Stellum Black Rye

February 3, 2022 Eric Burke

Going to be a short one tonight, I’m actually not here. Well, I’m not here when you are reading this…probably. This time travel thing is confusing sometimes. Anyway, at the time I would normally be writing this, I will be bringing supper to my Grandmother who I don’t get to visit very often. But since I’ve been missing a lot of time lately due to family and illness, I wanted to bang something out early.

Tonight we are looking at the last entry in the Stellum lineup that I have access to. We haven’t covered a single-barrel rye, but I think this should cover the brand for a while. Here is what the producer has to say about the brand on their website:

Stellum Black Rye is an evolution of the Stellum Rye flavor profile. Think of it as Stellum Rye in high-def. We used a meticulous blending approach to layer older reserve barrels into the original Stellum Rye blend. The result is a surprisingly mellow cask-strength rye whiskey combining iconic rye spice with a deep complexity that reveals new facets with every sip.

I was impressed, but “priced out” on the Black Bourbon, let’s see how the Black Rye does.

Stellum Black Rye

Purchase Info: $93.99 for a 750 mL bottle at Viking Liquor Barrel, Prior Lake, MN

Price per Drink (50 mL): $6.27

Details: Distilled in Indiana, Kentucky, and Tennessee. 57.13% ABV.

Nose: Cedar, cola, ginger, clove, and herbal mint.

Mouth: Very warm in the mouth. Notes of cedar, honey, mint, and cinnamon.

Finish: Warm and dry. Medium to long. Notes of oak, cedar, mint, cola, and cinnamon candies.

A hand-drawn smile to show I like this one.

Thoughts: Another very tasty offering from the folks at Stellum. I probably won't be spending the money on this again. Mostly because I really liked how the standard Stellum rye prominently featured the MGP-Style 95% Rye flavor profile. This is more of a balance of the various flavor profiles along with the addition of mature oak notes. Like I said, very tasty. I just happen to like the more inexpensive offering better.

For once, my bank account will be happy with my taste buds.

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Peerless Straight Rye Whiskey (24 months old)

December 9, 2021 Eric Burke

Sometimes things just cost too dang much for me. Not for everyone. I understand that there are people out there who will drop $100 on a bottle of whiskey with little to no hesitation. Being a freelance designer and a dog sitter, I am not one of those people. However, I will splurge if the whiskey is worth it.

When Peerless first came to Minnesota, I received a note from a reader letting me know that they’d be trying it out and would be reporting back to me. They then reported back that they were very disappointed with the purchase and expected more from a whiskey that cost as much as this one did. For that reason, I never took a look at the brand.

Now when I travel, I tend to purchase a bottle for the hotel, apartment, campsite, etc. Usually I’m there long enough that I’ll grab a full sized one (or two…). However, if I run out, I might take a look at the 200 and 375 ml bottles. And it just so happened that this fall I was doing that while staying in Kentucky. While I was looking I noticed the bottle of Peerless Rye you see above. I wasn’t going to spend over $100 for a full bottle, but I could probably swing the $29 that Liquor Barn was asking in order to see if we should be giving this juice another look.

Kentucky Peerless Distilling Company is a small distillery in Downtown Louisville (120 N. 10th Street Louisville, KY). It’s across the freeway ramps from the Frazier History Museum and the Louisville Slugger Museum. The distillery is run by father and son team Corky and Carson Taylor, descendants of the original makers of Peerless Whiskey. The distillery was built in 2014 (even regaining the family’s original DSP number) and started distilling the following year. Their first whiskey release was a two year old rye that was released in 2017. Since then they have released older ryes (current photos on their website do not have an age statement) and bourbons in both single barrel and small batch forms. Many of which have garnered awards.

The bottle I happened to pick up is still the 2-year old one. Guessing that people aren’t really looking to spend $30 on a 200 mL bottle too often. But let’s see how it tastes anyway.

Peerless Straight Rye Whiskey

Purchase Info: $28.99 for a 200 mL bottle.

Price per Drink (50 mL): $7.25

Details: Aged 2 years. 54.05% ABV.

Nose: Store-brand cola, wintergreen, cinnamon and brown sugar.

Mouth: Spicy cinnamon and cool wintergreen lead off to be followed by notes of store-brand cola and brown sugar.

Finish: Medium to long and warm on the finish. Store-brand cola is the predominant note with the familiar wintergreen supporting it.

