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Reviving a Legacy: The Journey of Chicken Cock Whiskey with Gregg Snyder · The Scotchy Bourbon Boys

• 0:58
  Speaker 1: What's up?
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: Scotchy Bourbon Boys fans, this is Alan Bishop of.
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: If you have Ghosts, you have Everything.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: You may know me better as Indiana's Alchemist of the Black Forest, but if you're at all interested in the Fortean high strangeness, the paranormal and the unexplained, then you should tune into my new podcast.
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: If you have Ghosts, you have Everything available now, wherever you get your podcasts, including Spotify, google Podcasts and Amazon.
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: We'll be right back and we're talking some sweet, but we're telling the truth.
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah, we're the Scotch and Bird and the Boys Raising the hill and making some noise.
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah, we're the Scotch and Bird and the Boys.
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: We're here to have fun and we hope you enjoy.
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: We're here to have fun.
• 2:40
  Speaker 3: Yeah, all right, welcome back to another podcast of the Scotchy Bourbon Boys.
• 2:46
  Speaker 3: Tiny here CT's in the house and we have a very special guest, greg Schneider.
• 2:52
  Speaker 3: I tried to combine your name with guest and Greg at once, but Greg Schneider is the master distiller of chicken cock whiskey.
• 3:01
  Speaker 3: Welcome everybody.
• 3:03
  Speaker 3: It's great to have you here, greg.
• 3:11
  Speaker 3: I'm going to cover just real quick that this is your 10th appearance, official appearance as a podcaster here.
• 3:22
  Speaker 3: You are the number one guest now of the Scotchy Bourbon Boys.
• 3:25
  Speaker 3: That is a record.
• 3:28
  Speaker 3: I know that Alan Bishop was at nine and Randy, the president, who did the last podcast, he's at eight, but still I think you got it in the fact that you've been with us consistently.
• 3:44
  Speaker 3: I think you and Alan started coming on at about the same time but Alan has switched, you know, over to a new distillery so he's in the process of setting a lot of stuff up and making whiskey.
• 3:55
  Speaker 3: So there's not a lot to you know.
• 3:57
  Speaker 3: There's not a huge amount to talk about at this point, unless I get down there.
• 4:03
  Speaker 3: So you know you've got that You're just Can I say something yes.
• 4:08
  Speaker 5: Greg's been a little more than I have.
• 4:15
  Speaker 3: I don't think, ct, I know that's not true at all.
• 4:17
  Speaker 3: I mean you've come with me yeah he's.
• 4:19
  Speaker 3: I mean you've come like me yeah he's.
• 4:28
  Speaker 3: Well, greg has been an official Scotchy Bourbon Boy for a long time but as far as promoting and helping us out and everything, I really we've always appreciated everything you know and all your knowledge.
• 4:36
  Speaker 3: I mean, I would say between you, alan, and just the knowledge that you guys have of distilling, you're on a big.
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: You know you've distilled on a large column still for most of your adult life, starting when you were a kid and going all the way through, and he's been on a pot still.
• 5:00
  Speaker 3: So, between the two of you and what I've learned, you know all the different.
• 5:05
  Speaker 3: There's so many different.
• 5:07
  Speaker 3: You know techniques or different ways to adjust the taste of the bourbon to come out the way that you want it to.
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: You know it has the most rules of any whiskey, right?
• 5:20
  Speaker 3: But at the same time there are so many adaptations of those rules, right.
• 5:26
  Speaker 4: Right, that's very much so.
• 5:29
  Speaker 3: I mean yes, and so the flavor you know that we've been getting and everything.
• 5:33
  Speaker 3: I'm excited to have you on tonight because we've got Kentucky Bourbon Festival coming up and you're going to be there.
• 5:39
  Speaker 3: Now on our bus tour I found out today.
• 5:43
  Speaker 3: I'm just going to ask you to put a little bit of you know something for the tour when we go to Bardstown.
• 5:51
  Speaker 3: This time They've got us on a thieving tour.
• 5:54
  Speaker 3: So, you know, maybe put in a good word to send Nick or Steve down, or even one of the distillers or somebody else to say hi to us for you.
• 6:08
  Speaker 4: We can talk offline on that.
• 6:10
  Speaker 4: But yeah, I'd love to.
• 6:11
  Speaker 4: I apologize first off that I'm not going to be there with you.
• 6:14
  Speaker 4: This would have been what the fourth year in a row maybe.
• 6:18
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I'd give you a tour, but yeah, unfortunately I'm going to be in New Hampshire the day you guys are coming by there.
• 6:24
  Speaker 4: So let me know, We'll chat and we'll see if we can line something up to let you taste a little something special.
• 6:31
  Speaker 3: That would be great.
• 6:32
  Speaker 4: Nice.
• 6:33
  Speaker 5: No, I was going to say Greg.
• 6:34
  Speaker 5: I think that the experiences there with you have been amazing because, just like going to the library the the few years ago when we started there in the library and tasted through some of your stuff from uh six months on up, and that that was a really special experience because still, I've only been in that library one other time and I've been to bardstown multiple times, but that was something that will always resonate with me as one of those key moments.
• 7:07
  Speaker 3: I agree, yeah, so now you've got that plus.
• 7:17
  Speaker 3: I just wanted to like people don't understand that whiskey truly is, in my opinion, very similar to wine.
• 7:30
  Speaker 3: They don't understand when it comes to whiskey.
• 7:33
  Speaker 3: You know that people understand wine because it could be a good year for the grapes, the soil, the acidity where the grape is grown and everything.
• 7:41
  Speaker 3: When it comes to making good whiskey, you've got to have there's better year.
• 7:47
  Speaker 3: People don't really get that.
• 7:49
  Speaker 3: Corn grows better some years than others and in different regions better than others.
• 7:54
  Speaker 3: Like I know that when we were up in michigan uh, just this past, michigan wasn't having a great corn year Some you could see that the stocks had a little yellow-green, maybe some flooding mixed with too much whatever, but you know, then, when we were back into Ohio, you can see certain areas that are, you know, and so people don't actually can be naturally genetically modified to be different strains and there's so many different things to choose from.
