Last Night's Tipple

The Buffalo Trace Distillery currently owns the Old Charter brand, and Old Charter comes in four expressions: 8, 10, 12, and 13 years old, the last also called Proprietor's Reserve. The 12 year old presents something of a problem for Buffalo Trace. It's old whiskey, and old whiskey is in short supply these days; but it's priced as a middle-shelf Bourbon at just a bit more than $20 per fifth. Every drop of it that they sell at a non-premium price is a drop less that they could put into one of their premium brands that sell for substantially more than $20 a fifth. Not only that, but there's also a bit of brand confusion going on here. The 13 year old Proprietor's Reserve is packaged, marketed, and sold as a premium product, and it's only a year older than the 12 year old, which is not. Now that premium, aged Bourbon is again booming, the 12 year old bottling of Old Charter makes very little sense for Buffalo Trace to continue. And so they're probably not going to do it. Alas. It's good Bourbon at a good price, and I've never seen the Proprietor's Reserve bottling down here.

Anyway, Old Charter is made from Buffalo Trace's high-corn, low-rye mashbill. And, in fact, there is no rye to be detected anywhere in the 12 year old. With some time in the glass, it develops some rich, dark caramel aromas, but the palate is still kind of woody. This latter fact makes me wonder if Ben might not find it noxious, since he seems to like Bourbons like Knob Creek that are predominantly woody. I wouldn't go so far as to suggest that he buy a bottle because I don't want a repeat of the swearing, spitting tirade that I got when he bought a bottle of 1792 Ridgemont Reserve, but he might try to bum some off of some sucker.