Thoughts: I like this, but it is hard to disassociate the juice from the price on this one. Quality-wise, I'd rank this to whiskeys that can be had for $50 to $75. So yeah, it's quite tasty. Unfortunately this sells at my local Total Wine for about $125. Or by my estimation $50 to $75 too high, even including the “craft tax.” I bought this small bottle solely for review purposes. I doubt that I'll be convinced to pay what is being asked for a full bottle. Especially if it is the two-year-old whiskey, like this recently purchased bottle was. I will however, be happy to try out a non-age stated 200 mL when/if that is what my local stores carry.

Jack Daniel's Tennessee Tasters' Selection: Barrel Proof Rye, Spring 2019

December 7, 2021 Eric Burke

So we got our first snow today. First measurable snow that is. Super light and fluffy. As I absolutely hate snow, I protested the hateful white stuff by using a leaf blower to clear the driveway. Much to my neighbor’s amusement. Though I did see him cleaning up with one after I went in the house.

It does help to make a pretty picture though.

In honor of winter officially landing in my Minnesota suburb, I’ve decided that tonight should feature a whiskey that will really warm up the ol’ insides. Tonight’s whiskey is another one of the Tennessee Taster’s Selections that I purchased on my September visit to the Jack Daniel’s Distillery. This time, we are looking at the Barrel Proof Rye whiskey they released in Spring 2019. These bottles are only sold through the Jack Daniel’s Distillery Bottle Shop and select liquor stores in Tennessee. As we discussed the last time we looked at one of these, the Tennessee Tasters’s Selections are limited, experimental releases that take a Jack Daniel’s product and play with it a bit. In this case they took barrels of their Rye whiskey and didn’t add any water to them. And let me tell you, roughly 127° proof will certainly help turn back the winter blues.

Jack Daniel's Tennessee Tasters' Selection: Barrel Proof Rye

Purchase Info: $34.24 for a 375 mL bottle at the White Rabbit Bottle Shop, Jack Daniel’s Distillery, Lynchburg, TN

Price per Drink (50 ML): $4.60

Details: 63.8% ABV. Selection#4. Released Spring 2011. Grain Bill: 70% Rye, 18% Corn, and 12% Malted Barley. Matured in the uppermost levels of barrel house #1-05.

Nose: Chocolate, tobacco, caramel, and allspice.

Mouth: Spicy. Tobacco, clove, cinnamon, ginger, caramel, and chocolate.

Finish: Long and warm. Lingering notes of mint, ginger, and black tea.

Thoughts: Very hot and spicy. I really like this. Even though I haven't tasted everything I brought back from the distillery, I'm thinking this might be my favorite thing I bought that day. It is so good! I bought two 375mL bottles. I wish I'd picked up even more. If you are in southeastern Tennessee, this is worth the detour to the distillery bottle shop.

Chattanooga Whiskey 99 Rye

December 2, 2021 Eric Burke

I really like being some place I haven’t been before. It doesn’t matter if it’s a new place to live or just a new place to visit. I guess I just like updating my internal map with new location information. I like new places so much so that I used to joke that I was pretty much ready to move to a new apartment/house/etc right after I’d figured out the optimum way to drive to the grocery store. And I was only mostly joking. Which makes it a bit odd that I go back to Kentucky at least once per year.

I guess some places are better than novelty. But that doesn’t stop me from tacking on a visit to somewhere new when I go back for a visit. This year I tacked on Chattanooga, TN. It seems like a nice enough area. Though like many places the hand-painted political signs start showing up just about the time you leave town. The house I was staying in was within walking distances of a couple breweries, many bars, and one distillery. And you better believe I made sure to schedule a tour there.

I’d had the two Tennessee High Malt Bourbons from Chattanooga Whiskey before. In fact, I mentioned when I reviewed those bourbons that “if I am in Chattanooga I'll be stopping in for a visit.” And so I did. It’s a nice short tour that ends with a tasting of a few of their whiskies. Including tonight’s.

Chattanooga Whiskey 99 Rye is a rye whiskey made from a mash bill of Malted Rye, Yellow Corn, Caramel Malted Rye, and Chocolate Malted Rye. It is aged in 53 gallon barrels and is bottled unfiltered. The bottle I picked up was a little over 3 years old. Let’s see how it tastes.

Chattanooga Whiskey 99 Rye

Purchase Info: $39.99 for a 750 mL bottle at the Chattanooga Whiskey gift shop, Chattanooga, TN

Price per Drink (50 mL): $2.67

Details: 49.5% ABV. Mash bill: Malted Rye, Yellow Corn, Caramel Malted Rye, and Chocolate Malted Rye. Fermentation: 7 days. Cooperage: 53-gallon charred oak barrels. Unfiltered. Age: 3 years old. Batch size: 6-10 barrels. Batch: 21H13R.

Nose: Cinnamon, cedar boughs, and mint.