• 8:31
  Speaker 3: But also it just does come down to not only all the ingredients and how well they grew and the yeast strain you use, but then once it's in the barrel, um, if it's cold or hot over the summers, uh, that can affect the whiskey and those batches.
• 8:50
  Speaker 3: You know, if it, we've been really lucky in my opinion, since, especially for the last six, seven years, I think it's optimal aging for bourbon and the flavors that are coming out of just Buffalo Trace's small batch.
• 9:08
  Speaker 3: I could take a 2019 small batch and put it up against today's small batch, and today's small batch has way more caramel flavor, and so people don't quite understand that year to year the whiskey can fluctuate better.
• 9:26
  Speaker 3: Now, I think most distilleries want to have that.
• 9:29
  Speaker 3: What would you say?
• 9:31
  Speaker 3: Not a low standard, but medium standard.
• 9:34
  Speaker 3: They always want it to match right.
• 9:37
  Speaker 3: But then there was, you know, you experience things like what happened to Knob Creek, where they had to take the age statement off because they couldn't meet demand, so they were using younger whiskey, correct.
• 9:47
  Speaker 3: Now the age statement's back on because they made whatever you know all those different things.
• 9:52
  Speaker 3: But all I've noticed is that the whiskey seems the general small batch whiskey seems to be better tasting in the last couple years than it had before.
• 10:04
  Speaker 3: Now I'm not sure if it's my palate or whatnot, but I also think it has to do with how well the whiskey's aging and those barrels that you know get put down from brand to brand to brand you know, and the younger and the younger that they get.
• 10:19
  Speaker 3: If you have really good aging, even those barrels are good, right, you know, for how the heat's hitting it and everything right.
• 10:28
  Speaker 3: That makes a big difference, correct.
• 10:31
  Speaker 4: Absolutely, and you know you touched on it.
• 10:34
  Speaker 4: But there's so many variables that impact and you start with the grades.
• 10:38
  Speaker 4: I've always said, you know I'm a big proponent in the importance of the wood and the barrel.
• 10:44
  Speaker 4: But as I've always said, if that whiskey is not good going in that barrel, it's not going to be good coming out of that barrel.
• 10:50
  Speaker 4: So the grains you got to start with the grains and it's a bit different.
• 10:54
  Speaker 4: You know most vineyards they've got what they got in the way of grapes.
• 10:57
  Speaker 4: A lot of the bigger wine companies will buy grapes from other vineyards and so forth.
• 11:00
  Speaker 4: A lot of the bigger wine companies will buy grapes from other vendors and so forth.
• 11:03
  Speaker 4: And luckily we have options.
• 11:05
  Speaker 4: We have strict quality controls, quality specifications on the corn, the rye, the barley or wheat.
• 11:13
  Speaker 4: If you make a wheat apartment and if it's not right it gets rejected.
• 11:19
  Speaker 4: And so I can remember years, the 46 years I've been in this business when I worked at Wild Turkey we'd be having loads of rye come in and it just had a musty smell to it.
• 11:28
  Speaker 4: We had to reject it.
• 11:29
  Speaker 4: We ended up having to buy rye from Sweden to get a quality enough level of rye to really make the quality whiskey that we were, you know, expected, wanted to make.
• 11:39
  Speaker 4: So you know, it starts with a grade and then from there there's so many other variables as far as, as you mentioned, the last gosh I don't know how many Fantastic.
• 12:48
  Speaker 3: Okay and then.
• 12:49
  Speaker 3: So yeah, I mean fantastic okay.
• 12:49
  Speaker 5: And then yeah, I mean, Roxy says hi, she just said hi but yeah, it's led up to this year even being warm temperatures in the spring and early summer.
• 13:04
  Speaker 5: But definitely you gotta imagine some of those barrels that are going to come out that have seen that extra heat, you know, throughout the last of their their tenure, are going to definitely have some some different taste notes, maybe a little more oak or whatever.
• 13:25
  Speaker 4: A best example I can think of.
• 13:26
  Speaker 4: I think it was 2022, when we actually, before we came out with the Double Oak our Chicken Cockade Year, double Oak the full summer season that that actually sat in the new barrels in the warehouse top floor.
• 13:40
  Speaker 4: We had over 80 days where the temperatures exceeded 90 degrees Fahrenheit in Kentucky, and that's perfect.
• 13:48
  Speaker 4: I mean, it's ideal for aging good whiskey, really extracting as much flavor as that barrel has to offer, and so I think we were very fortunate in that regard to really enhance the whiskey and get it to where we want it to in a great time frame that we need it to.
• 14:03
  Speaker 3: So that's nature, cooperating with you.
• 14:08
  Speaker 4: I mean, you know, Mother nature doesn't always cooperate, unfortunately.
• 14:11
  Speaker 4: And so you know you do the best with what you got.
• 14:14
  Speaker 4: But by the same token, you know we try not to compromise on that and you know, bother and sell it when it's our right.
• 14:25
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, so this is one Okay.
• 14:27
  Speaker 3: So initially, you know the history of Chicken Cock.
• 14:32
  Speaker 3: You've gone over a lot and it's a brand that your owner, monty, was able to acquire and you've been working hard to bring that brand back at a high quality level.
• 14:49
  Speaker 3: So initially you started off making whiskey but there had to be time between when you made whiskey and when it hit that hits the shelf and when and you know there's so many things you can do as a brand in between that to make money, and that's one thing that you know.
• 15:12
  Speaker 3: I think I wouldn't say you had now going into this to be able.
• 15:17
  Speaker 3: You knew what good whiskey tasted like and you've tasted many barrels from different places.
• 15:23
  Speaker 3: But is this experience that you've gone through as far as the different finishes, like the beer barrel finishes and the rum barrel finishes, and then also what you did with the double oak and this is in most cases that was purchased whiskey that you were able to put together and then either finish it or put it into another barrel or put it in?
