Blackened Whiskey

Batch 124: Nose is lemon zest. Potpourri. Melon. Body is lavender, watermelon, melon. Brine. Finish is chocolate. Milky. Black pepper. Bit of orange. I could see cherry. Comparing this to my last: Batch 113. Nose keeps the lemon zest, but completely substitutes more traditional, nutty bourbon notes for less frequent, floral notes. A similar thing occurs on the body, but melon and brine carry through. Finish is very similar. That floral bit is a weaker blend in this drink when compared to nutty notes. Thus, cross-batch consistent notes to date: Lemon zest, melon, brine, chocolate, cherry.

Smells great. Sweet, light, slight oak. Light taste, smooth with a slight after burn. Little spicy. Hmm interesting taste. There is something that numbs the flavors a little and maybe its the brandy, not a bad thing. Interesting, better than a ton of bottles out there but just not crazy for it.

Pretty good with a little spice. Kind of peppery

Batch 113. Turns out that little number matters, more on that later. Nose is caramel, oats, dust, honeysuckle. Lemon zest. Body is lemon, maple syrup. Honeydew melon. Brine. Tea leaves. Oat milk. Super creamy mouth feel. Finish is chocolate, milk. Very faint cherry. I like this a lot. In fact, a while back this bottle impressed me enough to launch a Blackened collecting spree, which I’m finally getting to drinking through now. In doing so, I wanted to be able to say that for Blackened, the batch number doesn’t matter. Bad news y’all: it really does, at least at this stage in their business model. I’m trying batch 113 back to back with batch 124, and there is a distinct difference. These two batches are as distinct as two different single barrel store picks. On the bright side, if you had a bad experience, there’s always a chance you could find a better batch later. On the flip: you could recommend this to a friend and have them scratching their head in disappointment. Batch 124 isn’t bad, but for me it’s a solid star lower. My approach to Blackened going forward: I will likely always have a bottle tucked away somewhere. It deserves that. I will not continue collecting them. Blackened doesn’t deserve that yet. And I’m not convinced they deserve to sell anything that costs more that $50, but I will wait to try the Blackened/Willett collab before I say that definitively.

Initial nose was pure ethanol. Second nosing I picked up dark cherries. The palette was hints of brandy The finish was a definite Kentucky kiss. Added 2 drops of RO water and the the ethanol was replaced with sweetness. The palette came alive with orange and oak. The finish is more oak with a medium length and mild Kentucky kiss. The mouth feel is nice creamy texture.

Initial nose was pure ethanol. Second nosing I picked up dark cherries. The palette was hints of brandy The finish was a definite Kentucky kiss. Added 2 drops of RO water and the the ethanol was replaced with sweetness. The palette came alive with orange and oak. The finish is more oak with a medium length and mild Kentucky kiss. The mouth feel is nice creamy texture.