Sommelier Tries 10 Bourbons From $20-$200 | World of Wine | Bon Appétit

hey I'm s Andre Houston Mac and today I'm going to be tasting 10 bottles of bourbon ranging from $20 all the way up to about $200 bourbon comes in many different styles different terminology and a wide price range but what does it all mean today I'm going to help you figure out the perfect bottle for you woo I think over the last five or six years bourbon has seen an incredible boom but what's really great about this is that you can actually go out and buy something for $15 and something of consequence something of good quality what we have here today is 10 different bottles of bourbon and we're going to kind of walk you through all the Styles and try to figure out which ones are the best or which ones are worth the effort so first up we have Jim Beam this is Kentucky Straight Bourbon and this comes in around $20 so I would consider this kind of like the Baseline when we talk about bourbon this is a brand that everybody knows and somewhat familiar with the world of whiskey is wide and vast so the over altering that category is whiskey and the subcategory of whiskey is bourbon whiskey is actually basically a distilling of grain so we're making alcohol from grain wheat corn barley and Rye that's the distilling base for bourbon it actually has to have at least 51% corn and it has to be aged in newred Oak barrels so here it actually says straight Kentucky bourbon there is a legal requirement in order to be able to put that on the bottle it has to be made in Kentucky and the straight part means that it needs to be aged at least 2 years in Barrel in Kentucky also the requirement is there's no additives no coloring or any kind of adulterating of the spirit basically you make the spirit and then you age it in a barrel Bourbon can be made anywhere and the the United States but there's something special about Kentucky having a great water source there that's enriched with lime imparts the minerality that you get in the spirit also a sense of Purity to it as well so we're going to go ahead and open this now this is one of my favorite tasting glasses comes with a little Hollow stem here so kind of the perfect portion but what's really great is that you can turn the glass on its side and then basically you're rolling the glass back and forth like this and what this is doing is basically coating the sides of the glass so it's opening up the airom mats so you can really get a a great sniff wow this smells like my dorm room a little bit of honey I would say a little bit of Sandalwood a lightly scented wood a little bit of dried apricot stone fruit sorry I was reminiscing there sorry just bringing me back to car keys missing all kind of wallet missing and obviously there's some heat that you get but it's not like overpowering it kind of dissipates a little bit of like Cherry apricot like the smell of Oak but like taste it's expressing itself in vanilla right so there's lots of vanilla maybe a tad bit of cinnamon but somewhat fruit for straight Kentucky bourbon it has to be aged in new char oak barrels this is where the flavoring is coming from this is where the color comes from and it's a big part of the aging process you can't add any flavoring agents or anything like that and so Oak barrels are imperative to what bourbon is cinnamon vanilla those all come from the oils within the Oak Barrel when we talk about bourbon it has to be at least 51% corn and most whiskies in this category are probably somewhere between 70 to 80% corn so to me corn gives it kind of this richness and this this round to it and a sweetness to it this was a sip of nostalgia for me I think this is great are there better whiskies out there yes but I think at this price point for anybody who wants to taste American bourbon I think this is apropo all right so we have Buffalo Trace this is white dog Mash number one and this is at $16 technically this is not bourbon but I think this is an interesting way to be able to understand what bourbon become and so this is not bourbon this is the raw distilling this is what the whiskey or the bourbon would look like once it comes out of the Ste you see it's clear it looks like water in order for it to be Kentucky Straight Bourbon it has to spend at least 2 years in Oak and so that time in oak or any extended time in Oak is going to impart color but also know that that it is imparting some type of flavor and this is a great exercise and a cool way to like kind of explain or experience what aging oak imparts on the whiskey this is at 125 proof after it goes into barrel and ages there'll be some type of dilution process that goes in and by adding water and diluting it it changes the nuances and the structure and the experience that you have with the whiskey okay I've smell that smell before you know someone says oh it smells neutral the only way that I can explain is that it smells like ever like that's like that's kind of my thing it smells like moonshine or what you would say but it's none of those things that really Define bourbon smells buttery right there's like um like movie popcorn butter oh god oh woo um yeah on Entry that's um that's definitely acquired taste you get like the viscosity and some of the texture that you would would get in in Bourbon but like you don't get there's no spice there's no you know it's like it's like unseasoned chicken right you know you know what I'm saying folks you got to season your chicken there's no Char or toastiness or anything that comes with that there's fruit but really on the back end there's no spice there's no cinnamon it's really missing vanilla it's missing the toastiness that you get from that can you taste more of the mash can you taste more of the Grain and you can and there's a sweetness to it a slight thing that is from the corn the spiciness you get from the Rye and then that kind of like that saltiness and