Charles K. Cowdery looks at the buzz created by the limited editions market.
Recently, limited edition bottlings have become a staple of American whiskey producers. Many of these releases – such as Buffalo Trace’s George T.
Stagg, Four Roses Barrel Strength, Parker’s Heritage Collection from Heaven Hill, and Wild Turkey American Spirit – are so coveted by enthusiasts that t...
By Charles K. Cowdery
from Issue 70 published on
Charles K. Cowdery meets the next generation of America's master distillers.
In the modern era, on both sides of the Atlantic, a master distiller may have many roles. He may be a brand ambassador, a quality assurance officer, and probably will have something to do with making the whiskey too.
Today, several of America’s best-known master distillers are semi or completely re...
By Charles K. Cowdery
from Issue 69 published on 18/01/2008
By launching a wood finish bourbon Kentucky’s Labrot & Graham is merely honouring a long tradition of innovation at the distillery. Our man reports
Does whisky have to evolve, change even, to secure a future? The debate is common to all three of the great traditional whisky markets in Scotland, Ireland and America. And it’s one that is regularly reassessed and reconsidered in all three countries.
On one side of the argument are the traditional...
By Rob Allanson
from Issue 66 published on 25/09/2007
Iconic distillery releases its latest antique collection
Whiskey fans rejoice! Buffalo Trace Distillery’s 2006 Antique Collection has been launched and it features some stunning whiskey.
This year’s collection boasts a new edition—Thomas H.
Handy, uncut and unfiltered straight rye whiskey.
Buffalo Trace Distillery is a family-owned company based in Fra...
By
from Issue 61 published on 19/01/2007
Bourbon is not only continuing its growth in profitability but is carving out a new premium image for itself. Dominic Roskrow reports
You don’t expect to find a top Kentucky distiller conducting tastings on a Saturday afternoon in a sprawling shopping mall on the edge of Louisville. Mind you, until relatively recently you wouldn’t have expected to find his whiskey there either.
Jim Rutledge is the master distiller at Four Roses a...
By Dominic Roskrow
from Issue 61 published on 19/01/2007
Let 10 young bartenders loose in bourbon country and it’ll get messy. But as Dominic Roskrow reports, when it
came to the business end of the trip, our boys delivered
In Kentucky the racing folk have an expression: the money, they say, is in the lovin’. The expression refers to the thoroughbred race horses that have made the State one of the most famous horse-racing centres in the world.
It basically means that no matter how fast you go round the track, or how m...
By Dominic Roskrow
from Issue 61 published on 19/01/2007
The names of many American whiskey pioneers are still with us today on the labels they started. Charles K. Cowdery here looks at the men behind the labels and on pages 24 and 25 considers how other brands were named
In the United States, whiskeys were among the first branded products to be advertised and sold nationally, and they pioneered many of the mass marketing techniques we take for granted today.
Often these brands were named for the distillery’s owner. So successful were these that many later brands we...
By Charles K. Cowdery
from Issue 57 published on 21/07/2006
Most single malts are named after their distilleries, which in turn are mostly place names. Most blended Scotches are named after the merchants who created them although a few, such as Cutty Sark (a ship), are more fanciful.
In the United States, a much younger nation with a much younger whiskeymak...
By
from Issue 57 published on 21/07/2006
Hayseed Dixie mix heavy metal with bluegrass music to novel effect.And as his name implies,the band’s frontman Barleycorn Scotch enjoys a whisk(e)y too.Rob Allanson joined him for a tipple
For many the twin poles of malt whisky and bourbon are about as far apart as you can get.
Taste, ingredients, climate for maturing, and water chemistry all make for two different drinks, and there are some people in each camp that cannot stomach the other side’s chosen beverage.
Yet, as often happ...
By Rob Allanson
from Issue 57 published on 21/07/2006
Charles Cowdery looks at how Abraham Lincoln’s time in the whiskey trade could have cost him his political career
Bill Clinton’s carefully constructed confession that he tried marijuana while a post-graduate student in England, but “didn’t inhale,” dogged him throughout his presidency. So has George W. Bush’s youthful reputation as a goof-off and party animal.
For Abraham Lincoln, America’s 16th president and ...
By Charles K. Cowdery
from Issue 55 published on 14/04/2006
Probably not, says Charles Cowdery, but supplies are as tight as they have been in many years
At the end of 2004, the last year for which figures are available, the Kentucky whiskey industry had 224,173 barrels of whiskey aged eight years or more in its collective inventory.
Because bourbon and other American straight whiskey is always aged in new charred oak barrels, it matures fast. Eight...
By Charles K. Cowdery
from Issue 54 published on 03/03/2006
What happens to United States Presidents after they leave office? The first one made whiskey. Charles K. Cowdery reports
Mount Vernon is George Washington’s estate in northern Virginia, just outside of Washington, DC. It is America’s most-visited historic home. The Mount Vernon Ladies’ Association, which owns the estate today, is a private, non-profit organization founded in 1853. It is the oldest national historic pr...
By Charles K. Cowdery
from Issue 53 published on 12/01/2006
Charles Cowdrey reports on a one-woman crusadeto bring Kentucky’s finest in to the Big Apple
LeNell has changed the way people drink in this part of Brooklyn,” says Alex Haskell, manager of MiniBar, a cosy drinking establishment as diminutive as its name implies.
‘LeNell’ is Tonya LeNell Smothers, proprietor of LeNell’s, a wine and spirits boutique where the emphasis is on hard-tofind wine...
