Whiskey Tasting: Bardstown Bourbon Company Fusion Series #5
In showing off whiskeys, part of what I wanted to do was have some newcomers mixed in with the old timers. To counter a W.L. Weller, we have a distillery that's relatively new to the whiskey world. Bardstown Bourbon Company is one of those and tomorrow we'll see Rabbit Hill, the other newbie that I picked for the tasting.
Whiskey Tasting: Bardstown Bourbon Company Fusion Series #5
The distillery
Bardstown Bourbon Company is a relatively new distillery, founded in 2016 in, you guessed it, Bardstown, KY, they’ve got an interesting focus on a white label distillation that they do for other whiskey companies. They call it their Collaborative Distilling Program (or Custom, used interchangeably). They claim to have provided mash bills and distillates for a number of well known whiskey brands like Jefferson’s and High West.
For the most part they seem to release experiments without focusing on a consistency in their brands. They have a Discovery series and a Fusion series that have run for half-a-dozen releases each. They're fairly transparent about the type of whiskey that's in each, but not strictly who the outside whiskeys are from.
The whiskey
This whiskey is a blend of 3 whiskeys, two from Bardstown Bourbon Company and one from an unnamed Kentucky distiller. They provide a handy image that describes the blend proportions and mash bill of each:
They also helpfully provide some tasting notes:
Rich bread pudding and caramelized plantains with a touch of orange zest leads to flavors of dark chocolate and bing cherry on the palate, concluding with the signature smooth and balanced fusion finish, perfect for a cocktail or summer sipper.
The language here is a little pretentious but my notes suggest it's not wholly incorrect, just obnoxiously over-specific with "bing cherries" and "carmalized plantains". Whatever, it's marketing copy.
Look
This whiskey is very clear and very bright and surprisingly light for having an 11 year old whiskey in it. It's medium amber with some minor reddish notes and bright yellow highlights.
Nose
The nose is, true to the tasting notes, filled with orange and cherry and finishes out with a little rye and oak. The alcohol is certainly carrying that citrus, but is quite mild on the nose.
Taste
This whiskey starts with caramel and toasted grains and moves quickly into spicy cinnamon that swells with the alcohol bloom and sticks around into the finish. The finish has a little oak and rye hiding under the cinnamon and also a little, yes, chocolate hanging out well into this astonishingly long finish. Occasionally a little vanilla will poke through at various parts of the palate. This is a little hot with alcohol, but it melds nicely with the cinnamon, so it's hard to say it's too hot.
After water
Sweet caramel and toasted oats show up to the nose after a little water is added. The cherries and orange are still there, but less pronounced. At the end of the nose the rye and oak are now overshadowed by vanilla. Probably still there, but harder to pin down.
The water tames the alcohol and makes this much sweeter with a butterscotch start that moves into a milder cinnamon with a cinnamon, oak, and rye finish. The basic character of the taste stays the same, but the proportions are a little tweaked. If you made me decide, I think the non-dilute version is better, but I'm ok with hotter whiskeys, and I love spicy cinnamon in my bourbon. The chocolate and vanilla show up stronger in the finish, but later than before.
Summary
I really like this whiskey. It smells good, it tastes good, it retains good features and characteristics when diluted so it would make good cocktails. It's also chock-full of cinnamon, so my biases makes me love it. That said, it's a limited run and is now hard to find, so I can't recommend it as a collectors item, but if you see it on a shelf or in a bar, you should try it. The chocolate is a standout flavor you don't see as often in bourbons.