salinity you get from The Barley this is not something that I would want to drink on an everyday basis I can't imagine that this is something that people sip on but it could be but I think for educational purposes you know this was the right fit to understand bourbon better as to understand all of his different processes so next up we have Evan Williams this bottled and bond this is Kentucky Straight Bourbon whiskey and this comes in at about $21 I think it started in somewhere like 1897 and it is a set of regulations in order to be called bottled in bonds so bottled and bond has to be produced so made within a calendar year it has to be from one Distillery and it has to be at 100 proof I guess the biggest stipulation that it has to be aged at least 4 years in a bonded government Warehouse so hence the term bottled in bond there's the number on the front here that identifies the government Bonded Warehouse that it's in and I think this law came about just like I think it was somewhat of the Wild Wild West uh and this was to kind of reain a lot of this stuff in to make sure that the consumer actually was getting a consistent product 1897 that was very very long time ago then it meant more than it does kind of now I smell lots of caramel honey vanilla extract it's just not hints of it floating around it's pretty strong it definitely smells sweeter like it smells confectionary less fruit it's more kind of woodsy and less spice so it's just kind of caramel and wood it almost kind of has like a slight like nutty taste to it so Citrus nutty is something happen now it smells celery you know the nuttiness can also come from you know Barrel is is porous right and so it allows oxygen to come in there's evaporation and I think sometimes you get a little bit of nuttiness from that look at this versus the gy beam this is has like deeper rich flavors you can see it in the color there is a little bit of a wallup with this you know this is at 100 proof but it's kind of evenly balanced with the texture of the whiskey but it is definitely a step up and you can taste it right away at this price point I think this is like pretty amazing so next up we have Redemption and this is called highr Bourbon and this comes in around $31 on the label it has a mash bill so a mash bill is basically like your recipe the ingredients so the ingredient list and it breaks down the percentages of what type of grains that you're using and why it's called high Rye bourbon is that that there's a higher percentage of Rye than most right 36% Rye is quite a bit and I would probably say anywhere from you know 10 to 20% is what you would normally see and and that might be a little bit on the high side Rye is going to impart a lot of spiciness and kind of textures and layers to this Bourbon and not to be confused with the other category of whiskey there's a category whiskey called rye and then than that it has to be at least 51% Rye in order for it to be called rye whiskey this is not quite that this is still considered bourbon because it's over 51% corn and this is from Indiana like I said bourbon can be from anywhere in America not just Kentucky it just smells a lot more mellow it's not as strong jumping out of the glass as other Bourbons it feels integrated it's not just like a lot of Oak jumping out of the out of the glass oddly enough it kind of smells like bananas and then has like a peach kind of undertone to it you can definitely taste the Rye it's so prevalent it makes the bourbon taste different it slightly tastes a little bit more medicinal in a way there's not a lot of fruit flavors here it's like a really woodsy so less fruit more wood more spice you can see why this is a style cuz it's totally different than other Bourbons but this is really fun to drink why wouldn't you just get a rye whiskey but if you look at 36% Rye to add another 20% changes this whole composition of what this tastes like and drinks like and I think it's just another style of bourbon that's just not kind of like in your face and has a little bit more nuance to it with the spiciness all right so next up we have maker mark this is cast strength Kentucky Street Bourbon and it comes in around $47 cast strength is also referred to as Barrel proof whatever the proof of straight from the cast straight into the bottle what you don't hear a lot of is dilution in its simplest terms when we talk about dilution it's very simple we're just adding water straight whiskey is a lot to handle it's powerful it's very alcoholic so when it's time to bottle the whiskey we take it straight from the barrel and we go through adding water to it and diluting it from cast string to whatever your desired strength is and then it's bottle just even you look at the bottle here this comes in at 110 this is just the proof that it was straight from the cast straight to the bottle this is so funny like this business is pretty litigious they have a trademark on this wax you know even at a higher proof it seems really mellow it's not jumping out of the glass it just not over medicinal or alcohol doesn't seem to burn lots of caramel minerality and um and kind of dried fruit so in the back in there you're getting like sandal wood there's a little bit of heat and then there's just vanilla peaches stone fruit so when I say heat um we're just talking about alcohol can you really taste it and how alcohol at a higher levels how it's expressed is kind of the hotness like you feel like a fire breathing dragon there's like so much heat in your mouth that you're got to go you know kind of thing like that that's kind of the experience that I'm getting you can definitely taste that it's much more alcohol in it but it's not really expressed on the nose and it's really not on Entry it's on the back pallette that is a desired thing that's something that I like if we were taking like this and putting Ice Cube or putting drops of water your technically