any better any time soon. The chances of finding one of those bottles just sitting on a Shelf for a reasonable price are astronomically low. Store owners who were not aware of the bourbon bubble got picked over and have nothing left on the Shelf and those who pay attention to the market have raised prices for any of those bottles that they may have in stock.

Just two days ago I walked into a nondescript store that appeared to cater to a low-income clientele and a saw a bottle of Old Rip Van Winkle and Old Fitzgerald 8 year on the Shelf. The Old Rip was $999 and the Old Fitzgerald was $899.

Your best bet for trying limited edition bourbons right now is to find a bar that has some for reasonable prices and buy a pour or two.

If you really want to pursue bottles of allocated bourbon here's how you do it... spend tons of money (probably tens of thousands of dollars) at small stores and develop a relationship with the owner(s) so that you get a call when those bottles come in or get lucky and win a lottery drawing for the right to purchase one of those bottles at something close to retail. Although sometimes even the lotteries require you to purchase large amounts of liquor beforehand. Either way there is likely to be a significant investment of time and money on your part. In the case of the Old Fitzgerald, you might also get lucky and get it at the distillery if you happen to be in Bardstown on the day of a release.

Based upon your list it seems that you enjoy products from the Buffalo Trace Distillery. Unfortunately, Buffalo Trace is probably the hottest distillery in the bourbon market, so it's difficult to get a lot of their offerings off of a shelf. I would recommend looking at A. Smith Bowman products. Bowman ships Buffalo Trace distillate to Virginia and distills it once more. There are still a lot of similarities between the products despite the extra distillation run. If you enjoy higher proof bourbon, they have a cask-strength offering that is pretty good.

Private Barrel selections, AKA store picks, are a good way to expand upon whiskey's that you already like or try quality bottles from other lines that you might not be familiar with. Unfortunately, these are also getting tougher to come by but at least they make it to a shelf. Of the brands you listed as already trying every one offers store picks except Weller 12 and Elmer T Lee. Blanton's is probably the hardest to find and Elijah Craig and Eagle Rare are probably the easiest to find.

My personal favorite bourbon is Four Roses. It's easy to find their core lineup on the shelves and their store picks, while increasingly popular, are not impossible to find on a shelf.

I find Bottled-in-Bond (BiB) bourbons to be the best value in whiskey, even though E.H. Taylor is BiB and it has jumped the shark. Henry McKenna, Heaven Hill, Evan Williams, Old Granddad, and Old Forester all have great BiB offerings that sit on the shelf. A lot of smaller distilleries also have BiB offerings that can be very good, although pricier than the ones above.

Just wanted to thank you. Learned alot from this and picked up some Evan Williams bottled in bond and love it!
 

BrewingFrog

Was I supposed to type something here?
What does BiB mean?
Bottled In Bond: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bottled_in_bond

Bottled in bond is a label for an American-made distilled beverage that has been aged and bottled according to a set of legal regulations contained in the United States government's Standards of Identity for Distilled Spirits,[1] as originally laid out in the Bottled-in-Bond Act of 1897. As a reaction to widespread adulteration in American whiskey, the act made the federal government the guarantor of a spirit's authenticity, gave producers a tax incentive for participating, and helped ensure proper accounting and the eventual collection of the tax that was due. Although the regulations apply to all spirits, most bonded spirits are whiskeys in practice.

To be labeled as bottled-in-bond or bonded, the liquor must be the product of one distillation season (January–June or July–December) by one distiller at one distillery. It must have been aged in a federally bonded warehouse under U.S. government supervision for at least four years and bottled at 100 (U.S.) proof (50% alcohol by volume). The bottled product's label must identify the distillery where it was distilled and, if different, where it was bottled.[2][3] Only spirits produced in the United States may be designated as bonded.

Some consumers consider the term to be an endorsement of quality, while many producers consider it archaic and do not use it.[3] However, because bottled-in-bond whiskey must be the product of one distillation season, one distillery, and one distiller – whereas ordinary straight whiskey may be a product of the mingling of straight whiskeys (of the same grain type) with differing ages and producers within a single state – it may be regarded as a better indication of the distiller's skill, making it similar in concept to a single malt whisky, small batch whiskey, or single barrel whiskey.
 

Horny 4 Life

Active Member
Just wanted to thank you. Learned alot from this and picked up some Evan Williams bottled in bond and love it!

That's a great one, especially at $16-20 per bottle.

I recently did a 12 bottle tasting of Heaven Hill products that spanned prices from $10 to $400 per bottle and the EW BiB was the favorite of a couple guys and in the Top 4 for everybody.
 

SuperTFrog

Active Member
I’m not going through this whole thread to find out…….did the OP SuperT ever buy some freaking Whiskey or not?
I posted this and then went off the grid on a backpacking trip. Getting caught up and this has been glorious. Going to try some of these recommendations if I can find them and report back. Thanks for the great feedback!
 

Paint It Purple

Active Member
I posted this and then went off the grid on a backpacking trip. Getting caught up and this has been glorious. Going to try some of these recommendations if I can find them and report back. Thanks for the great feedback!
Where'd you go? I can think of several backcountry high points that a good whiskey would be a great capper, right about sunset.
 
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