Mouth: Spicy cinnamon, cedar, mint, and dry oak.

Finish: Sweet. Like Icy Hot, this is both warm and cool on the finish. Notes of cinnamon, black tea, mint, and Rye malt.

Thoughts: I am on the record as not being a fan of Whiskeys that use malted rye. This whiskey makes me rethink the absoluteness of that position. I really like this! I'm thinking that the addition of rye malts roasted to the caramel and chocolate levels is at least partly the cause of that. This still has the rye malt flavors, but it isn't as sharp and funky as others I've had. It's sweet, savory, spicy, and just really good. So much so that I wish I'd bought two bottles.

Woodford Reserve Rye, Liquor Barrel-MN Selection

September 7, 2021 Eric Burke

IMAGE: A Bottle of Woodford Reserve Rye, sitting on a railing. This bottle was a private selection by Liquor Barrel-MN.

My wife and I have birthdays this week and it has gotten me to thinking: relationships are hard. My wife and I have been married almost 25 years and it still takes work. When people find out how long I’ve been married, they inevitably all ask the same question: “what’s the secret?” And honestly, I used to have a hard time answering it. I’d joke that we were just both too stubborn to walk away when things got tough. And in fact, that is kinda true. We are both competitive by nature and when we were young, neither of us wanted to let the other “win” by being the one to walk away from an argument. Instead we’d fight until we were exhausted and then be forced to talk.

But that isn’t the answer that people are looking for. And it isn’t the real one anyway. After 20+ years, I’ve learned there is a simple answer. And it is twofold. The first part is to actually like each other. The old Boomer joke of “take my wife, please” is more than a bit upsetting to me. When I worked in an office and heard people at lunch saying things like “road trip? no thank you, I could never be around my husband (or wife) that long” I couldn’t understand them. I really like being around my wife. She is my best friend. I’d take an evening with her over any number of nights out with “the guys.”

The second part of the answer is empathy. I don’t cheat, never have, and never will. I can’t imagine the hurt on her face if she found out. Even though I am very competitive, I try to think about what “winning” will cost. When I’m angry, I try very hard to think about how much whatever it is that I’m about to say or do will hurt my friend. And she does the same. And because of that, we’ve both realized that there are some battles that just do not need to be fought.

That of course doesn’t mean we don’t get into arguments. We do. More than either of us would like. But because deep down we really like one another and because of empathy, and trying to see things from the other person’s perspective, we get through them. This really has nothing to do with whiskey, but it has been on my mind this week as I prepare for our first “real” vacation with just each other that we’ve had since before Covid.

So with that out of the way, let’s take a look at tonight’s whiskey. Not too much to say about this one. I was wandering through my local corner liquor store and I noticed that they had a barrel pick of Woodford Reserve Rye. As I’d never run across one of those before, I decided to pick it up. And so here we are.

Woodford Reserve Rye, Liquor Barrel-MN Selection

Purchase Info: $34.99 for a 750 mL bottle at Viking Liquor Barrel in Prior Lake, MN.

Price per Drink (50 mL): $2.33

Details: 45.2% ABV. Selection date: 5-28-21

Nose: Brown sugar, cinnamon, cloves, and herbal mint.

Mouth: Spicy. More tingle than I'd normally expect from Woodford. Follows the nose with brown sugar, honey, molasses, clove, cinnamon, and herbal mint.

Finish: Gentle and on the shorter side of medium. Notes of clove, cinnamon, and herbal mint.

Thoughts: These guys usually do a pretty good job with their barrel picks, but I'm not tasting that much difference here between this and the standard Woodford Rye release. It's good, just nothing to write home about. I like it though. Happy with the pick-up. I’ll probably try a pick by someone else just to see if my store just wanted a bottle that tasted like the standard or if they are all that way and that profile was all they were offered.

Stellum Rye

August 5, 2021 Eric Burke

Sometimes one thing just leads to another, you know? You can wake up in the morning thinking to yourself that you have nothing to do, nowhere to go, and that there is nothing on your calendar. And then you can end the day having spent $450 on a meat grinder and another $120 on whiskey. And that was me last Saturday.

I woke up Saturday morning. Early of course because hungry dogs had me up at 5:30 am. I groaned and tried to convince them to go back to sleep, to no avail. So the only thing to do was see if my wife would make us coffee while I took the pups out to go potty. It has been so dry in Minnesota that I think the only moisture my lawn gets is from the dogs urinating on it. Which probably means that the lawn is done for. But at least the weeds are still green. So there’s that.