• 15:51
  Speaker 3: You know you were making these decisions.
• 15:53
  Speaker 3: Was that fairly new to you as far as something that you, or had you done something like that consistently?
• 16:01
  Speaker 3: I mean as far as what you can do.
• 16:04
  Speaker 4: I took point.
• 16:05
  Speaker 4: I mean again to give you know, give your viewers, a little bit of history on that.
• 16:09
  Speaker 4: You know I started consulting.
• 16:11
  Speaker 4: I've been in this business over 46 years.
• 16:13
  Speaker 4: In 2017, I started my own consulting company and I connected with Grainer Barrel Spirits, who owns Chicken Cocker Whiskey.
• 16:20
  Speaker 4: In 2017, I was helping with some supply chain issues and some operational stuff, but one day, the founder came to me, marty Antle, who you mentioned earlier.
• 16:30
  Speaker 4: Marty actually acquired this old whiskey brand in 2011.
• 16:35
  Speaker 4: It was originated in 1856.
• 16:37
  Speaker 4: And so in 2011, the brand actually in the 1950s, it still had a fire burnt to the ground, and so the brand sat idle for close to 60 years.
• 16:46
  Speaker 4: Well, 2011,.
• 16:47
  Speaker 4: Marty was looking for a whiskey brand.
• 16:48
  Speaker 4: He acquired.
• 16:48
  Speaker 4: The brand sat idle for close to 60 years.
• 16:49
  Speaker 4: Well, 2011,.
• 16:50
  Speaker 4: Monty was looking for a whiskey brand and he acquired the brand rights to it.
• 16:51
  Speaker 4: And small company needed cash flow, so he was able to source young whiskey.
• 16:55
  Speaker 4: He put it in an aluminum bottle, they flavored it and it served his purpose.
• 16:59
  Speaker 4: It created cash flow, but it didn't help the high-quality reputation the brand was known for for many years and so shortly after I started helping him through my consulting services, monty came to me one day and he shared his vision of wanting to resurrect Chicken Cock back to Kentucky and bringing it back to the high quality prominence the brand was known for.
• 17:16
  Speaker 4: So he asked if I would help him do that and serve him the role of master distiller.
• 17:20
  Speaker 4: Of course, I said I'd do that on one condition we stopped buying that young crack whiskey and everything we do was focused on bringing this brand back to its high-quality promise.
• 17:28
  Speaker 4: So that's kind of what we did Initially.
• 17:31
  Speaker 4: He went to Paris, kentucky, where the brand originated.
• 17:34
  Speaker 4: He looked for the original mash bill, but unfortunately, I believe that the recipe burned down with the distillery, so we really didn't know.
• 17:42
  Speaker 4: So what I tried to do was to emulate a mash bill that was indicative of that time period, a high rye mash bill, you know, a bourbon 70% corn, 21% rye, 9% malt and barley, and so that's kind of the bourbon mash bill that we set our sights upon and been making ever since we hooked up with Bardstown Bourbon Company in 2017.
• 18:04
  Speaker 4: Now to your point.
• 18:05
  Speaker 4: When we started making whiskey, you know you've got to give it time to age.
• 18:09
  Speaker 4: It's not like you can't make it and bottle it the next day.
• 18:13
  Speaker 4: You've got to give it time, and so over the first four years after we started making whiskey, or during that time period, part of my job, I'd go out and try to find good quality whiskey that we could acquire and put aged whiskey, put it under the chicken cock label to really kind of establish a basis for some good quality whiskey that was going to lead into the product that we were making and maturing, you know, down the road, and so what you're tasting now in the way of a bourbon, of a rye, is everything that I had responsibility for overseeing at Bardstown Bourbon.
• 18:48
  Speaker 3: Right, and we've gotten that.
• 18:49
  Speaker 3: Now here's a question.
• 18:51
  Speaker 3: You made this fantastic whiskey.
• 18:55
  Speaker 3: So earlier this year, me and CT, we went down to your brand new tasting room that would be called Circa 18.
• 19:07
  Speaker 3: 1856.
• 19:09
  Speaker 3: 56.
• 19:10
  Speaker 3: I, it's just 63, 56, 49.
• 19:14
  Speaker 3: It's like a football game, but 1856.
• 19:16
  Speaker 3: And we went in and we did a barrel pick for Kentucky Bourbon Festival with Lisa Roper Wicker, yourself, steve Coombs, stacy Pritchard, me, ct.
• 19:27
  Speaker 3: It was, what would you say?
• 19:30
  Speaker 3: A pretty good cast.
• 19:36
  Speaker 4: And we got to pick a great group.
• 19:37
  Speaker 4: It really was a great group.
• 19:38
  Speaker 3: We got to pick from barrels, not the barrels that we, if any.
• 19:41
  Speaker 3: If people have listened before, greg basically did a barrel program through this.
• 19:46
  Speaker 3: First he initially, his first couple years, was buying barrels.
• 19:49
  Speaker 3: But at one point he was able to work with the barrel the barrel company to make the barrels and pick the actual wood staves for each individual 600 barrels that he would have made for him and he got the wood seasoned purse perfectly and he made those barrels but the barrels for the was it three years?
• 20:09
  Speaker 3: The first three years were, or was it two?
• 20:14
  Speaker 4: Actually, the first two years 2018, 2000,.
• 20:16
  Speaker 4: Well, 2017, 18, 19 were other barrels.
• 20:19
  Speaker 4: 2020 was when the first whiskey was laid down, where I actually had oversight of selecting the logs, overseeing the cutting of the stays and the heading, natural air drying those stays in the heading.
• 20:33
  Speaker 4: They're going out about a week and a half before we made our whiskey to ensure those barrels were constructed properly in West Virginia.
• 20:40
  Speaker 4: They were toasted properly to medium plus dose and then charred properly to number three level char.
