Barrell Armida

Too much going on with this one

Truly unique. Do not expect a typical bourbon flavor. Lots of fruity flavors!

Very sweet. Lots of flavors throughout. The Amaro finish shines on this.

The most original whisky I’ve tasted since Baller and probably as divisive. The pear comes through strong on the nose, along with unique notes like shiny coins and a freshly opened bag of brown sandwich bread. There’s more pear in the mouth, along with lychee, all layered over a decent bourbon rich in caramel with a respectfully long finish and a dash of wood spice. Your appreciation of this may depend on your tolerance for pear, so strong is the influence, but even if you don’t want more than one pour of this you have to applaud innovators like Barrell that carve their own path. A fascinating experiment.

Initial pours are really hard to define. There’s a lot going on. The nose is intense and smells like George Dickel 12 with some additional fruit notes, definitely pear, plum too. Palate is hot, sweet, sour, bitter, spicy, with strong notes of Dickel 12, including the minerals. There’s light vanilla, caramel, sea salt, aromatic bitters, baking spices and some fruit notes I can’t nail down. Finish is medium length and muddled, not really spicy, not sweet either, a little bitterness. I tried it with water, didn’t like it. An ice cube made it viscous, syrupy, toned down the heat and i actually enjoyed it more. Can’t say I love it, can’t say I hate it. But I will drink more of it. The bottle in my hand says 56.77 ABV