By Charles K. Cowdery
from Issue 51 published on 07/10/2005
To paraphase an old music expression, it’s climbing the drinks chart with a Bulleit.Charles Cowdery on the latest bourbon success
Tom Bulleit – ex-Marine, ex-tax lawyer, current whiskey pitchman – is on the crest of a wave, paddling as fast as he can, hoping he can ride it to fame and prosperity.
It has been a lifelong dream of Bulleit’s to bring his family back into the Kentucky whiskey business. He first put that ambition i...
By Charles K. Cowdery
from Issue 50 published on 09/09/2005
How did bourbon get established, and who were the people who perfected it? Charles Cowdrey looks back to frontier times
American whiskey as we know it today was cooked up in the same cauldron as the modern American nation itself. Though they started out using Old World rye, America’s distillers soon switched to indigenous corn (maize) to craft the unique spirit we now call bourbon.
The men who made the first whiskey...
By Charles K. Cowdery
from Issue 49 published on 15/07/2005
It’s nearly 10 years since a major fire all but destroyed a great part of Heaven Hill. But the distillery’s now thriving and going from strength to strength. Charles Cowdery reports
The flames could be seen for miles.
The heat could be felt a half-mile away. Ablaze fuelled by alcohol and oak burns like nothing else; blue-white, clean, and very intense. The best firefighters could do was contain it.
No one was seriously injured, but the property damage was catastrophic: 7.7 mi...
By Charles K. Cowdery
from Issue 49 published on 15/07/2005
Among great bourbon families it doesn’t get much bigger than the name Beam. And as Charles K.Cowdery reports, another generation is considering its options
One day you’re driving through Ohio, on the interstate highway, just minding your own business. You pass a flatbed truck. It is hauling something strange, unfamiliar.
It looks like a big copper pot, but it is huge, the biggest copper anything you have ever seen.
And it is not alone. There is a sec...
By Charles K. Cowdery
from Issue 42 published on 3/9/2004
Buffalo Trace takes its name from the great pioneering days when Kentucky marked the new frontier.Today, it’s still blazing a trail for whiskey. Charles K. Cowdery reports
American straight whiskey is now taken seriously throughout the drinking world. This phenomenon is no longer new. Maker’s Mark, the first craft bourbon, has been on the market for close to 45 years. Blanton’s, Booker’s and Knob Creek are closing in on 20.
Even in the glacially slow world of whiskey...
By Charles K. Cowdery
from Issue 40 published on 4/6/2004
Why, why, why Delilah’s? Because, says Charles Cowdrey, it’s a cracking bourbon bar
The Chicago Chowhounds are a group hedonistically dedicated to the passionate enjoyment of everything consumable.
In February, when they decided to have a tasting of bourbon whiskey, Delilah’s, on Lincoln Avenue just south of Diversey, was the only logical destination.
Proprietor Mike Miller was h...
By Charles K. Cowdery
from Issue 39 published on 1/5/2004
So you thought there were only a handful of bourbons? American correspondent
Charles K. Cowdery tracks down some collectors who have hundreds
What do you consider a well-stocked drinks cabinet? For some people, two or three bottles will do. For others, 10 or 20 are plenty. For John and Linda Lipman of Cincinnati, Ohio, 400 different bottles of American whiskey is little more than a good start.
The Lipmans began collecting American whiske...
By Charles K. Cowdery
from Issue 37 published on 23/2/2004
Bourbon producer Heaven Hill is a family business that’s branching out. Kate Ennis joined the extended family in Kentucky for a preview of their new vintage.
It might well be the case that Heaven Hill president Max Shapira likes to keep it in the family when it comes to his business – but that family seems to be growing by the month.
There are three generations of Shapiras directly tied to the Heaven Hill story so far – four if you include baby Lindsey ...
By Kate Ennis
from Issue 36 published on 28/12/2003
Lynn Seldon charts the history and success of a bourbon made beyond Kentucky:
Virginia Gentleman
Those who think Kentucky has a monopoly on bourbon whiskey in the United States haven’t talked to the descendants of Abram Smith Bowman – or tried his bourbon. Founded in 1935 by Bowman and his two sons, Smith and DeLong, A. Smith Bowman Distillery is the oldest familyowned bourbon distillery in the...
By Lynn Seldon
from Issue 32 published on 13/7/2003
The bad guy's whiskey is set to leap off the history shelves and stage a magnificent revival. Scott Aiges makes an irresistable case for procurring some bottles.
With the snifter held aloft, the liquid inside displays a deep amber colour, the result of years spent in a barrel of charred oak. But with one whiff, it is obvious that this whiskey is like no other.
What is it? A 10-year-old bourbon may give off a buttery sweetness, a 16-year-old Islay malt a hu...
By Scott Aiges
from Issue 9 published on 16/4/2000
In the second part of their American whiskey odyssey, Gary Regan and Mardee Haidin Regan uncover the traditional practices that makes each bottling unique.
American distillers employ many intricate techniques to make their whiskey unique (see Whisky Magazine Issue 6). But that is far from the end of the idiosyncracies – once a new spirit is made, many other devices come into play. Each builds on the initial differences so you end up with a galaxy of va...
By Gary Regan
from Issue 7 published on 16/12/1999
Gary Regan & Mardee Haidin Regan guide us through the process of whiskey-making American-style
It's almost impossible to write about Bourbon or Tennessee whiskey without drawing some comparisons to Scotch.
Whisk(e)y drinkers tend to have a greater knowledge of Scotch, and single malts in particular are generally regarded as the connoisseur's whisky.
Indeed, in some circles Bourbons are se...
By Gary Regan
from Issue 6 published on 16/10/1999
