Bourbon Whiskey


Barrel 309, Rick 112, Warehouse H, Dumped June 12th

In 1897 a Frankfort distiller talked Congress into stamping a federal guarantee onto whiskey. In 1933 a distillery president put up a warehouse in sheet metal because he needed the space fast, and changed the way the bourbon inside it aged. In 1984 a master distiller a year from retiring pulled one barrel out of that same building and bottled it by itself. Four Roses stencils a four-letter recipe code onto every barrel head it fills. Wild Turkey still prints an age on the label. Four bottles this week, all of them Kentucky, and everything we're about to tell you is written somewhere on the glass.

On top of a hill outside Lawrenceburg sit rickhouses that have been standing since the 1890s. Tin-clad, wooden, drafty on purpose. That's where the Wild Turkey 101 8-Year-Old spent its eight years, and eight is what the label says. Federal law would let them print two. They've never gone below five. Jimmy Russell hand-picks a small batch of barrels and bottles the result at 101 proof. The water comes out of the Kentucky River already filtered through limestone, which strips the iron out. Every barrel takes a No. 4 alligator char, the deepest grade made, and goes in at a lower proof than most houses use — so less water comes back at bottling. At $44.99 that buys vanilla, clove, toffee and lemon zest, closing long on brown sugar and allspice.

Before he made whiskey, E.H. Taylor made loans. He financed distilleries as a banker, learned the trade from the money side, then bought a small Leestown plant in 1869 and named it O.F.C. Three years later he spent over $70,000 rebuilding it — copper fermentation tanks, column stills, and a steam heating system Buffalo Trace still runs in its barrel warehouses. Then he took his standards to Congress and pushed the Bottled-in-Bond Act through in 1897. He also served sixteen years as mayor of Frankfort. The Colonel E.H. Taylor, Jr. Small Batch is 100 proof, Mash Bill No. 1, aged in the century-old warehouses he built. Caramel corn and butterscotch up front, licorice underneath, pepper and tobacco on the close. It took Double Gold at Whiskies of the World in 2024 and sits on the shelf at $69.99.

June 12th, 2026. That's the day they emptied barrel 309 off rick 112, and it's written on the bottle. Warehouse H went up in metal because Albert Blanton needed storage in a hurry after repeal in 1933. Thin walls let Kentucky weather straight through, and the bourbon inside worked against the oak at a steadier rate. Blanton liked what that did and started pulling honey barrels from the center of it for guests. In 1984 Elmer T. Lee — whom Blanton had once turned away with "Son, we're not hiring any hands today" — bottled one of those barrels alone and named it for him. First single barrel bourbon ever sold. Blanton's Original Single Barrel is 93 proof, creamy vanilla and butterscotch over clove and nutmeg. $99.99, and we keep it in the shop only.

Every other major distillery in Kentucky stacks its barrels high. Four Roses builds flat. Their single-story rack houses vary about 8°F from the top rack to the bottom, where a multi-level rickhouse can swing thirty. This barrel sat in one of them for nine years and two months. The code on the Four Roses Single Barrel Private Collection OESO reads letter by letter. O for the distillery. E for the mashbill of 75% corn and 20% rye. S for straight whiskey. O for the yeast the house files under rich fruit. Recipe eight of ten. The face label names the cask: Warehouse SN, Barrel No. 38-1U. It went in at 120 proof, under the legal ceiling of 125, and came out at 52.9%, uncut. It's $99.99, and it was picked for New York State — which means it's here and nowhere else in the country.