Last Night's Tipple

Ben evidently decided that the bottle of Old Forester 86 that he bought and hated was just too vile to remain in his presence any longer, so he brought it with him to Houston this weekend and unloaded it on me. He also gave me a barely-tasted bottle of 1792 Ridgemont Reserve, which he also thinks is execrable. I happen to love that Bourbon, so Ben's taste in spirits is already somewhat suspect in my book. I wanted to determine if he is fully or only partially cracked, though, and so I had a pour of the Old Forester 86.

It's very interesting on the nose: I pick up cocoa, black walnuts, and mushrooms; and the fact that I do is unusual. I'm not one of those tasters who can smell and taste every food product under the sun in a glass of wine or whisk(e)y. Most of what I detect are the elements that hit me over the head. Atomic Fireballs in a rye-heavy Bourbon is about as exotic as I tend to get. In any event, while I could smell cocoa, black walnuts, and mushrooms in the Old Forester, they were muted. It reminded me of a Canadian Whisky in that respect. On the palate, it was a bit green-tasting and thin. I didn't think that it was the best Bourbon that I've ever tasted, but it certainly isn't vile. I think that 100 proof version would be better. Ben is only three quarters cracked.

I'm Sorry, Ben

Ben writes:

To add further confusion to the "What Should Ben Drink" topic, I finished a bottle of Weller 12 sometime last week, and on your recommendation, I replaced it with Old Forrester.

Sigh. OF is really harsh and unpleasant.

Sigh indeed. It's becoming increasingly obvious that I haven't a clue about the attributes in a Bourbon that will appeal to Ben. More than that, I should never have recommended Old Forester at all. The only OF expression that I've had is the 2003 Birthday Bourbon; and if I've learned anything from trying many different varieties of Bourbon, it's that different Bourbons made from the same mashbill in the same distillery and aged in the same types of barrels in the same warehouses can taste radically different. The different Birthday Bourbons are intentionally different from one another. It shouldn't be any surprise that they all differ from the OF regular bottlings. More than that, it would not be at all surprising if the two different OF regular bottlings (the 86 proof and the 100 proof) differed in character from one another. It's not necessarily the case that Brown-Forman bottles them like Beam bottles the three different proofs of Old Grand-Dad: dumping a number of barrels, diluting to 114 proof, bottling, diluting to 100 proof, bottling, diluting to 86 proof, and bottling. Brown-Forman may actually be trying for different things with the 86 and the 100 proof expressions of Old Forester.

So the question is, Ben, did you try the 86 or the 100?

Last Night's Tipple

Another pour of Old Forester Birthday Bourbon, released every year in honor of the birthday of the creator of Old Forester Bourbon and one of the founders of the Brown-Forman company, George Garvin Brown. I continue to be impressed with its quality, and I think that it's a good value even at the $31 a fifth that it costs. It's interesting, though (and I can't really take any credit for thinking of this -- the point was made originally by someone else), that Birthday Bourbon would have offended Brown's sensibilities. He was all about consistency. The goal was for every bottle of Old Forester to taste like every other bottle of Old Forester. That was the reason that he disliked the Bottled in Bond Act: the act required that bonded Bourbon be distilled at a single distillery in a single season. Brown didn't think that that requirement allowed him enough flexibility in blending to ensure the consistency that he valued so highly. Birthday Bourbons are released yearly in small batches, and the goal of Brown-Forman's master distiller is to make each one different. George Garvin Brown would not have approved, but I do.

Last Night's Tipple

Know what happened on September 2? Yes, yes, we all know that it was the second day of World War II, but that's not what I was going for. It's George Garvin Brown's birthday, and it's also the day that Brown-Forman, the company that he founded and that his family still owns, releases the new batch of Old Forester Birthday Bourbon every year. Given the difficulty in digging Birthday Bourbon up in Houston, I doubt that I'll be able to find the new edition on September 2 or any time close to September 2. Heck, I can't even find the 2006 release. That's okay. The 2005 release is pretty good.

I had another pour of this last night because I remember it having characteristics that might appeal to Ben -- that is, wood and orange aromas flavors that might make it less of a dessert-type Bourbon. And I remembered correctly -- there were oranges and wood on both the nose and the palate. Those aromas burned off after with some time in the glass to reveal dark chocolate and, believe it or not, white pepper. I'd still classify this one as a dessert Bourbon, but it makes me wonder if the regular bottlings of Old Forester might not be Bourbons that Ben would enjoy.

Brown-Forman's main brand, of course, is Jack Daniel's, which is the world's most popular American whiskey. Compared to JD, all of the expressions of Old Forester put together are strictly small potatoes. Heck, Old Forester sales are pretty puny even when compared to noon-mega-brands like Buffalo Trace or Evan Williams. When Brown-Forman wanted to enter the boutique Bourbon category, it restored the old Woodford distillery in Versailles and developed the Woodford Reserve brand. That they would choose to build a brand from scratch rather than expand their existing brand with upscale bottlings (Birthday Bourbon doesn't really qualify because it's not made in quantities sufficient to make it a real nationwide hit) indicates to me that Old Forester had the reputation to make it successful at $25 or $30 a bottle -- even though Woodford Reserve's core is and will probably always be honey barrels of Old Forester. Brown-Forman keeps Old Forester around not because of the sales but out of respect for the founder of their company and the brand that he created.

Last Night's Tipple

Believe it or not, doctors used to prescribe whiskey for medicinal purposes. More than one distillery was able to stay open during Prohibition by making and selling medicinal Bourbon to doctors. It was because of this medicinal market that Old Forester Bourbon came to be. George Garvin Brown and his half-brother, John Thompson Street Brown, were well-aware of the problems with whiskey adulteration that the Bottled In Bond Act was later passed to address. They figured that if they sold Bourbon in sealed glass bottles with a guarantee of authenticity, they would find a ready market amongst the doctors of the country. Because of the expense of bottles before the invention of an automatic bottle-making machine in 1903, it was unlikely that ordinary members of the general public would buy it; but George Garvin Brown must have figured that the medical market was large enough for him to make a good deal of money. Old Forester was first sold in 1870, and it was the first bottled Bourbon. Brown's company, which became Brown-Forman, today not only sells Old Forester Bourbon but also owns Jack Daniel's and Early Times, two of the largest-selling whiskeys in the world.

Brown-Forman releases a limited bottling of specially-selected Bourbon every year in honor of George Garvin Brown's birthday, called, amazingly enough, Old Forester Birthday Bourbon. My bottle was distilled in the fall of 1990 and bottled in 2003 at 89 proof. It's a very robust Bourbon, with powerful aromas of creme brulee and vanilla. Its palate is spicy and full-bodied, with a good dose of candied orange peel. A nice Bourbon, even if the bottle is annoying.