Yo Boozehounds,
So I recently opened my bottles of Eagle Rare 17 and George T. Stagg from the legendary BTAC and if you saw my post on my Mortal Spirits Kombat tournament entry for them, you know that I was slightly disappointed finding them a bit unbalanced in the heat department and rough hewn, lacking the smoothness of the Jefferson’s Presidents Select. I respect them but am not totally in love with them.
So I am at an LCBO tasting bar last night and I notice they rotated out the spirits bottles and have the infamous Maker’s Mark and W.L. Weller 12 year old. The Weller 12 year old was smooth and sweet with hints of butterscotch and vanilla and cream – more what I was expecting the Eagle Rare 17 to taste like, to be honest. This raised my eybrows a bit and then on a lark I decided the Maker’s Mark. OK, yes, it’s a bit low-end for bourbon. Aged just 6 years, a bit simple, not the most complex by any means but the sweet cream and butterscotch flavors were there as well.
Now I was a touch confused. Both of these were more like what I expected good bourbon to taste like and were surprisingly close to the Jefferson’s. So why weren’t my BTAC bottles as good? Then I noticed one single key word on the W.L. Weller front label that explained everything: wheated.
So I rushed back home and did a Google on the Interwebby thingy and found out that wheat in a bourbon will give it a softer, rounder and sweeter flavor whereas rye will give it higher heat, spice and a coarser texture. Ruh-roh!
One last piece of interwebby research confirmed it for me – the Jeffersons is wheated as well. D’oh! There’s the issue right there! There’s nothing wrong or unbalanced with the Eagle Rare 17 and George T. Stagg – that “unbalanced” heat and “rough hewn” texture I’m detecting is due to the fact that they are ryed bourbons and therefore have higher spice and heat to them! They’re supposed to taste like that! I retasted a small sample of each bottle again and realized it’s definitely the rye that’s throwing me off.
Now it all makes sense. As everyone knows from my posts, I lean towards sweeter wines so of course I favor the softer and sweeter taste of a wheated bourbon. It’s not the BTAC bourbons that are unbalanced, but rather my palate. I was so caught up in the thrill of the chase in going after the Eagle Rare 17 and George T. Stagg that I didn’t have the opportunity to check if they were in fact the right bourbons for me! Although to be fair, given their rarity, it’s impossible to find out beforehand.
Well, that was an expensive $200 lesson to learn the difference between rye and wheated bourbons and which one I like better. The good news is, the W.L. Weller is already here at the LCBO in Ontario and the William Larue Weller is coming in July. Hell, I might even pick up some Maker’s 46 as well.
So which do you prefer? Obviously I lean towards the wheated bourbons. Incidentally, my research also shows that the legendary Pappy Van Winkle’s is a wheated bourbon as well, so I can only dream of how good the 21 year old tastes.