• 20:44
  Speaker 4: So yeah, as far as the full oversight, we marked the barrel, the burling bottle.
• 20:49
  Speaker 4: That actually started in 2020.
• 20:51
  Speaker 4: Now, the two years before that, I had oversight.
• 20:54
  Speaker 4: I went to the Goobridge and actually got to oversee the barrel production as far as the toasting and the charring, but I didn't actually get to select the logs.
• 21:04
  Speaker 3: I mean, all that was left for you is to actually chop down the actual trees.
• 21:13
  Speaker 4: I still get it on my fingers.
• 21:14
  Speaker 3: Yeah, actual trees yeah, but so so this year, um, we were early when we did this pick.
• 21:22
  Speaker 3: We're dealing with those ones that you pick, but it's the distillate that you did at bardstown bourbon company and we got to pick from four barrels and all I gotta say is it was so exciting and fantastic.
• 21:36
  Speaker 3: Those four barrels.
• 21:38
  Speaker 3: It was a the hardest barrel pick I've ever been on.
• 21:41
  Speaker 3: I've been on some barrel picks where it's a couple where you get two good barrels, or out of four or there's.
• 21:47
  Speaker 3: You know, sometimes it's just one or sometimes is there that really good barrel.
• 21:53
  Speaker 3: You have to work to see if there's a good barrel, but in this case all four were spectacular and it was trying to figure out which would be the best for the festival and we didn't go with the sweetest.
• 22:06
  Speaker 3: I mean, there was a really caramely sweet one that was fantastic.
• 22:11
  Speaker 3: Ct was like let's get that one ourselves, you know, but I wanted to buy it for me yeah, exactly just like.
• 22:19
  Speaker 3: Like that's all the bourbon you'd have to buy the rest of your life, I don't know.
• 22:24
  Speaker 3: 53 gallons, that takes you a long time to drink that a lot of sharing yes, anyways.
• 22:31
  Speaker 3: So, um, but we did the pick and it's exciting to be able to taste the whiskey now, the one I picked up today, this particular bottle of chicken cock.
• 22:40
  Speaker 3: I picked it up on my way home.
• 22:41
  Speaker 3: This is the same stuff that you did.
• 22:44
  Speaker 3: Um, now your blends for your batches of chicken cock whiskey are 30 barrels, correct, is that?
• 22:50
  Speaker 3: Is that what we talked?
• 22:52
  Speaker 4: It varies.
• 22:53
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 22:55
  Speaker 4: A typical bourbon batch would be anywhere from 40 to maybe 80.
• 22:59
  Speaker 4: It just depends on what the backlog is on orders and how much we need to bottle, Because it's not like we can pick and choose.
• 23:06
  Speaker 4: We can't bottle every day.
• 23:07
  Speaker 4: We have to give the Barstown Bourbon Company enough notice, get it on the schedule and we try to make sure we've got enough orders and have some in inventory to handle the flow.
• 23:19
  Speaker 3: So my opinion is there's a lot of stuff that goes on on this, but from the initial chicken cock whiskey that you were putting in that bot and making those batches initially, to now that it's your distillate I mean, I everybody as a distiller, you have to be somewhat nervous, correct?
• 23:43
  Speaker 3: Because what you had the previous years that were was going on the shelf for the last three, four years, that was just you as getting whiskey and making it taste.
• 23:57
  Speaker 3: Um, I mean, the flavor profile was determined, by which the whiskey was purchased, although you were the one who was telling them where to get this specifically for this.
• 24:11
  Speaker 4: You know it's tough, as I tell people that time period as master distiller, I looked at it as treasure.
• 24:23
  Speaker 4: I get out and I treasure it, and some days you find treasure, some days you don't.
• 24:29
  Speaker 4: If that whiskey didn't meet our quality specifications I'd reject it.
• 24:32
  Speaker 4: I don't care what they were selling it for, what kind of great deal it was.
• 24:35
  Speaker 4: If it didn't meet and I've rejected a lot of whiskey and I taste whiskey I had to be, for my palate, a quality whiskey.
• 24:44
  Speaker 4: Now, was it going to be the same whiskey that people were going to taste four, five, six years down the road that I was responsible for producing?
• 24:52
  Speaker 4: Probably not.
• 24:53
  Speaker 4: But what you do is you segue in it, get good quality whiskey, so you kind of get the name established and bridge the gap and create a following until yours becomes available.
• 25:05
  Speaker 4: Hopefully it takes off.
• 25:06
  Speaker 4: At that point I think we kind of achieved that schedule.
• 25:10
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 25:10
  Speaker 3: Now here's a question, and I just just because did you start to supplement at one point both whiskeys, like, was there a time where it was made up of the stuff you distilled along with the stuff that you had purchased, to kind of try and bridge the gap more towards what they were going to taste?
• 25:30
  Speaker 4: There was a very short time period there.
• 25:31
  Speaker 4: We basically were using up what we had acquired and we segued what was included into what we were using.
• 25:38
  Speaker 4: So there was a time period maybe it wasn't that many months where we had a little bit left over from certain ages and we stepped way into the stuff that I had produced.
• 25:50
  Speaker 5: Greg, so the bottle that was the old bottle was 90 proof.
• 25:55
  Speaker 5: Did you keep the proof?
• 25:56
  Speaker 5: The same Is everything kind of still in line with that that's right.
• 26:01
  Speaker 4: When we established that CP that's our flagship bourbon brand Chicken cock, kentucky, straight bourbon, 90 proof.
• 26:08
  Speaker 4: You know it's in the old replica bottle that was pre-prohibition prohibition air bottles and so, yeah, 90 proof.
• 26:20
  Speaker 4: Part of our objective was to bring this brand back to high-quality provenance.
• 26:24
  Speaker 4: As I've told people time and time again, if we let the financial folks of the company manage the business, every one of those bottles would be 80 proof, because you get a lot more bottles out of the barrel than 80 proof and so you get more money per barrel.
• 26:37
  Speaker 4: That was not the objective.
