Tastes

Bought this on the recommendation of a store clerk and his personal notes of it and the fact that my neighbor said he really liked it so worst case, my neighbor drinks it all when we hang out. Okay so on to the tasting. Gonna keep it pretty simple because this bourbon is sourced and if I’m wrong about where this is sourced then I don’t know whiskey. Smells like Dickel, unmistakable vitamin smell. Tastes like.....Dickel BIB 13year almost exactly. I wish I still had the Dickel laying around to do a side by side even without it I can almost guarantee this is the same juice. Is it good? Well I did like the Dickel BIB.... a lot. But I also only paid $35 for the real Dickel vs $50 for Bob Dylan’s version. So the short answer is yes, it’s good, but I won’t be buying again based on the availability of the Dickel 13 year BIB being pretty easily available in my area. 3/7/20

After my 4R SiB experience i wasn't sure what to expect, but I know I enjoyed the 2019 LE and the Small batch select my friend so graciously gave me a few weeks ago. So without wasting too much energy on a review that has been rated almost 4,000 times already and has been around for a long time I'll leave a quick review...... The 4R Small Batch is a great every day drinker. Nothing that will stand out but will hold it's own to a buffalo trace or eagle rare. Not as sweet as the BT products but has a nice "traditional" bourbon taste. After tasting the majority of the standard bourbons on the shelf i'm finding myself to enjoy the Heaven Hill and Wild Turkey products more and more over the BT and 4R stuff and they are usually on the shelves. WT101 is probably the most underrated bourbon out there along with EW BiB or SiB. I know I sidetracked on this review but to me this is good comparison in notes ror myself to where this 4R SB lies. Either way, I put this one in my decanter on my work desk to sip daily. Overall I'm okay with spending sub $30 on this one. 3/2/20

Continuing my dive into unattainable bourbons this evening we concluded the night with 2oz pour of this gem. This was a very nice complex pour. First having Thomas Handy 2019 and Old Fitz 15 before this one made it difficult to realize how good this was. It was just an end of night bonus for me after an amazing night of bourbon tasting. 2/24/20

Fortunate enough to have a 2oz pour of this with some good friends who know A LOT about bourbon and know a lot of people in the industry. When seeing the 2019 I was told this was one of the best years besides the 2014 so he had to buy me a pour. For reference my friend has almost every year of all the BTAC’s in his home bar along with every other “unicorn” you can think of. This was my first foray into the BTAC and I honestly don’t think I’ll ever have a rye as good as this again. The first sip was absolutely HEAVEN! Sweet candy-like with no burn. Spicy rye sits on the palette for quite some time before making me want to go back for more. I don’t how it’s possible to make a whiskey with this proof taste so good. I will most likely never see a bottle of this for retail but if I did I’d buy it in a second. As much as I loved this whiskey, it has ruined all other ryes for me.

Can’t leave a very detailed review based on the fact this was an “end of nighter” and I drank about 1/3 of the bottle after already having a bunch of 1792. From the bits and pieces of that night I do recall I really liked this rye and that it went down pretty easy so therefore I gave it four stars. Maybe next time I’ll get to enjoy it a bit more being somewhat sober first.

I visited this distillery a few months after they opened by chance while staying in St. Augustine. I remember they had only vodka and gin at the time because the whiskey had “a long time to finish”. The long time was apparently not long enough. I was gifted this bottle by a friend whom I was supposed to meet up with but the hurricane this summer destroyed the Bahamas and wasn’t sure it it wanted to hit FL or not so we never got to meet up so as a sign to remember we never got to go, he bought me this bottle. Cool story, now time to review. The smell is somewhat a fresh wood smell. New oak smell, sawdust with a hint of alcohol. First sip is hot with a bite of alcohol that is not pleasing. This is only aged for three years and it certainly shows could probably spend a little more time mellowing out before being barreled. After the first sip and initial hot bite you get a raisin, molasses taste that lingers for a small amount of time. I wish I could have gotten behind this one as the gin they make at this distillery is amazing but their standard straight bourbon just didn’t live up to my expectations. I will certainly stop at the distillery next time I go to the city though and see what the operation looks like after a few years of being open.

Yowza’s super tasty! Longer review when I buy a bottle. Had this at my barber today when getting my haircut. 2/4/20

Bumping this one up to 3.5 stars as i'm really enjoying this for a $20 bourbon. I get a lot of notes from the Russell's Reserve in this but at a much nicer price point. I think the Wild Turkey products agree with my palate similar to the Elijah Craig products do.

Tasted this once in the past but couldn’t remember details as I only took a quick taste at a party. This time I went and bought a bottle. My thoughts are that this is a very good daily drinker that is very affordable and easy to find on the shelf. Not overly complicated bourbon but a pleasant easy drinking sweet bourbon that seems to find my mouth every day when I get home before the other dozens of bottles. At the $30 price point I think it’s a reasonable asking price.

This was a Christmas gift to me that I’ve been secretly wanting for quite some time. My in-laws visited the distillery and brought back a bottle to gift me for Christmas this year. So I had high expectations for this rye for two reasons, one being that it is local and secondly it won some prestigious awards out in San Francisco. I’ll spoil it by saying I thoroughly Njoy’d this rye (pun intended). If you want to know where I felt a little let down on this one then keep on reading, if not, then let it be known this is an excellent rye. Okay so upon opening this bottle the smell was not the best scented rye I’ve ever had but by no means was it unenjoyable; it was just average. Smell to me is not as important as taste so if I was judging I wouldn’t deduct points. Next up I took my first taste and whoa the explosion of great flavor just came all at once. Spicy rye, sweet undertones, distinct Florida flavor that I just can’t describe came rushing at me. It’s no wonder that this rye was suggested to me by lesser whiskey aficionado friends than me a few times already. It’s just a nice spicy sweet mix that has amazing flavor. I made this in an old fashioned the third time tasting and WOW it is great in a good cocktail. Okay so you read all this way to know what my “gripe” was with this was. Well, it’s not a huge factor but one that really irks me personally. I really hate when I have a wonderfully flavored whiskey/bourbon/scotch and the flavors finish too quickly. The one thing that I love is a drink I can taste a half hour later in my mouth and this one just goes away as fast as you get it past your esophagus. So other than that this is a damn fine whiskey and I’m glad to know it’s a local company that is using locally sourced Florida ingredients and I can drive to their distillery in an hour if I decide I want to! 1/22/20