Heavy and old bourbon jug

As you may or may not know, I became a board member of the Presbyterian Church (USA), last year. They’re based in Louisville, Kentucky, so I get to go there several times per year now. And, up until I went to The Ville several times a year, I hadn’t really explored bourbon much. So, for my first trip, in July of 2010, I decided I needed to try it. I happened upon a great bartender at Proof on Main, which is the hotel restaurant for the 21C Museum Hotel. Good food, great gallery inside the lobby of the hotel, and if you go, you MUST check out the men’s restroom. Even if you’re not a dude, yes, you must check it out. Eric gave me some tastings of some bourbons, and told me why some were his favorite and some were not. Then added a bit of housemade lemonade to them, and also water to some others. So, that was my first experience with bourbon, outside of a small Buffalo Trace tasting as part of the Orange County Bartender’s Cabinet at least a year before.

On that trip, I don’t think I went to any distilleries (as I count back in my head), but I definitely was exposed to some bourbon that I’d never had before. In the past year, I’ve been to 6 distilleries so far, the first was Buffalo Trace, then Woodford Reserve, then then Four Roses, then Heaven Hill and finally the Bulleit Experience and Maker’s Mark this time. I was just informed that Buffalo Trace has a hard-hat tour, and now I want to go revisit that distillery. Next time – in February.

So far, the best two, in my very humble opinion, have been Buffalo Trace and the Bulleit Experience. Buffalo Trace wasn’t as much about the pomp and circumstance of “we are a very fancy distillery!” as some of the others have been. Four Roses was pretty chill, but they truck the liquid out to get bottled elsewhere. Heaven Hill had a giant fire some years ago, so they don’t let anyone near the liquid. Woodford Reserve was interesting, but the tour guide we got was kind of smarmy. The friends I was with had a great tour there the first time, so they were disappointed with this guide. I guess that leaves Maker’s as the 3rd favorite. I learned about the house that is a remake of the exact Samuels house just recently, so that was something I didn’t get while in Kentucky. What kind of bugged me was that Maker’s kept trying to make themselves sound like a craft distiller. Well, if you’re building 25 new warehouses to store the bourbon barrels, over the next ten years, I can’t agree that you’re a craft distiller. And, I like the Maker’s 46, but not really much else. For the price of a 750 ML bottle of Maker’s Mark ($20 in California), I’d rather have a 750 ML bottle of gin. I can get a bottle of Eagle Rare (I believe 12 year) here in Washington for $25, so yes, I’d rather have that. Anyway… on to what I decided to write about today (yes, I’m 3 paragraphs deep already).

In September, I flew to Louisville earlier than I normally do, mostly due to the whole lack of a job thing, and also because I like to stay extra days. This time flying home to Seattle on a Sunday would have cost far too much money, so I flew into Louisville early. Unfortunately my hosts had to work the next day, and my meetings didn’t start till Wednesday, so I had to find another ride to go tour some distilleries. I had previously met Hollis Bulleit, the global brand ambassador for Bulleit Bourbon, in LA and had asked her if they did tours. At the time, they weren’t quite open, but I kept asking her and lo and behold – they were OPEN the last time I asked.

I dragged my friend Scott up from Lexington to go visit The Bulleit Experience with me, and it was quite lovely. We were “subjected” to a tour by Bobby, and he was a great tour guide. Thank you Bobby!! I love the restoration of the old Stitzel-Weller distillery and understand the care that went into the offices. The artifacts that are in the offices are thoughtful and tell the story of Bulleit Bourbon. The Stitzel-Weller distillery was opened on Derby Day in 1935, so it has some history. It’s the closest distillery I’ve been to in all my journeys to Louisville. It’s also pretty close to Churchill Downs, where I’ve never been.

The Bulleit family has been making bourbon for years and years (Hollis’ great-grandfather used to take bourbon from Louisville down to New Orleans and disappeared while on that route many years ago.) but in 1987 Tom Bulleit revived the Bulleit family’s distilling legacy by using the recipe his grandfather used at that time. At this time, there is also Bulleit Rye and it won double gold at the San Francisco Spirits Competition this year. It is darned good. The bourbon is delicious as well, but I think the rye trumps it.

The family story helps to give Bulleit Bourbon & Rye much more of a craft distillery feel and I liked that. It was quite a juxtaposition to go from the Stitzel-Weller distillery to Maker’s Mark. I’m sure knowing Hollis helped as well. We also got to see barrels being rolled out of the warehouses, which was pretty awesome, since it happens so rarely.

Maker’s Mark was close to 2 hours away from Louisville, but it was a beautiful drive. Many thanks to Scott for driving. The Maker’s Mark tour is much more of a show, and much less of a craft distillery. They do show you the “beers (step 1)” (and step 2 and step 3) and the liquids, but they do quite a volume. One of my favorite things about Maker’s is that Mrs Samuels decided to recreate the design, to make it more appealing to women – but not to turn men off from the bourbon. But, the flavor went from “firewater,” to something more along the lines of bourbon from Maker’s Mark today. Additionally, she was the one who thought up the mark that signifies Maker’s Mark now – the wax. On the tour you walk the line to see where they dip the bottles after they’ve been filled and sealed. Then the bottles are boxed up to get shipped out.