• 26:39
  Speaker 4: Our objective was to bring back this high-quality province and our flagship bourbon and our flagship rife.
• 26:44
  Speaker 4: To me, the sweet spot on those was 90 proof.
• 26:47
  Speaker 4: You really allow the flavors to come to the front and pop.
• 26:57
  Speaker 5: I mean even the original.
• 26:59
  Speaker 5: I don't have the new one, but I enjoy sipping on it.
• 27:02
  Speaker 5: I like it, so I'm excited to get a new bottle, I think the new one has like a tan label, is that?
• 27:08
  Speaker 5: Right Jeff.
• 27:10
  Speaker 3: Well, that's a small batch.
• 27:11
  Speaker 3: That's a small batch right here no here is the new label.
• 27:18
  Speaker 3: The new label is exactly the same right there, ok, so so how do you know which one you're getting?
• 27:32
  Speaker 4: as far as the year it was produced.
• 27:35
  Speaker 4: Well, it's hard to.
• 27:38
  Speaker 4: There's a laser coating on the bottle.
• 27:39
  Speaker 4: It's hard to see.
• 27:40
  Speaker 4: It's usually on the back of the bottle, right below or right underneath the back label, but it's laser coated and that laser coat will tell you what day it was bottled and you can trace it all the way back to the barrels that were dumped in.
• 27:56
  Speaker 5: Huh, it must be small enough to see.
• 28:00
  Speaker 5: My eyeballs will allow me to see.
• 28:04
  Speaker 4: Every bottle that's on the bottling line and the laser edges into the.
• 28:08
  Speaker 4: Some have inkjet, but I think the bars have a laser, but I think the bars don't have a laser jet and the new ones have the California, the whatever CR.
• 28:20
  Speaker 3: It has the recycling bottle code on, whereas the old ones don't.
• 28:25
  Speaker 3: But I will tell you this you did a pretty damn good job, because I have the old and I have the new and there's a base flavor that you were able to keep that I'm not going to say it, but I want not gonna because it's not a.
• 28:49
  Speaker 3: But the main difference is the newest one is a lot more caramel and sweetness, but it still has that bourbon, the flavor of bourbon, where you pick up a little bit of nuttiness but you pick up the little bit of whiskey, the flavor of actual bourbon.
• 29:25
  Speaker 3: You know what I mean, like what you pick up in the Rick House, where this has a lot of caramel notes and some vanilla, and this one is a little bit more what would you say, not as sweet.
• 29:40
  Speaker 3: So the older one is definitely.
• 29:42
  Speaker 3: It almost feels I don't know because this does not have any.
• 29:48
  Speaker 3: You wouldn't say age is a difference, you know what I mean.
• 29:52
  Speaker 3: But one feels more like there's a little bit more barrel influence where the other one is picking up the fresh, newer whisk, the, the distillate aspect of it too, you know.
• 30:06
  Speaker 3: So what did you think between the two, have you actually tasted both of them?
• 30:13
  Speaker 3: personally yeah side by side all along yeah but I mean, are you, are you like?
• 30:22
  Speaker 4: I think again, what we're trying to achieve and that's part of what I I pay so much attention to detail with and that was the barrel.
• 30:30
  Speaker 4: I thought that if you truly do all the things we did with slightly, extremely tight grain, you know, letting the stage and heading natural air dry and then to toast that barrel a deep penetrating medium plus toast before you chart only a number three level chart you can create as much flavor as that barrel has offered.
• 30:49
  Speaker 4: As I told people, I take our whiskey every six months.
• 30:52
  Speaker 4: You guys know this and I truly believe, based on my palate, our four-year-old is comparable to most six-year-olds.
• 31:01
  Speaker 4: I don't believe in accelerated maturation, but I believe when you can create so much flavor that that barrel has to offer you extracted incomparable time.
• 31:08
  Speaker 4: And so the caramel notes, the vanilla notes you're about jeff, you know the old black tones.
• 31:14
  Speaker 5: I think they're more prominent in today's badges than they were, uh, four years ago yes, except the complexity of those barrels that we tasted on the barrel pick were amazing.
• 31:26
  Speaker 3: I mean that and that eight and ten year old product and that's not even the grand finale that we're going to get to later this year and go into the ones where you made the barrels.
• 31:37
  Speaker 3: I will say this You're right.
• 31:39
  Speaker 3: So in my opinion, this one has those flavors, but the sweetness of the caramel, and you know the aging process, process, whatever the barrels here are, you can tell there it's um, you're picking up a lot of those caramels and vanillas where the other stuff isn't.
• 32:02
  Speaker 3: It's got some of those flavors, but they're a little bit more bitter put it that way not as sweet.
• 32:10
  Speaker 3: So I mean I and, but you know some people don't like a real sweet bourbon.
• 32:15
  Speaker 3: But that isn't what this is.
• 32:17
  Speaker 3: It's, it's got the caramels and it's sweeter, but you still have that basic flavor, right, wouldn't you say?
• 32:25
  Speaker 4: that's a beauty.
• 32:26
  Speaker 4: I mean everybody's palate's insane.
• 32:28
  Speaker 4: And some, some people have some people, like we dided Bird versus the Rye Bird.
• 32:32
  Speaker 4: But even with Rye Bird, everybody's palate is different.
• 32:35
  Speaker 4: So when we did the Barrel Pick, how many differences.
• 32:39
  Speaker 4: Personally, I thought all four were distinctly different, but they were amazing In their own right, in their own space.
• 32:49
  Speaker 4: I thought they were amazing.
• 32:50
  Speaker 3: Right, and now to revisit the question I asked you before.
• 32:54
  Speaker 3: So were you tasting the older batches while you were blending the newer batch, so that while you were adding in certain barrels and putting that in, that you were matching a little bit, trying to match the taste?
• 33:10
  Speaker 3: So if you had a couple barrels that, if it was getting too sweet or whatever, and you had a couple barrels that were a little bit less, you were dump, trying to get a little bit closer to what you had before.
