Here we have a refreshing change amid the long, endless, maddening aisle chock full of NDP American whiskey. (NDP = Non-Distiller Producer, or brands that do not distill their own whiskey.) Rabbit Hole started in 2012 by – yes – rebranding whiskey from New Riff distillery. However, they completed construction and opened their state-of-the-art Louisville distillery in 2018 and now produce all of their own whiskey.
So it has indeed been 12 years since I first reviewed the 12-year edition of DoubleWood by Balvenie. In that time, it became my go-to suggestion for newbies, or (more accurately) my suggestion for aficionados wanting to indoctrinate newbies into the single-malt fold. It has a little of everything, and manages to remain balanced. It is (or was) reasonably-priced, and comes from a venerable name in single-malt scotch.
I just returned from South Africa (Cape Town) and a lovely time was had by all. While travelling, I always try to carve out some time early in the trip to seek out a bottle of whisky or whisky-adjacent spirits that are locally made, or at least only available locally. I do this for two reasons: First, it’s easy to get tunnel vision about what products are available at my regular liquor stores, and I like to try to get access to things I can’t get at home. Second, then I have a bottle of whisky t
This bottle, from Jefferson’s, displays both the highly-respected “very old” AND “very small batch” epithets, so you know it must be good. I jest, of course. The brand has taken (one of the) laudable paths to official distillery-hood in transitioning from a NDP (non-distiller producer) to a “real” distillery by buying Kentucky Artisan Distillery in Crestwood, Kentucky. That said, some large percentage of the barrels still aging in their warehouse (and, likely, being blended into their whiskeys)
Glenfiddich, as befitting a large distiller with a significant share of the global single malt scotch market, releases enough special editions that I can’t keep up with them. I do know not to dismiss them as “airplane bottle” scotch, as not only is the Glenfiddich 12 serviceable in its own right, but several of their special editions have had that magic combination of high quality and low cost. Even their 15 and 18 (both excellent) can be found for less than comparable brands.
In furthering my pursuit of reviewing low-end as well as high-end whiskies, and because I reviewed Jim Beam’s basic white label with surprisingly positive results, I figured that a review of Old Faithful itself Jack Daniel’s Old No. 7 was due. I know that no one cares what I think of Jack Daniel’s. Essentially nobody is out there drinking it neat out of a Glencairn and performing Richard Patterson’s tasting routine on it. Really, this is just an exercise in completionism and I’m going to ignore
I last reviewed the 2019 edition of this malt, which was an entirely different beast: heavily peated, 15 years of age, and rum finished. The 2021 bottling which appeared at my local Costco last week is unpeated and sports a red wine cask finish, but at least it’s a bit cheaper due to a lower age statement.
Some of my more astute readers have noticed an uhm… dramatic drop-off in my posting regularity. The rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated. In fact, a bout of Covid and a number of real-life distractions have gotten me out of the habit of sitting down Saturday mornings to churn out a blog post. Once that habit is broken, well… it’s easy to stay distracted.
Oof it’s been a month. Nobody wants to read about a blogger’s personal life outside of the topic of interest, so I won’t bore you, but lately Saturday mornings (when I write) have been… unavailable. Apologies for that.
Writing about Barrell is weird for me. From a costs perspective, there’s very little difference between a cask strength bourbon from a major producer like Barton that sells for $45 and something like Barrell Batch 017 which sells for upwards of $90. They’re both not super-old… most bourbons aren’t much older than 9 or 10 years, as the wide temperature swings in rickhouses where bourbons are aged tends to make them overly woody tasting much after 10 years. There’s no difference in the input ingre