Jack Daniel's Silver Select Single Barrel

A duty-free exclusive, about which very little information is available. But let's be honest: this is essentially JD Single Barrel, plus a few extra ABV percentage points, and *arguably* pulled from better barrels. I've been told this may only exist to fulfill requirements from some duty-free companies that they have an "exclusive" product. Tawny in colour, almost reddish. Smell is milk chocolate and cooked bananas, banana-flavoured medicine (Amoixicillin? I'm allergic to it, but I distinctly recall it from my youth), pine, maple/maple syrup, tree sap. Rich caramel and vanilla. Dark cherries and maybe some other berry flavours. Light wood-smoke. Honey. Cinnamon. Custard. Hints of apple and fresh flowers and cereal. Taste is soft and creamy and smooth. Sweet vanilla, custard, and caramel. Grape flavours. Simple syrup. Those bananas, some tree sap. Saltwater taffy. Cocoa. Crab-apples. Maple syrup, hints of the maple charcoal used in filtering. Barrel char. Light nuttiness and sweet orange. All good. And then it . . . completely falls apart on the finish, which is pure sour, soggy, cardboard-y woodiness with a faint garbage-juice kick. A potentially great whiskey absolutely ruined by that borderline-poisonous finish. A considerable improvement on both standard JD and the regular Single Barrel, . . . but that finish. Ick.

$60 Brown sugar, vanilla and charred oak on the nose. Same notes on the palate. Finish of roasted nuts and marshmallows. This is one of the best I've had and I'm not a huge jack fan. Incredibly smooth for 100 proof. Not as complex and full bodied but a great sipping whiskey! Definitely a bottle you should get if you can.