These are very special days indeed for whisky
These are very special days indeed for whisky. We might well have laughed at the marketing men in the 90s when they told us about the way consumers were moving from standard products to premium ones.
We might have jeered when they told us about ‘portfolio’ and ‘repertoire’ drinking – the growing ha...
By Dominic Roskrow
from Issue 41 published on 16/7/2004
Is there a perfect age for American whiskey – and are different age expressions driving the market or in danger of harming it?
The world of bourbon faces a major dilemma – how does it reverse years of decline and make such a proud drink acceptable again but do so without sacrificing the very qualities that make the product so special in the first place?
Not easy. The emphasis on tradition and heritage are what sets the cat...
By Dominic Roskrow
from Issue 41 published on 16/7/2004
When TW Samuels VI first produced Maker’s Mark he was dismissed as a crackpot. But he succeeded in changing the image of bourbon forever, and the sector is still benefiting Dominic Roskrow reports
To fully understand just how revolutionary Maker’s Mark was when it was launched you have to go back not just 50 years to that time, but further back still. To 1946, in fact, when the classic film It’s A Wonderful Life was released.
“There’s a scene in that movie when George goes with Clarence in t...
By Dominic Roskrow
from Issue 41 published on 16/7/2004
If you’ll excuse the pun, Kentucky whiskey is on a roll at the moment. Dominic Roskrow went on a voyage of discovery that started with selecting his own whiskey and ended at the party to end all parties
It may have been the sunshine heat, it may have been the exquisite bourbon and it may have been no more than standard festival excitement, but in Kentucky in September there was a real sense that something pretty special’s going on for the bourbon industry right now.
Under stunning blue skies, in t...
By Dominic Roskrow
from Issue 35 published on 17/11/2003
The distillery at Woodford Reserve is like nowhere else on earth
This is truly surreal. Kentucky’s youngest master distiller, Chris Morris, is standing over a single barrel which is full of a liquid that looks
like concrete mix and has the consistency of gruel. His mentor and boss Lincoln Henderson is pouring a large bucket of icein to the mix.
And Chris is wie...
By Dominic Roskrow
from Issue 35 published on 17/11/2003
The Kentucky Bourbon Festival is starting to attract people from across the world.
Dominic Roskrow went to find out why
The party for Tom Bulleit at a private house in the suburbs of Bardstown was dead as a dormouse.
We – Whisky Magazine managing director Damian Riley-Smith, myself and a Polish writer we’d adopted called Jaroslaw Urban, had missed Bulleit Bourbon’s brands ambassador earlier in the evening and had pr...
By Dominic Roskrow
from Issue 35 published on 17/11/2003
