Merry Christmas, Mr. Bryson
Written: Feb 18 '01 (Updated Feb 18 '01)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Tastes real good and looks mighty purty, too; a bourbon with some presentation.
Cons: A bit harder to find than some, which is a shame.
The Bottom Line: The package on this whiskey looks great, and the spirit inside delivers on every bit of that promise. Get some, and discover Buffalo Trace Distillery.
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| beerfly's Full Review: Hancock's President's Reserve Single Barrel Sour M... |
Twenty years ago, Bourbon was embarrassed to be bourbon.
Prohibition declared bourbon to be illegal and immoral in the Constitution and the law of the land. Bourbon and rye whiskey disappeared from the land except for "medicinal" purposes. No distilling was done. Bourbon that had been distilled prior to Prohibition grew dry and woody in the barrels. Dilute floods of blended Scotch and Canadian whiskies filled the American speakeasies and jazz age hipflasks. Bourbon was hard to come by, replaced by moonshine and raw corn likker.
Repeal was no better. Bill Samuels of Maker's Mark told me what his grandfather told him about that time. "When the Volstead Act was repealed," he said, "whiskey could be made and sold right away. But Canada and the UK were ready that day, and we had to wait."
Bourbon without aging was just moonshine. The law said that it had to be aged for a minimum of two years. "That meant that when the market opened," Samuels continued, "the only place open was the floor. My grandfather called it ‘swapping dollars,' because there wasn't any money being made. We had 14 years of bad press, followed by imported spirits and none of our own. The distillers had to eat so they had to put two year old whiskey on the market, and that hurt us even more. It was an enormous burden to overcome the public's perception of bourbon whiskey over the first 35 years after Prohibition."
That bad start haunted bourbon for decades. Cheap drinking whiskey, cheap-looking bottles, competition on price as a booze commodity...bourbon hated itself, and watched Scotch and Canadian whiskies take its rightful place as America's spirit. Poor rye whiskey was so knocked out by this that it almost disappeared.
Samuels' father started to change that. The look, the character, and the marketing of Maker's Mark reflected an older, prouder bourbon heritage. Other distilleries began to think of their bourbon as the special, wonderful spirit it truly was, and began to create special bottlings... more "special" than just another Elvis decanter.
Hancock's President's Reserve Single Barrel Bourbon is one of those special bottlings. Just a look shows that bourbon's embarrassment is over. There's nothing classless about this package. A smooth cylinder of wood hinges to reveal the heavy cut-glass decanter, stoppered with a wooden-knobbed cork tightly plugged in the thick, flared top of the bottle. Nice. I mean, you can't drink a wood box, but why should Scotch and Cognac drinkers have all the fun?
You can drink the whiskey inside, of course, and I highly recommend that you do just that. This is highly aromatic stuff, and I've been whiffing it for about 20 minutes now while I've been typing. Rich, sweet aromas, just a touch candy-thin around the ages, and enough brisk spicy touches to keep this one far away from being syrupy.
The taste--no, tastes really hit a lot of buttons on the way down. A bright, juicy mouthful of happy corn and vanilla opens up to a broad creaminess with some smoky hints, then drops into a toffee-ish caramel that spreads wide at the swallow. The finish is reminiscent of fine Munich doublebocks that manage to be malty but not sweet as they fade in the mouth. I think I'm going to have to have another of these. Excuse me a second...
That's better. Hancock's is selected by Buffalo Trace (that's the latest name for the Leestown distillery lately known as Ancient Age) master distiller Gary Gayheart, a man who is finally coming out from under the shadow of Elmer T. Lee as a bourbon artist in his own right. Watch for some truly interesting things coming from Gayheart and Buffalo Trace, by the way; I learned about some experimental whiskies in the making that are going to shake up the industry, old recipes that haven't been distilled in almost 100 years, new ideas that should be ready in a few short years. Interesting times.
This is a very significant bottle of bourbon for me. My publisher, John Hansell, gave it to me for Christmas back in 1995, and it was this bourbon that opened my eyes to the glories of bourbon as more than a booster for Pepsi. I learned a lot from this whiskey, and I'm still learning.
Change your bourbon life. Open this box. And don't ever be embarrassed of bourbon.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
beerfly
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Member: Lew Bryson
Location: Philadelphia, PA
Reviews written: 88
Trusted by: 82 members
About Me:
One bourbon, one Scotch, one beer, eh? I'll take Kentucky Spirit, Scapa, and HopDevil.
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