Benchmark Single Barrel Bourbon (95 Proof)

Extra bite of spice and citrus

Caramel, oak, rye heat, spice

You get what you pay for and for $20 it’s not bad.

Round 3 for the Benchmark series, and the single barrel is up, a nice lite sweet nose of cinnamon honey on toast. The proof holds up for some of the corn sugars and legs on the glass. This may wind up being my favorite of the Benchmark expressions. Yep, up front indeed is the honey toast and litely dusted cinnamon, it's a very lively and balanced expression, more of sugars and very slight barrel wood notes reveal through the middle, this is some extremely drinkable bourbon. I'm going to say this is more like an EH Taylor than any other BT line, it certainly is more refined than the Stagg-Full proof and less sweet than the Eagle Rare-BiB. It's starting to add up now, they raided the better rickhouses for some younger juice that would layout a great spread and bring some real value to those who recognize what the Benchmark team is doing. So far its: Stagg(jr): Full Proof Eagle Rare: Bottle in Bond EH Taylor: Single Barrel So this is turning out to be a fun experiment brought to us by Buffalo Trace, perhaps a small token of apology for the failure of the BTAC line this year. Either way I'm going to be stocking up on more of these Benchmark series, and stay tuned for the Top Shelf-Small Batch finally's!! Cheers!

Nose- vanilla and honey Body- honey toast with a hint of green apple Finish- the honey toast gives way to grain notes that suggests a younger age Overall the nites are very nice but are not completely developed.