• 33:19
  Speaker 3: Is that what you were doing?
• 33:21
  Speaker 4: there was a little bit of blending segue into that, but but again we were very, very small inventory okay, so we're very limited, we're running out of inventory.
• 33:31
  Speaker 4: I didn't have a lot of uh leeway to play with different taste and setting way into it, you know.
• 33:37
  Speaker 3: So I tried to balance it and make a smooth segue into to the flavor profile that we currently have so that is that that's another aspect of a skill as a really good master blender who's been in the business for a long time.
• 33:53
  Speaker 3: This isn't something that there's a lot of money involved with what you're doing.
• 33:59
  Speaker 3: You know what I mean.
• 34:00
  Speaker 3: If you, if you f it up and you end up and you run out of, out of the stuff that you were talking about, all of a sudden you have this batch and you didn't quite.
• 34:09
  Speaker 3: You weren't able to do what you're supposed to do, and then that has to're supposed to do and then that has to go in the bottle and then maybe people react to it negatively.
• 34:16
  Speaker 3: That is where somebody like you or somebody you know, like people, don't quite understand how important the taste testers are at a distillery.
• 34:27
  Speaker 3: The people tasting those whiskeys and those bourbons have to really know what they're doing, because there's a lot of different palates but they're good whiskey going out for the palates.
• 34:39
  Speaker 3: You know what I mean.
• 34:39
  Speaker 3: It's kind of like it has to happen because there's those high-end palates that are always tasting and whatever that are going to either talk about it or whatever, and then there's an awful lot of people who don't know the difference.
• 34:51
  Speaker 3: But overall I I found to produce good whiskey.
• 34:55
  Speaker 3: You need people who know what they're doing to make it.
• 34:58
  Speaker 3: But then you also have to have a team.
• 35:00
  Speaker 3: You can have really good whiskey and a bad team and make some bad whiskey even though the whiskey was good.
• 35:10
  Speaker 4: Well, in consumer perception you can skew it as well.
• 35:14
  Speaker 4: Just a quick story about that when I was managing director of Wildturt.
• 35:18
  Speaker 4: I started there in 1998, and they had just started a process to change all the packaging the bottles, the labels, the closures, the boxes, everything.
• 35:30
  Speaker 4: They were changing the entire package and so we did the packageures, the follow-up boxes, everything.
• 35:32
  Speaker 4: They were changing the entire package and so we did the package change.
• 35:37
  Speaker 4: Same whiskey it was six and a half-year-old whiskey.
• 35:43
  Speaker 4: I'm in this new package and you can't believe the number of complaints we got at bars and from you know consumers saying consumers saying oh, what'd you do?
• 35:55
  Speaker 4: The whisk you changed.
• 35:56
  Speaker 4: And no, you changed the bottle, the label, the closure of the box, everything except the whisk.
• 36:02
  Speaker 4: And it was crazy the number of complaints we got.
• 36:05
  Speaker 3: So consumer perception could have a big role in this well, yeah, people, I don't care what you say when you're dealing with whiskey.
• 36:14
  Speaker 3: Even straightforward, you can't make the palates are so different.
• 36:18
  Speaker 3: You can't make everybody happy, there's no doubt about it.
• 36:22
  Speaker 3: But you can produce good whiskey, you put it out there and the one thing that whiskey does do.
• 36:27
  Speaker 3: If you produce good whiskey, it sells.
• 36:31
  Speaker 3: In's the way.
• 36:33
  Speaker 4: In fact, you know, what we were talking about earlier is that you know I was given the charge, the responsibility, the opportunity to say, hey, we want to resurrect this brand back to Kentucky and bring it back to its high-quality product.
• 36:47
  Speaker 4: So that's what the focus was.
• 36:49
  Speaker 4: My palate is my palate.
• 36:52
  Speaker 4: Some people might not agree with what I like, okay, that's okay.
• 36:56
  Speaker 4: But what I tried to do was come back with a high-quality whiskey that was reminiscent of days gone by when the famous old brand was around and had a high-quality reputation.
• 37:07
  Speaker 4: So I think we've been fairly successful in resurrecting it back to Kentucky.
• 37:12
  Speaker 4: So I think we've been fairly successful in resurrecting it back to Kentucky.
• 37:14
  Speaker 4: I have Arnstown Bourbon Company, which is a great place, great crew, and they're making some fantastic whiskey.
• 37:23
  Speaker 5: And so I'm proud of that.
• 37:25
  Speaker 5: Actually, well, you should be, because it's like the brand itself when people and in Ohio it has some notoriety People will recognize it.
• 37:31
  Speaker 5: I have friends who swear they're like I don't like any other rye, but I like that Island Rooster, and they'll call it out by the name.
• 37:39
  Speaker 5: They'll say it's that chicken cock one that you had us drink.
• 37:41
  Speaker 5: But I do think that the bottling is important.
• 37:47
  Speaker 5: I mean the way it looks and you guys hit it, you know, on the head.
• 37:52
  Speaker 5: The bottles are amazing and they don't do it any justice sitting here on our tables until you get one in your hands and you see the design of them.
• 37:59
  Speaker 5: But the product is great, but where it's going I think that's the thing people need to recognize is that those barrels we just tasted are what's coming.
• 38:12
  Speaker 5: Those barrels we just tasted are what's coming.
• 38:17
  Speaker 5: And that is, man, it's going to be.
• 38:18
  Speaker 5: If you're not paying attention to chicken cock and what's coming out in the next year or two, you're going to miss some really good stuff.
• 38:25
  Speaker 5: Thank you, I agree.
• 38:28
  Speaker 3: Thank you, yeah, oh yeah.
• 38:31
  Speaker 3: I mean the one thing.
• 38:32
  Speaker 3: There's a couple things Like you've done.
• 38:35
  Speaker 3: I just hope with this run that you're doing that.