diluting it to your taste and some people like might think that's improper or whatever you know it's kind of like hey like I want to have it the way that the chef intended it to be I think it's great and serves its purpose at this price point I think that there's probably a lot more interesting things out there than this but I think a great example of cast strength is this so what we have here is full roses this is small batch Kentucky Straight Bourbon and this comes in around $39 so how big is a batch and that really depends on on a Distillery there's no technical or legal definition of of small batch and what it might mean small batch is kind of really a marketing term it's not a single barrel it might be three or four barrels it might be a couple hundred barrels it might be several hundred barrels small batch equates to craftsmanship small batch means that a smaller group of people can actually touch it within something like a big distill to call something small batch inside of there gives a little bit more creativity it gives them the chance to make something different and uniquely different than what they produce every day but anybody can put that on their label and so you really have to distill it down to the producer and what it means to them I want to dive into this sucker I haven't had this in a while color looks crazy feels really bright not dark caramel salted caramel in a way tastes pretty bright fresh dried fruit berries like it's like it almost like a red berry like a black berry kind of taste to it there's a bit of spiciness to it not like like in Rye but kind of like an all spice kind of flavor to it this caramel tastes salty um starting to salivate a little bit a little bit more fragrant too it's like they can put in the soap or something like that so when we say bright I use it in a term of like um might me say jumping out of the glass but like it there's a freshness to it a liveliness to it you know some people say acid could be bright like I guess the big question is does it taste small batch and that's a very hard question to ask when I talk about the brightness of some of the right red berry fruit those things seem to be a little bit more nuanced those weren't qualities and things that I found in other ones small bash doesn't equate to Quality but like I think like there's quality in this bottle next up we have Basil Hayden this is red wine cast finished Kentucky Street bourbon this is also known as small batch and this is 6 $5 so you're probably thinking what is finishing and it's basically how you finish aging Your Whiskey what kind of Oak barrels you're putting it in does it have any flavor and what you see as a prime example here is taking barrels that have been used in a different industry and using those to finish your whiskey in and so here they're using red wine barrels red Wine's been stored in a barrel for a year 5 years whatever it is the barrel has picked up some of the flavoring from that so if you see the inside of a red wine barrel it's red the thought is is that that imparts flavoring and new Nuance to the spirit it says that they're using California red wine barrels when you think about California wine because of the heat it is right it's really robust and I think in Parts quite a bit of flavor that's absorbed by the oak it's so funny I'm always amazed by you know all the packaging that you find in the spirits industry but what really matters is like what's inside here you look at the color and it's kind of a color that we kind of hadn't really seen this comes from the coloring inside of the barrels wow I mean you're not joking like right off the bat there's there's fruit cherries vanilla I know it sounds weird but it actually smells like is is like the Juran lotion I haven't tasted anything like this in some weird way it tastes old there's a component and and something an angle here that's different than any of the whiskies that we've had today finishing matters that's a way to be distinctive and stand out in the crowd there's a lot to offer just within the bourbon category and try to figure out your style like this may not be the style for somebody who's a purist I'm a fan of this this is interesting I didn't I didn't think that I would be and I'm sure there's a lot of people out there like you guys who think of course the Wine Guy would like that but like no it was just it just offered a different expression I want to taste different things at different times and I want to be able to you know switch it up every now and then all right so next up we have Weller this is weed it Bourbon and this comes in at $90 so this is called a weed it bourbon we talked about that it had to be at least 51% corn in the Grain in the mash bill in order for it to be called Bourbon and then the highest percentage after that is wheat they state that they replac the Rye with wheat what does wheat add to me it always made it a little sweeter made it like smell like fermentation it felt like bre kind of bready in a way you look at this and you're like wow this $90 like I last time I checked wheat was was cheap well or comes with cult status you know very hard to find this is a a real commodity here in New York I was in Indiana and I bought a double siiz bottle of this for $55 somewhere closer to Kentucky where it's made you get it at a more digestible price there is kind of a bready kind of like a Brio thing like like champagne thing that I'm picking up on the nose there's hay there's a fruity element to it there's a floral element to it yeah that's distinct it's actually softer and and more palatable it is much smoother and softer than other Bourbons that are corn heavy or Ry heavy when I say soft it's another word of saying palatable and maybe even saying smooth it's just like it's just it's not harsh there's definitely a distinction between this and non- weeded Bourbons right it brings this Elegance to