Redemption High Rye Bourbon Single Barrel Select

Nice and light. You can drink this all night long. Be careful with the ice as it's easily watered down.

Tippin’s barrel pick.

Pick by Orange County ABC Board Barrel No. 21-189 Barreled on 10-10-2016; Bottled on 05-24-2021 Age: 4 years, 7 months, 14 days 52.5% abv; 105 proof Open 3 weeks Nose - Spicy caramel, vanilla, boiled peanut brine, cinnamon, allspice, caramelized green apple, heavy grain, and medium oak and ethanol. Palate - Peanut brittle, sweet oak, boiled peanuts, burnt caramel, light toffee, light apple, and light ethanol. Finish is medium with a lot of grain and rye spice, light caramel, light peanut, and a pleasant sweet cereal note at the end. This is a new offering in NC, and something I've passed up at Total Wine in SC. For the price I figured why not. I really appreciate the transparency on the bottle about the barrel, mashbill, and source. This is quite a bit better than other more expensive MGP products like Old Soul, Old Scout, and Penelope. It's close to Belle Meade and Smoke Wagon, but I believe the age and proof hold it back slightly. I regret passing up the barrel proof in SC, and hopefully I can snag one in the future. For $45 this is an excellent buy considering the market of sourced MGP.

Of all the store picks I had last year, this was the store pick I was most blown away by, and it encouraged me to look into the standard issue high-rye bourbon. Begin soap box: If you can’t find the redemption high-rye bourbon locally, look in your rye section. I can’t figure out why the hell multiple chains in my area, stores that *should* know better when it comes to stuff like this, keep putting this next to the Redemption Rye in the rye section rather than the Redemption Bourbon in the bourbon section. I felt strongly enough about this that I discussed it with the manager of a major chain out of curiosity (let’s just call them Wise Guys for the sake of argument). She tried to tell me this was both a bourbon and a rye because it was a bourbon that had rye in it. I discontinued the conversation. Unless I’m missing something obvious here, “high rye bourbons” are… you know… bourbons. They’re not ryes. And fun fact: Ryes aren’t bourbons. They’re ryes. There’s no such thing as a whiskey that is both a bourbon and a rye, unless you figure out how to simultaneously have 51% corn and 51% rye in your mashbill. Even if you were to mix a rye with a bourbon (which is distinctly not what is happening here) it’s not a bourbon anymore. This is a “high rye bourbon” because it has a mashbill with 36% rye (60% corn). For comparison, Four Roses mashbill #2 uses 35% rye (60% corn), but you don’t see people attempting to label it as some weird, innovative, fusion product. Put the delicious Redemption High Rye Bourbon where it belongs. Which is with the bourbons. Because it’s a damn bourbon. End soap box. Barrel No: 21-196 ABV: 52.5% Barreled: 10/10/16 Bottled: 5/25/21 Nose hits you upfront with a musk. Dusty. Basement floor. There is still sugar, apple, tangerine. I don’t get the honey that I do in the standard issue, and this is overall less sweet. There’s a new perfume note too, something like a fabric softener or a detergent. Cider too. In comparison, body is less complex than I had hoped. There’s loads of caramel and apple. Strong bitter leather note. Walnuts. It’s solid. Finish is cinnamon, more sugar and caramel. I can stretch the apple, but it’s only barely there. Mild orange note at the end of the finish. Cinnamon is the champ here. I hate it is when this happens. This is solid, but now that I’ve had the standard issue, it’s impossible not to be let down by this whiskey. It really is good, it’s just not as good as I want it to be. I think there is some default expectation that a “selection” will in some way be better, and it’s just not the case here. I’m going to enjoy this bottle, but when compared to it’s cheaper counterpart, this is shallower and steers it’s focus away from that caramel apple profile that was so amazing in the high rye bourbon. Probably won’t buy this pick again, but I will buy different store picks of this label in the future. This product line is just too exciting to me. P.S.: These are bourbons y’all. They’re not ryes.

Very interesting flavors and taste. Caramel/butterscotch/ smell. Bites at the end with pepper.

Total Wine barrel 21-002. Bit of a bite. Pepper and caramel. I liked this a lot.