As I was cleaning up after the dogs, my wife came out to add something to the ol’ honey-do list. She said, “remember to do some research on a meat grinder today.” Now, as you might expect from someone who does what I’m doing right now, I like to do research on the internet. I find reading reviews, combing through forums, and looking at specs to be fun and enjoyable. And I’ve been smoking a lot of meat lately. Which means I have a freezer full of trimmings. So looking at a meat grinder to turn those trimmings into tasty food was something I was looking forward to.

As I finished my research, I realized that my local Fleet-Farm had the model I was looking for. In-stock and on sale. You know I decided to brave the smoke outside and go get it. And of course, Fleet-Farm is right by a local Municipal Liquor store. It’s a small store, they don’t have everything, but they try to make their selection complement that of the Total Wine up the road by carrying items that Total Wine doesn’t. So I decided that since I was out braving the smoke anyway, it would be a waste of a trip if I didn’t stop in.

And that is where I found tonight’s whiskey. And one of next week’s as well. I picked up the Stellum Rye and the Stellum Bourbon, but I’m going to stretch the content out as much as I can. Stellum is a brand created by the makers of Barrell Bourbon. It is a cask-strength, non-chill filtered blend of Straight whiskeys from Indiana, Kentucky and Tennessee. According to an interview conducted by Fred Minnick with Barrell founder Joe Beatrice, the constituent whiskeys are between four and ten years old. And according to the Stellum website, the rye we are exploring tonight is made mostly of the 95% rye Indiana mashbill with small amounts of more “barley forward rye and choice barrels from both Kentucky and Tennessee.” The suggested retail price is $54.99 and should be available on an ongoing basis in 45 markets across the US.

I am a big fan of MGP’s 95% rye whiskey, especially at cask strength, and while they didn’t confirm that the 95% Rye from Indiana that they used was actually from MGP, I’m just going to go on the assumption that it is. So I was very excited to taste this one. Let’s see how it tastes.

Stellum Rye

Purchase Info: $52.99 for a 750 mL bottle at Lakeville Liquors, Lakeville, MN

Price per Drink (50 mL): $3.53

Details: 58.12% ABV. Distilled in Indiana, Kentucky, and Tennessee.

Nose: Cooked cereals, mint, cinnamon, clove, and maple.

Mouth: Very hot in the mouth. Notes of honey, cherry, mint, cinnamon, and tobacco.

Finish: Spicy and warm. Medium length. Notes of cinnamon, mint, and brown sugar.

Thoughts: I'm really digging this one. As I said, I'm a big fan of the MGP 95/5 Rye recipe and am very glad that they made it the star of this blend. The other parts of the blend work to add sweetness and round off the sharp edges that 95/5 can sometimes come with. Big fan. I really like this one. I highly recommend it if you want a high-proof variation on MGP-style 95% rye.

Michter's US-1 Kentucky Straight Rye

July 22, 2021 Eric Burke

IMAGE: Front Label of Michter’s US-1 Rye. Single Barrel. 42.4% ABV.

As I get older, I occasionally find myself getting nostalgic for days gone by. Sometimes it is for when I was a kid in the early 80s, playing my friend’s Atari 2600. (I mean, Pitfall was awesome and I’d go visit him just to play it.) Sometimes it is for when I was newly married in the late 90s and my kid was young. This past weekend though the nostalgia hit a little closer to the current day. I was in the liquor store picking up a couple of bottles of cocktail whiskey when I noticed a bottle of Michter’s Rye sitting there.

Now when I was first getting into whiskey, Michter’s was one of my go-to Ryes. I was fascinated by the burgeoning craft distilling movement and found their story interesting. Of course, it was just a story. It was a complete fabrication. Instead of being the “oldest distillery in America” or whatever they were claiming back then, they didn’t even have a distillery and had instead appropriated the history of an abandoned trademark. And that left a bad taste in my mouth. Not literally, of course, I still liked their product but I just didn’t want to support it anymore. So yeah, I was nostalgic about when I was naive enough to believe the marketing. Whiskey felt romantic back then.

So I was standing in the store, feeling nostalgic, and decided to go ahead and grab that bottle of Michter’s Rye to use in cocktails for old time’s sake. I mean they have a functioning distillery now and have been distilling for themselves for a few years. And it is pretty silly to hold a grudge for a decade when all they did is tell a fanciful story. I mean Heaven Hill somehow gets away with telling people that Evan Williams was Kentucky’s first distiller and that Elijah Craig both somehow invented charring barrels in a fire that only burned the inside of the barrel and I never gave them too much grief about it.

Plus, maybe I’d been missing out on something all these years. I mean it was my go-to for a reason, right?