it that that you really don't get in and and bourbon at the lower end levels you have to go higher in and age longer you're getting like you know this kind of great quality to it it's it's something special all right so we have Widow Jane Lucky 13 straight bourbon whiskey and it's $129 this is aged for 13 years so I would say this is extra extra age extra long age uh whiskey whiskey and Spirits don't age in the bottle when you put wine into a bottle it still ages and still matures in the bottle this is not 13 years that it was in the bottle it was 13 years that it was in cast and then they bottled kind of bright kind of overly Oak kind of thing that kind of dissipates and the karma seems to be less there is a transformation of you know kind of bright and fresh to this kind of well polished Nuance layered and layered layered spirit this is actually from Brooklyn you I guess the running joke is everything in Brooklyn is expensive what makes it distinct and it's it's water source and they talk a lot about where they get their water source that is high content in lime Kentucky is one thing but Brooklyn is a different thing and that also adds a different dimension into the whiskey that you're tasting anytime that anybody's talking about hand assemble handmade them touching it that's definitely a level of craftsmanship and quality but also means it means a little CH ch- Ching as well at least like there's artists and there's still people making in Brooklyn I get that part of [Music] it wow there's a minerality to it there's kind of a wet stone it's a fruit element say cherries maybe rain a cherries wow you know it's interesting it definitely isn't Kentucky bourbon those had had like a a thread an underlying thread that kind of ran through all of them this is um this is really mineral dri and as a whiskey ages they kind of transition into like being more dried and being more oxidative in some ways and you heard that term the angel share there's evaporation that's constantly going on also there's oxygen circulating in those barrels and for 13 years the fresh fruit flavors turn to more like kind of nutty oxidative kind of flavors $129 is it worth it you know to each his own what I would say is that like I know the business and so you respected business is 13 years old somebody has to pay for that it's sat there like this is kind of part for the course for something aged this long and it kind of takes you through the pendulum of what whiskey can be the world is willing to pay for it sorry so moving along we have Elijah Craig this is the 18-year-old single barrel and this is Kentucky Straight Bourbon whiskey and this comes in at a whopping $199 $199 that's a pair of Jordans right can we get a pair of Jordans for two $200 now Single Barrel actually means Single Barrel this actually comes from one Single Barrel in their Rick house most whiskey is a blended whiskey in order to make your favorite whiskey that's out there there's thousands of barrels hundreds of barrels all in a room the key and the process of all of that is blending it all together but within that each Barrel is different depending on its positioning in the Rick house so if it's high or low second floor third floor it's all affected by the elements each Barrel has its own characteristic this actually really comes from one single barrel this is 18 years and so there's value on that readily available and things that you can find this kind of like maybe tips the scale right at like 18 I mean just off the nose the fruit is very expressive stewed fruit stone fruit peaches cherries apricot there's vanilla there's spice lots of vanilla caramel older that it gets there's less like fresh fruit components and like vanilla all these things seem to be integrated this is what old whiskey tastes like lots of kind of secondary nose that aren't fruit like that are wood uh that are grass that are hay and there is fruit but like almost like just more on the dry side over the 18-year aging process like there's things that are lost they evolved into something else talking about Citrus talking about all those things that are fresh and here like over that time it just evolves we don't lose it it morphs into something else and Elijah Craig has always been known for overd delivering at8 years and $199 that's a fair price if not undervalued the things that you're getting from this whiskey some people would pay three times the amount and half and and have there's so much more whiskey offerings north of this that it would make your head spin and that's why I say at $199 I I think that's a fair price for this the word bourbon is a category that we know but within that there are subcategories and styles and many different things that I think that will really help you becoming more of an expert in your own taste I went to college in Oklahoma in Oklahoma City I worked at Red Lobster and I had a a friend of mine who was a waiter who was moonlighted as a waiter but was a bookie and all we all we would drink was Willer Monday nights were payout nights right um and we would go out I should have taken that game it was like uh Indiana the Pacers versus the Bulls game six Bulls favored by one and my rent was due and I didn't take the game and now you got nothing I have nothing I have nothing

Channel: Bon Appétit

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Keywords: american bourbon whiskey, andré hueston mack, best affordable bourbon, best bourbon in the world, best bourbon whiskey, best expensive bourbon, bon app, bon appetit, bon appétit, bourbon for beginners, bourbon review, bourbon tasting, bourbon vs whiskey, bourbon whiskey review, cheap bourbon whiskey, different types of bourbon, food, how to drink bourbon, professional sommelier, sommelier tasting, what is bourbon whiskey, what makes bourbon bourbon, world of wine

Id: 2KICE2g8XAA

Length: 19min 59sec (1199 seconds)

Published: Wed May 08 2024