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Elijah Craig 18 Single Barrel The Attainable Unicorn · Aussie Bourbon Lovers

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  Incredible flavours, even better stories.
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  One Pour, 10 Minuts, Aussie Bourbon Lovers, Sharing Bourbon with Australia.
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  Oh, there we go. Pretty good pop.
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  Not bad. What are we drinking, Dave?
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  Well, I think I thought when I first opened this that I was opening
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  what some people call a unicorn.
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  This is an Elijah Craig single barrel, 18 year.
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  Which is a...
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  And I think I've just discovered right now.
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  It's a single barrel. So all the 18 years are-Single barrels?
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  Single barrels, yeah.
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  Are you showing that to me or are you showing that to the camera?
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  Did you zone out?
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  I thought that that was going to be... No, I was showing it to you.
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  There was going to be an audience inside my eyeballs.
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  I was showing it to you so that you make sure you got all the
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  information and everything correct. Thanks.
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  A larger barrel. A larger barrel, single crack.
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  Cheers. Cheers.
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  Eighteen years. Eighteen years.
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  Was a single barrel, so that's literally how long it's aged, right?
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  That's exactly right. Oh, wow.
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  It's really nutty on the nose.
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  In fact, if you're playing along at home, it's got the barrel number.
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  The barrel number is 65, 63, and it was bottled.
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  Almost grand final weekend, the 18th of September, 2023.
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  Who won the grand final that year?
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  Here's the fun thing, actually.
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  Wait, who won the grand final in 2023?
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  Can't ask me your question about-Not about teams.
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  Can I come back to them? Is that the one my team won, '23?
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  Maybe. Yes.
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  I don't know. I can't get track of it.
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  I don't know.
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  Wait, your team doesn't want to... Oh, maybe they did.
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  Okay, whatever.
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  We digressing into this weird...
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  Okay, so wait.
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  September? Yeah.
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  Can we put it in this and come back to this?
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  You're making a connexion about where we were.
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  Wait, wait.
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  Oh, 2023? Yeah.
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  September eighth? Yes.
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  We probably were in Kentucky when this was bottled.
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  I know. Dade is having this-Sorry.
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  Live revelation.
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  It's a special bottle anyway. It's a special bottle.
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  Have a look at that. Stop.
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  I do love a single barrel because...
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  Well, I love them and I hate them because you find a single barrel
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  that you really enjoy, but the catch is it's a single barrel.
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  It's not something you can keep buying a lot of.
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  So it makes it really wonderful to enjoy.
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  But also the downside is once it's gone, that's gone.
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  Do you know something weird about this single barrel?
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  Tell me, Dave. It's been proofed down.
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  It's 90 proof.
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  I don't think I know very many other single barrels have been proofed down.
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  I wonder why they did that.
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  So it goes further?
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  Eighteen years is really old. So you got more bottles?
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  Would that be a… I'm making stuff up.
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  I'm just guessing.
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  Yeah, that definitely does make sense, but heaven, who might do that?
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  I don't know. Do you get nutty on the nose?
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  It's like, really… Yeah, I don't know.
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  That's got woodiness.
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  Oh, yeah, maybe that's some nut. Yeah.
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  Those smoked diamonds that we open sometimes when we're having our bourbon.
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  It's like very… I was going to go to Brazil nut, actually.
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  Is that too boutique? No.
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  I was going to say a honey-covered almond.
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  A honey-covered almond?
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  You know how sometimes they like honey roast an almond?
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  Good on you for having a good…
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  That's a good taste, that one.
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  I can smell the honey. It noses hotter than 45, actually.
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  I don't know. What's that?
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  There's like that woodiness.
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  It's not a huge amount of caramel stuff on that nose to me.
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  No, it's like a honey nut flavour.
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  But yes.
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  But tell me, Dave, we've got quite a few, a little of her look over the shelf,
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  a lineup of Elijah Craig's up there.
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  There's a single barrel, a toasted barrel, a small batch, and a barrel proof.
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  For people who are just trying to get their head around what's
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  the difference in layman's terms?
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  Well, I think the first step for them would be that they should go back and
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  listen to our other podcast about toasted barrel and small batch.
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  But just quickly, what's the…
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  Obviously, single barrels- No, I'm not going to say I'm not answering your
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  question, listen to the other podcast.
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  Small Batch is the one that everyone gets.
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  You can buy it everywhere.
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  It's easy to get your hands on.
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  Great shape bottle is really great.
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  And actually a really banging whiskey.
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  This is one of these ones that I discovered.
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  It's like how to do a staple.
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  It's a really we pour it a lot and it's a good one, really good one.
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  Really, I think it's often it doesn't have an age statement on, but it's often nine
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  or 10 years old and it's really very good, really very good and excellent value.
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  I highly recommend if you're looking for a bottle of bourbon, haven't had
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  one, get your hands on that.
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  Pretty bottle for yourself, but really good juice inside.
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  I like these pretty bottles.
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  I do like a pretty bottle.
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  And you can listen to some other episodes about how much I don't
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  like not pretty bottles.
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  But then we go to Toasted Barrel.
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  So that's the same juice, but then they put it in a toast, a barrel
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  that's just been toaster.
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  And then it's been a thing called flash chard, that particular one.
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  That gives us some extra caramely sweetness.
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  And if you taste them side by side, you get this really interesting desserty
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  flavours in the style, it's not the same notes.
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  It's not the same. You get some, what do they call them?
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  Christmas spices or those-It's a bit more desserty.
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  Yeah, it's a little bit double-oaked-y, but it's not.
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  It's a bit different. And barrel proof?
