Whiskey Lover’s Club highlights bourbon’s popularity
The aroma of vanilla rises out of my glass. A few drops of water brings honey and caramel to the nose. The first sip of the copper-tinted bourbon carries notes of dried fruit, brown sugar and tingly rye spice. This rich, complex single-barrel bourbon is a world away from the everyday stuff.
My sophisticated tasting experience was the result of both distilling craftsmanship and stubborn patience, allowing the carefully crafted bourbon to transform in the barrel. American bourbon has come of age.
Corey Shoop was surrounded by a hundred bottles of premium liquor in the tasting library at Wines and More in Milford where I visited him. The library serves as a gathering spot for the store’s Whiskey Lover’s Club. With a focus on bourbon, Shoop has created a thousand-member strong community of fans who collect, savor and explore their favorite spirit.
Bourbon has become a soughtafter collectible. From entry level brands to allocated special bottlings, it’s the most hotly pursued liquor in the market these days. A generation ago, you could hardly give brown spirits away.
Creative retailers like Shoop are introducing the curious, while feeding the high-end demand for rare, prestigious, pricy bottles. They build the audience between distillers and consumers. Good relationships up the supply chain can generate access to limited bottlings and collectible rarities.
Bourbon is a uniquely American whiskey. By law, it must be distilled from at least 51 percent corn and aged in new, charred-oak barrels. Although closely identified with the American South, particularly Kentucky, it can be made anywhere in the U.S. The difference from brand to brand and bottling to bottling comes down to the distiller’s art. World-class distilling skill is the result of a lifetime of experience, often handed down through generations. Once distilled, barrel selection, aging conditions and time determine flavor profile and quality. Finally, specialized tasters blend for a house style.
Shoop encourages beginners to join the Wines and More Whiskey Lovers’ Club, sign up for his newsletter and come to the free Tuesday night tastings. Club members get to know a wide variety of brands, get invited to special events, and get a heads-up when allocated bottles are in stock.
According to Rich Beladino at Stew Leonard’s Wines in Norwalk, current hot brands include Yellowstone, Michter’s, High West and the almost-never-seen Weller. Bourbon brands are blends of multiple barrels mixed together to fit the house style with water added to get to a consistent proof. (Proof is an old-English measure that is double the alcohol).
In partnership with distillers, stores have started creating their own collectable single-barrel bottlings. Individual barrels are selected because of their unique barrel character. The flavor comes from a range of variables including their time in the barrel, the level of char and their location in the rickhouse. Stores select their barrel from samples shipped to them or on a visit to the distillery. A team of tasters, often including favored customers, chooses the barrel that will be bottled as a store exclusive. Single-barrel selections are usually bottled at cask strength. As whisky ages some evaporates, concentrating the alcohol and raising the proof. For typical bourbon brands, barrels are married and water is added to lower the proof, but that also dilutes the flavor.
For example, Stew Leonard’s has an “Uncut, straight from the barrel” bottling of Elijah Craig ($90) aged nine years that has 66.85 percent alcohol (133.7 proof.) Blended bourbons are at about 45 percent. The tasting notes include: caramel, apple, orange, vanilla, butterscotch and black pepper. Sounds enticing.
Straight from the cask the flavors are concentrated but the higher alcohol can be hard to take. Shoop loves the authentic barrel character of the high-proof bottles. Beladino, on the other hand, likes to tame it with a few drops of water. I like to drop in a few ice chips, so that the flavor evolves as the ice melts.
“Some bourbon fans drink and enjoy, other’s collect, seeking rare and prestigious bottles,” Shoop explained. Whatever the motivation, there’s no end in sight for the bourbon craze.