Michter's US-1 Kentucky Straight Rye Whiskey

Purchase Info: $39.99 for a 750 mL bottle at Total Wine, Roseville, MN

Price per Drink (50mL): $2.67

Details: 42.4% ABV. Single Barrel #: 21A227

Nose: Wintergreen, cooked oatmeal, caramel.

Mouth: Thin mouthfeel. Spicy with cinnamon, wintergreen, and caramel.

Finish: Medium length and warmth. Lingering mint, cinnamon, caramel.

IMAGE: a neutral face because this is very meh.

Thoughts: This is... fine. It's ok neat, but nothing to write home about. It’s a good thing that I originally bought it as a cocktail rye because cocktails are where I will probably use most of it. As a cocktail rye, I like it. As a sipping rye, it gets a meh. It turns out, I wasn’t missing that much all these years. My palate has become more sophisticated along with my ability to sniff out crazy marketing stories, I guess.

Catoctin Creek Roundstone Rye Whisky: Distiller's Edition 92 Proof

June 14, 2021 Eric Burke

I am so excited. Tomorrow I get to pick up my 10-year-old niece so that Wednesday we can head off on her “Yay! You are 10!” trip. My wife and I did this for my brother’s oldest child when he turned 10 and have plans to do it for his youngest too. But this time around we are taking his middle child, and only girl. Our goal with this is to take the kids someplace where their parents can’t or won’t take them. To broaden their experiences and get them out of the small town they live in (because the small town I grew up in, and that my family still lives in, has quite a “small town attitude” if you know what I mean). And aside from giving them valuable life experiences as they are finally old enough to begin to comprehend it, the trip makes them feel special and grown-up. Plus we spoil them, of course, because that is what Aunts and Uncles are for.

A couple years ago, we asked her to pick where she wanted to go. At first she wanted to go to the ocean. Then the mountains. Finally she settled on the desert. Growing up in Northern Wisconsin, she has no idea why a trip to the desert in summer isn’t the greatest plan. But if the point is to go somewhere to broaden your experiences, going from an overabundance of water to a scarcity of it will be a good experience. So we are taking a trip to Utah to experience the National Parks, National Monuments, and National Recreation Areas.

It will be our first vacation since 2019 and we are super excited about it. But what does that have to do with the Catoctin Creek Whiskey up in the photo above? Absolutely nothing. I’m too excited about vacation to process much else. But that said, here is what the distillery has to say about the product:

Only one in every ten barrels gets selected to be in the Roundstone Rye "92 Proof" whisky. This whisky is the culmination of several years of planning. "For a few years now, we've been putting whisky away for storage," remarked Becky Harris, Chief Distiller and President of Catoctin Creek Distilling Company. "We pulled some of the more interesting barrels from the back of the barn and decided to release these at a higher proof: a whisky specially curated for flavor, while still being remarkably smooth, as is our existing 80 proof Roundstone."

A few notes on it. This is a 100% Rye Mash whiskey. Usually, that means I won’t care for it as I’m not really a fan of the flavor that malted rye brings to a drink. This is non-chill filtered which seems to be a trend lately. One I am enjoying seeing. Also, this is a single barrel product so my notes and yours may differ.

Catoctin Creek Roundstone Rye Whisky: Distiller's Edition 92 Proof

Purchase Info: $50.99 for a 750 mL bottle at Total Wine, Burnsville, MN

Price per Drink (50 mL): $3.40

Details: 46% ABV. Non-chill filtered. 100% Rye Mash. Single Barrel # 1894

Nose: Cinnamon, mint, nutmeg, and red fruit.

Mouth: Spicy with strong notes of nutmeg and cinnamon. Herbal mint and red fruit.

Finish: Medium length and warmth. Strong notes of spearmint and nutmeg.

Thoughts: If you are a fan of nutmeg, you will really like this one. I happen to be a nutmeg fan and was very pleasantly surprised to find nutmeg as the dominant note throughout the tasting experience. This worked well in a rye cocktail. I tried it in a Sazerac and it performed very nicely. I'm a fan and will probably be giving some of their other products a try in the near future.

Did you notice that this came out a day early? That is because BourbonGuy.com will be on vacation until June 28th. Regular posts will resume at that time. I’ll be traveling with a 10-year-old girl, who I adore. But she is still a 10-year-old girl so wish me luck.

Blog

Stellum Black Rye

Peerless Straight Rye Whiskey

Jack Daniel's Tennessee Tasters' Selection: Barrel Proof Rye

Chattanooga Whiskey 99 Rye

Woodford Reserve Rye, Liquor Barrel-MN Selection

Stellum Rye

Michter's US-1 Kentucky Straight Rye Whiskey

Catoctin Creek Roundstone Rye Whisky: Distiller's Edition 92 Proof