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  Barrel proof.
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  Barrelproof is this release that went a little bit nuts a few years ago.
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  They'd release three of them each year.
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  There's this idea where there's an A release, a B release, and a C release.
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  Each of those releases, because I'm just going to quickly reference exactly what
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  the months are, so I don't get this wrong.
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  But the A release, for example, in 2023, and this is why I'm coming back to this
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  one, because the one we've got up there is the...
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  Elijah Craig Barrelproof C923, which was this one that they said
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  was the one, like this is the bottle to have the unicorn, the bar
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  up of what do you want. So we have a C923.
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  C is the C, A, B, C, third release for 2023.
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  That's what the '23 is.
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  And then the '9' is September, the ninth month.
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  So there's a January one as well, which is A123, A, the first release, 1 January 23.
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  And then there was a May release as well, actually a B523.
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  But I'm just going to check. A lot of numbers.
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  So in short-Sorry.
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  First letter is what release it is.
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  Second character is the number, which is the month, and then the
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  last two digits is the year.
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  And it seems like it's always January, May, and September that they release them.
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  Yeah. And so when they say barrel proof…
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  Sorry, barrel proof. They haven't proofed it down.
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  They haven't had a water tool. Sorry, sorry.
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  That's what I wanted to know. Sorry, sorry.
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  And then single barrel, they have had a water this one, but it's not in your job.
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  But it's like a single barrel. Or is the barrel proof?
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  They'll have mixed barrels together to get that?
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  A hundred %, yeah, exactly.
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  That's a batch, so they don't have to use just one barrel.
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  Sorry.
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  It took me a long time to get to that. Sorry.
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  I didn't know that.
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  That's how the letters worked. That's good to know.
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  Yeah, exactly.
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  And so interestingly then, so Because this was bottled, this is nerdy
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  and boring, but let's do it.
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  Because this was bottled on the 18th of September, 2023.
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  This was theoretically being bottled almost exactly the same
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  time as the C-93 was.
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  This particular bottle of 18-year-old.
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  I'm just excited that it was being bottled while we were pretty much in Kentucky.
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  We were there, yeah. Yeah, exactly.
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  We should look at the date more often on some of the bottles we get.
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  I know. And go, When was that bottled?
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  And what was happening in my life?
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  And then, I don't know.
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  What a great idea.
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  They say drink bourbon and make memories, and you can have drink bourbon
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  and reminisce about good memories. Here's a fun thing.
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  I don't know. Does Freddie talk about this in the doco?
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  Does he say it's a fun idea to spend some time thinking about what happened 18 years
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  ago when they first put that into the barrel?
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  Yeah, he talks about the- If we do the maths here.
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  Eighteen years ago. September of 2023.
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  So 18 years before that, 2005. Oh, wow.
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  That takes us back a long way.
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  2005, Dave.
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  We didn't know each other? No, we did.
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  We just met, haven't we? We just met.
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  Yes, that's correct.
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  We just started dating, actually.
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  I wonder if we should stop this conversation before it
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  gets too weird and boring.
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  That's a fun thing, though. That is fun, isn't it?
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  When you go to buy a bottle of bourbon, look when it was bottled.
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  This is really old bourbon.
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  No, but like- Sorry, go on.
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  Or like, as in it's fun.
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  As in buy a larger crazy bottle for yourself, have a drink.
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  But when you're at the shop, don't just grab the first one on the shelf.
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  Have a look and see what dates they were bottled That's fun.
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  Where there's a single barrel, yeah.
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  Good gift, too.
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  You look at the date and line it up with something that person's-
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  Something significant.
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  You're going to need quite a lot of single barrels on the shelf to be able
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  to find something that's relevant.
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  But if you can find one, go for it. Just to farm.
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  Okay, here we go.
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  I was going to say, can you please have some of this and tell me it's really old?
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  So I think this is probably the oldest bourbon we have there, isn't it?
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  What are we getting? What do you feel like?
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  And it doesn't have to be complementary either, because it's the oldest
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  bourbon by some distance, I think.
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  Yeah, it's got that woodiness from that, when I say that nutty
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  smell, it's definitely got that barrely…
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  It's not as smooth as I thought it would be.
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  It's a little rougher on the back than I thought, but it's a nice taste.
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  But definitely, you get that oaky barrel flavour.
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  And I think it's okay for us to say that I love a really good bourbon.
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  I reckon, I think, that I might almost prefer
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  all the other expressions we have of Elijah Craig over this.
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  Yeah, but you like a good desserty one.
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  This one here, I wouldn't call it desserty one.
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  It's definitely nothing, even in the smell.
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  You've got that nuttiness rather than that caramel.
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  Well, you keep saying nuttiness, but to me, there's just a lot of wood.
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  It's just so much barrel.
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  Yeah, but you definitely get the wood and the taste.
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  But that's probably the age.
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  The more you age it, the more.
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  It's also a single barrel, so they don't have the opportunity to then
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  take other less oaky barrels.
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  But someone's obviously picked this. Someone's definitely picked it, yeah.
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  This is delicious. Let's bottle this one.
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  Yeah, they have. You're exactly right.
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  Well, here's to 18 years of whiskey.
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  Yeah. Knowing you, child.
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  Can you imagine if 18 years ago, sorry.
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  We were doing a bourbon pop cast.
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  That's only funny for you and I to laugh at.
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  I know. Someone else will laugh, I'm sure.
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  Let's go and drink some more whiskey and forget about the fact that we've
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  been in the energy for 18 years. It's too long.
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  No, it's not. Okay.
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  It's great. Here's to more of that.
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  Thanks for listening.
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