Friday, July 13, 2007

Buffalo Trace Mashbills

Ben comments in my post about Buffalo Trace Bourbon:
Bought a bottle of this a few days ago. Do you know what's in the mashbill? The heat and spice make me think it must have a high proportion of rye.

At any rate, I don't much care for it compared to Knob Creek, but at $15 I certainly wasn't ripped off.
According to what I have read online, Buffalo Trace Distillery has four different mashbills: the rye whiskey mashbill used to make Sazerac Rye; the wheat mashbill used to make wheated Bourbons like WL Weller; the low rye mashbill used to make Bourbons such as Old Charter, Eagle Rare, and Buffalo Trace; and the high rye mashbill used to make Bourbons such as Ancient Age, Elmer T. Lee, and Blantons. See here, although I have seen and cannot now find something more comprehensive before. I don't know the exact proportions of each mashbill, but I have read (from Chuck Cowdery, author of Bourbon Straight: The Uncut and Unfiltered Story of American Whiskey and a noted authority about Bourbon, Rye, and other straight American whiskeys) that Old Charter's mashbill (ie, the Buffalo Trace low rye mashbill, which is also used for Buffalo Trace Bourbon) is more than 80% corn.

I will not address whether Ben's preference for Knob Creek over Buffalo Trace proves that he is a philistine.

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