• 38:41
  Speaker 3: I know that you probably could just put it all out as bourbon and sell it, but you know barrel strength, you know, start getting some years where it's a 10 year or you know, on this, this stuff is going to be insane.
• 38:59
  Speaker 5: I mean you're already imagine that stuff.
• 39:03
  Speaker 3: We drank it 10 years, I mean eight, eight years, I mean it's yeah, the key for you now is just to basically be able to put in, put enough back.
• 39:14
  Speaker 3: You know, I think that's a huge key that we would, you know, or hide a few, ate a few barrels and then have the lot long lost.
• 39:27
  Speaker 3: You know, 15 year chicken cock show back up.
• 39:29
  Speaker 3: You know at one point.
• 39:29
  Speaker 3: You know, 15 year chicken cock show back up.
• 39:31
  Speaker 3: You know at one point.
• 39:32
  Speaker 3: You know.
• 39:32
  Speaker 3: But now you've got a new product coming up, you know, and initially, you know, when we first started we were talking about you were saying God willing, I'll be here for the launch of my stuff.
• 39:44
  Speaker 3: And you are here.
• 39:45
  Speaker 3: Actually, so am I.
• 39:47
  Speaker 3: I'm glad we're here.
• 39:48
  Speaker 3: We've been through a lot for the last five years, there's no doubt about it.
• 39:52
  Speaker 3: Um but um, you know you've, the one thing that they've been doing is these higher and really beautiful whiskeys.
• 40:02
  Speaker 3: You know, you've had the chantecler, the, the um red stay.
• 40:07
  Speaker 3: You've got the Cotton Club, you know, but you've got a new one coming out, correct?
• 40:14
  Speaker 5: Correct, yeah.
• 40:15
  Speaker 3: So tell us about it, and then also, when is it coming out?
• 40:20
  Speaker 4: So the new product, our latest LTO limited time offer, is going to be bottled probably in about two weeks, yeah, two weeks.
• 40:29
  Speaker 4: Probably in about two weeks, yeah, two weeks, and it's called Chicken Cock.
• 40:37
  Speaker 4: Mizunara Japanese Oak Finish.
• 40:40
  Speaker 4: Now don't know what consumers know about Mizunara Oak.
• 40:47
  Speaker 4: It's a very rare Japanese oak.
• 40:50
  Speaker 4: Most of the trees are at least 200 years old before they can even be cut.
• 40:54
  Speaker 4: Very slow growing, very tight grain.
• 40:56
  Speaker 4: But it's a different chemical composition, very unique, very spicy, very Asian spiciness.
• 41:06
  Speaker 4: But it'll be in those mizunar oak barrels 10 months, at least 10 months, before it's actually bottled.
• 41:14
  Speaker 4: Now, this is our five-year-old bourbon.
• 41:15
  Speaker 4: It went into those barrels back in what?
• 41:18
  Speaker 4: Early November, no, excuse me, in October, last October, and mizunar oak can be pretty harsh.
• 41:31
  Speaker 4: So I actually laid out the specifications for those barrels.
• 41:34
  Speaker 4: Those barrels, it's going to be a high-end product.
• 41:37
  Speaker 4: Those barrels alone, each barrel costs $5,000.
• 41:41
  Speaker 4: Now that's new, oh yeah, brand new, okay.
• 41:45
  Speaker 4: So what we did is we bought the Japanese oak from a company, a broker in Japan, and they shipped the stage and heading to a company in France.
• 41:54
  Speaker 4: A cooperage in France made the barrels and they shipped them to us to fill $5,000 a barrel Put that in perspective.
• 42:02
  Speaker 4: Most bourbon barrels nowadays are probably in the $240 to $300 range, on the high end $5,000 a barrel.
• 42:14
  Speaker 4: So we bought 10 of them and so it kind of drives the cost of goods up, which drives the price up a little bit.
• 42:19
  Speaker 4: But the flavors and that's the thing you talked about earlier.
• 42:22
  Speaker 4: Today's consumers, they're always looking for something different, innovations.
• 42:27
  Speaker 4: So every year we try to come out with some new LTO limited time offer, and so this year that's something we decided.
• 42:33
  Speaker 4: Let's try this.
• 42:34
  Speaker 4: It's something unique, and when I bought the barrels I sent this specification Number one we're putting delicious five-year-old bourbon in those barrels, so I don't want to char those barrels.
• 42:46
  Speaker 4: I don't need to char those barrels.
• 42:48
  Speaker 4: What charring does?
• 42:49
  Speaker 4: It's like a charcoal filter.
• 42:51
  Speaker 4: It filters out the flavor that's in that whiskey or the distillate, and it starts picking up some of the flavors of the barrel.
• 42:57
  Speaker 4: Well, initially, the extraction you get out of Misenar oak would be pretty harsh, and so what I did is I didn't char those strips, I just told them I want a medium plus dose.
• 43:08
  Speaker 4: All I want to do is convert all the flavors in that wood, but I don't want to chart.
• 43:12
  Speaker 4: When they showed up to the distillery back last September October I think it was actually September they arrived.
• 43:18
  Speaker 4: I had them fill those up with water reverse osmosis water let them sit in those barrels a while, roll them around and then actually dump that water out.
• 43:26
  Speaker 4: I wanted to extract some of the initial harshness off the front end of the extractables coming out of that wood.
• 43:33
  Speaker 4: Then we put our five-year-old bourbon in and I taste it every month.
• 43:37
  Speaker 4: I get a sample from the store every month and it's just progressed so nicely.
• 43:41
  Speaker 4: It's got such a unique spiciness to it it's unlike anything you've ever tasted.
• 43:47
  Speaker 5: Well, the Japanese don't?
• 43:49
  Speaker 5: They put their.
• 43:50
  Speaker 5: They will let some of those rest 17 years.
• 43:55
  Speaker 4: That's a good point, cp.
• 43:56
  Speaker 4: Most companies that finish their whiskeys in a Mizunaro they're Scotch companies, most Scotch whiskeys in the Cisano.
