While They Were Horsing Around . . . We Went On A Field Trip

Last Saturday, while Leah and Tash went to Breyerfest, Abby and I headed off to a place where they take corn, rye and barley and use them for a more glorious and noble purpose:

Yes, we drove a few miles out of Lexington to visit the Buffalo Trace Distillery. One of the oldest distilleries in America, it makes many fine products.

It was pretty busy that Saturday and while all the reserved tours were cancelled as they were on Summer shut down so some areas were not available to be seen, such as the huge mash tanks, but they did offer a free 1 hour tour that we took.

First we went to the visitor's center and then the old firehouse that has been changed into a sandwich shop - we had some excellent hot dogs and root beer before going on our tour.

The tour was led by a very friendly and knowledgeable gentleman who is a University folklorist in his regular job.

We learned how the distillery was one of 4 that were allowed to operate during Prohibition, making medicinal spirits that could be acquired in limited quantities via a doctor's prescription. The solution of course was to have a large family with each of the kids getting a scrip so the parents would have at least something to drink.

We saw a nicely produced film on the distillery and how whiskey is made and how they use different variations in the mash to get different products. The mash is fermented and then distilled, and then aged in new charred oak barrels.

This is Warehouse Cone of the storage houses where the barrels of whiskey are aged. Each floor gives the whiskey a different quality - the upper floors have larger temperature swings so the quicker maturing whiskies are located there. Buffalo Trace tends to be on the middle floors and product like Weller and Pappy Van Winkle resides in the basement.

Note how the racks are actually built into the walls. The building survived a tornado in 2006 that tore the rook off but otherwise did not harm the buiding - it apparently created a very fine whiskey that year as a result and they're trying to replicate the effects of the storm on the shiskey even today.

We then entered Warehouse C, labelled as Bonded Storage Building C

And within the building:

Barrel upon barrel of Whiskey slowly aging to perfection in the dark, hence the lousy photo. We were on the lowest floor and saw barrels that might, should they meet quality standards, become Pappy Van Winkle 23 Year - aged 23 years and the barrel loses 30% of its volume the first year and 3% or so each year thereafter - that's why Pappy's is rather rare and expensive. They don't make much and if it doesn't meet their standards its not released. The building had a lovely smell of whiskey all about it.

After that we got to see the bottling facility and some Blanton's Single Barrel that had just been bottled and packaged for shipping.

then off to the tasting room for a sample.

You could try 2 of either Buffalo Trace, White Dog Mash, Wheatly Vodka, or Eagle Rare. I tried some White Dog Mash and Eagle Rare. The White Dog - unaged Whiskey fresh from the still had a sweetish corn taste and at 125 proof went down rather well when sipped, or when others tried to slam it a coughing fit that was rather humorous to watch.

The Eagle Rare, a Bourbon aged for 10 years was very nice and refined indeed.

Then everyone got some Bourbon Cream, a drink like Irish Cream, but better, as a dessert.

Abby contented herself with a free Root Beer that she enjoyed quite nicely as in lieu of alcohol as they gave her a rather large and cold glass of the quite tasty root beer.

Then we went to the visitor's center again and I picked up a bottle of Bourbon Cream and a T-shirt to take home and that was our visit to Buffalo Trace.

It was a darn good trip and if you're ever visiting the Lexington area, the Buffalo Trace distillery is well worth visiting.

Whisky in a can? Oh heck no!

Instapundit makes a links to a story with he catchy headline WHISKY IN A POP-TOP CAN.

This is very, very wrong.

Silly South Americans, everyone knows Whisky's in the jar.

Abuse of Alcohol- Historic Fine Whiskey to be destroyed

While the raison d'etre of government is waste this needs to be halted: From WSMV Nashville:

Vintage Whiskey May Be Poured Out

Law Requires Officials Destroy Whiskey That Cannot Be Sold Legally
NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- Here's a sobering thought: Hundreds of bottles of Jack Daniel's whiskey, some of it almost 100 years old, may be unceremoniously poured down a drain because authorities suspect it was being sold by someone without a license.

Officials seized 2,400 bottles late last month during warehouse raids in Nashville and Lynchburg, the southern Tennessee town where the whiskey is distilled.

"Punish the person, not the whiskey," said an outraged Kyle MacDonald, 28, a Jack Daniel's drinker from British Columbia who promotes the whiskey on his blog. "Jack never did anything wrong, and the whiskey itself is innocent."

Investigators are also looking into whether some of the bottles had been stolen from the distillery. No one has been arrested.

Authorities are still determining how much of the liquor will be disposed of, and how much can be sold at auction.

Tennessee law requires officials to destroy whiskey that cannot be sold legally in the state, such as bottles designed for sale overseas and those with broken seals.

"We'd pour it out," said Danielle Elks, executive director of the Tennessee Alcoholic Beverage Commission.

“If it's forfeited to the ABC, we will divide the alcohol into sellable and unsellable alcohol. The alcohol that's available for sale will be auctioned off to the licensees in the state, and the funds will go to the state,” she said.

The estimated value of the liquor is $1 million, possibly driven up by the value of the antique bottles, which range from 3-liter bottles to half-pints.

One seized bottle dates to 1914, with its seal unbroken. Elks said it is worth $10,000 on the collectors market. Investigators are looking into whether the liquor was being sold for the value of the bottles rather than the whiskey.

"Someone was making a great deal of profit," she said.

Tennessee whiskeys age in charred white oak barrels, but the maturing process that gives them character mostly stops when it is bottled. A bottled whiskey can deteriorate over a long period of time, especially if it is opened or exposed to sunlight and heat.

Christopher Carlsson, a spirits connoisseur and collector in Rochester, N.Y., said old vintages of whiskey in their original containers are highly prized.

"A lot of these bottles are priceless," he said. "It's like having a rare painting. It's heavily collected."

...

For now, the whiskey is being stored in a Nashville vault.

Elks acknowledged that pouring out the whiskey would not be a happy hour for her.

"It'd kill me," she said.

Officials with Jack Daniel’s agree.

“Certainly we would be all in favor of the bottles being auctioned off in some way in which the proceeds could go to charity. We've had some discussions with ABC in Tennessee about that particularly, with the oldest bottle that dates back to 1914,” said Jack Daniel’s spokesman Phil Lynch.

But not everyone’s motives are so noble. Some just wish that enormous stash of Tennessee sipping whiskey could be put to good use.
. . .

Attorneys are currently researching Tennessee law to see if the bottles that aren't sold at auction could somehow be preserved for historical purposes.

Pouring a million dollars, literally down the drain is unconscionable and the law should be changed immediately to prevent such waste. At the very least convert it into E85 rather than pour it down the drain - some lucky car would get some very vintage fuel.

This is Jack Daniels Whiskey - a signature American and indeed Tennessean product, for the State of Tennessee to desecrate such a fine and historic item is simply awful. Indeed, the Executive Director of the Tennessee Alcoholic Beverage Commission even acknowledged it would be a terrible fate for such fine alcohol.

While my personal favorite is Irish Whiskey, specifically Bushmill's or Jameson's, Jack Daniels is an American icon and a fine and noble whiskey that can stand on its own merits and such historic whiskey, especially the 1914 bottle should be preserved. At least give it to the Jack Daniels Distillery with the condition that it must be kept there in a museum to show the history of their fine product, auction it off for charity in the state, or simply, since its already seized, make any buyer pay the appropriate tax on the alcohol and reintroduce it into the stream of alcoholic commerce.

Save Jack!