The tour guide said that Maker’s Mark is a craft distillery, which I pretty much scoff at, because in the next breath she said that they were building another 25 warehouses in the next 10 years. So, I disagree. I do like the fact that the wheat comes from within 25 miles of the distillery, and that the corn is non-GMO corn from Indiana.

One thing is that Maker’s does have their own reservoir of water, and as an employee of Maker’s Mark apparently if you are caught around the reservoir, it will be your last day working there. Something to know, if you decide to go get a job there.

At the end of the Maker’s Mark tour we got to taste Maker’s 46, regular Maker’s and we had the opportunity to taste their white dog. I just tried the regular and 46. I think 46 is quite lovely.

Of the tastes I got today, I’d say that my favorite is the Bulleit Rye. I didn’t expect to like it, in all honesty. I pretty much thought I’d not like it as much as the bourbon – but it was quite smooth and well-rounded.

When I get back from Thailand, I’m going to have to go purchase some. Someone recently mentioned on twitter how good fig-infused Rittenhouse Rye was. I might try that with Bulleit Rye.

Or else get a local Seattle bartender to make it for me. Yeah, that one.

Or rather: Bartenders on Fire – a competition.

On Halloween, there was a competition sponsored by Novo Fogo Cachaça at Vito’s in Seattle. It pitched 3 local Seattle bartenders against 3 greater Washington bartenders. It was Keith Waldbauer (Liberty), Jim Romdall (Vessel) and Jay Kuehner (Sambar) for the Seattle All-Stars versus Chris Keil (1022 South in Tacoma), Dave Shenaut (Dave lives in Vancouver, bartends in PDX at Rum Club) and Gabe Pimentel (jimgermanbar in Waitsburg – which is apparently East of Yakima) as the Washington Challengers. I’d met all the Seattle bartenders and Dave Shenaut before, but I hadn’t ever met Chris or Gabe in person. I qualify the in person part because I have known Chris on the tvittah for quite a while.

What the challenge entailed was 3 secret ingredients and either Novo Fogo Silver or Gold Cachaça – or potentially both! The ingredients could be used pretty much any way at all. The winner of the whole competition would be the recipient of a stay at the Willows Inn on Lummi Island. The chef at the Inn’s restaurant was listed in The New York Times’ 10 Restaurants Worth a Plane Ride article from earlier this year. It was a great article, and I do want to go. I have about as much of a chance to go as I do going to the moon right now, though.

Dragos Axinte, one of the founders of Novo Fogo Cachaça Organico, unveiled the secret ingredients – each of which were somehow related to where the sugar cane for the cachaça came from – were Corn (grilled, cooked or creamed corn), Coffee (beans, ground or could be made into espresso or coffee) and Hops (fresh or dried). The teams got together and figured out who would deal with each ingredient and it was game on.

Jim and Chris used fresh hops – both lit them on fire (as per the name of the event) and made two very different drinks. Jim’s was citrus-based and Chris made a riff on a Manhattan, I believe. The judges chose Jim’s drink, which meant that we, the audience, got to try it. I would have liked to try Chris’ drink, but it was not meant to be. I’ll have to go to Tacoma to visit Chris and his wife (it was their 10th anniversary on Halloween – after I return from Thailand.

Jay and Dave chose the corn (or were elected to use the corn, not sure which), where Dave chose the creamed version, and Jay the cooked version (he ended up adding some creamed corn at the very end). Dave made his entire drink while in costume, except he took the crazy gloves off in the end. His drink was a very interesting flavor that a friend said tasted like Jaegermeister or Fernet. I didn’t quite get that, but I understood where she was coming from. Jay’s drink used muddled corn and a variety of other items, topped by a Belgian ale. Dave won this round, so we didn’t get to try Jay’s drink.

For the final round, Keith and Gabe were up against coffee in a drink. Which is fairly normal, perhaps not the coffee beans, but coffee is in drinks more often than any of the other items. Keith did a brief infusion with the beans and the aged cachaça, separated the beans from the cachaça and then ground the beans up with a muddler. I believe Gabe did a similar infusion, but in the end Keith won the final round. With Keith’s win, the audience tried his drink and voted his the overall winner of the night. I think it may have been the most approachable drink of the three, but of course I would have liked to try all of them. Who wouldn’t have liked to try drinks from 6 of the best bartenders in Washington?

If you aren’t one of those who wanted to try them all, not sure we should be friends…

Keith won the overall competition, and the 206 reigned. I might have to journey off the interstate when I go to visit my grandmother next time – after all, Waitsburg is between Yakima and the Tri-Cities!