• 44:05
  Speaker 4: You're right, they're going to sit there 20 years or longer and so they want this.
• 44:11
  Speaker 4: So because of that reason it can be such a harshness.
• 44:13
  Speaker 4: That's expected.
• 44:14
  Speaker 4: So what I was trying to do was kind of alleviate, eliminate some of that harshness before we put our whiskey in there, to kind of pull out the flavors that I wanted to extract out of the liquid itself.
• 44:24
  Speaker 4: And so it's going to be very unique.
• 44:27
  Speaker 4: We're actually going to have a grand launch of the Chicken Cock Mizunara during the Bourbon Festival Kentucky Bourbon Festival On that Saturday, september 14th, from 6 to 8 o'clock.
• 44:40
  Speaker 4: You mentioned our tasting room in downtown.
• 44:42
  Speaker 4: Those people haven't been to Barstown.
• 44:44
  Speaker 4: It is right on the circle, right in the heart of town.
• 44:47
  Speaker 4: We're kind of in a big yellow house, an old house.
• 44:50
  Speaker 4: It's a historical home on the southwest side of the circle.
• 44:53
  Speaker 4: It's called Circa 1856.
• 44:56
  Speaker 4: It's our tasting room and visitor center type thing.
• 44:59
  Speaker 4: But on Saturday, september 14th, from 6 o'clock to 8 o'clock pm, we're going to be doing our launch of the Nisnar Oak.
• 45:07
  Speaker 4: So people are invited to come over, join us, buy your bottle.
• 45:10
  Speaker 4: If you want to buy, I'll be there to taste with you inside of a few bottles.
• 45:17
  Speaker 5: Yeah, and what I like about this, compared to a lot of what's been going on for the past two years in the bourbon world, is this is a wood.
• 45:27
  Speaker 5: It's not a wine finish, it's not some finish, which, believe me, I like some maple finishes.
• 45:36
  Speaker 5: I've got a barrel sitting there with some maple in it right now, but I like that stuff.
• 45:42
  Speaker 5: But man, a wood finish, a chinkapin, whatever it's kind of nice to see some different wood species coming instead of just finishes of the wine and et cetera.
• 45:54
  Speaker 4: I agree there's some unique oaks that contain Tylose.
• 46:00
  Speaker 4: You can actually quarter saw it and make a barrel and it won't leak.
• 46:02
  Speaker 4: But there's some unique oaks I mean some of the Ambarana stuff.
• 46:06
  Speaker 4: We haven't done anything.
• 46:06
  Speaker 4: Ambarana is something I'd love to do.
• 46:08
  Speaker 4: It's an Ambarana finish.
• 46:09
  Speaker 4: I mean it's like a cinnamon bomb.
• 46:11
  Speaker 4: The flavors that you extract out of the South American oak the Ambarana oak is amazing as well.
• 46:18
  Speaker 3: So do you have plans for the?
• 46:21
  Speaker 3: I know you have to have plans for the used barrels.
• 46:32
  Speaker 4: I mean once they're used you've got.
• 46:33
  Speaker 4: I mean that's got to even be intriguing in itself.
• 46:35
  Speaker 4: Not sure you know.
• 46:37
  Speaker 4: There's a lot of people involved in those decisions and the finance people get involved with that.
• 46:43
  Speaker 3: The marketing folks get involved with that so they could recover some of their losses by selling them.
• 46:48
  Speaker 4: Or we could reuse some other type of finished whiskey and some other collaboration.
• 46:55
  Speaker 5: So my thing is, greg, is like Madeira is such a strong wine and when you put anything in it it's very potent and even after it's been drained for a while it's still potent and it can take.
• 47:09
  Speaker 5: You can put a bourbon in it.
• 47:11
  Speaker 5: In six months, boom and it's ready and you can reuse it.
• 47:14
  Speaker 5: Is this going to be similar to that?
• 47:17
  Speaker 5: Do you think that the Mezzanara is capable of?
• 47:21
  Speaker 4: being re-barreled, no doubt.
• 47:24
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think it's going to have enough.
• 47:25
  Speaker 4: Having a whiskey in only 10 months, it's going to have adequate flavor to really extract more flavor out of it.
• 47:32
  Speaker 4: Whether we do that or we sell those barrels to some third party, they do it, but there's definitely some flavor left in those for sure.
• 47:39
  Speaker 4: You were talking about that.
• 47:41
  Speaker 4: You know you were talking about that.
• 47:42
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, look back at our chicken cock Chanticleer.
• 47:45
  Speaker 4: That was our bourbon that had finished in French cognac barrels.
• 47:49
  Speaker 4: You talk about a potent, yeah one nation, french cognac is so much stronger than Madeira, and so again I was very careful because the barrels that we bought the French cognac barrels some were 225 liters, some were 300 liters, so that really screwed up my liquid and wood ratio.
• 48:08
  Speaker 4: They had to really kind of do a lot more extra tasting, but our bourbon stayed in those barrels anywhere from a month and a half.
• 48:16
  Speaker 4: All I want to do with that secondary barrel is just enhance the flavor.
• 48:26
  Speaker 4: I don't want to overpower it, I just want to enhance it.
• 48:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 48:31
  Speaker 3: So, to finish up right now, you initially what?
• 48:37
  Speaker 3: Okay, okay.
• 48:40
  Speaker 3: So right now, greg, initially you put out a 15 year barrel strength chicken cock that, uh, I remember tasting a long time ago and had my fair share and uh, but uh, they're right now at the, at the, the tasting room, and you can go there and get that at the moment and it I mean the packaging is spectacular on it, but you have a.
• 49:07
  Speaker 3: It's not a barrel strength, but you have a 15-year chicken cock.
• 49:10
  Speaker 3: Tell us about that at the circa 1856, that's there.
• 49:14
  Speaker 4: Yeah, that's one of the unique things at circa 1856.
• 49:17
  Speaker 4: At our tasting room we have some exclusive products that you only buy there.
• 49:21
  Speaker 4: That's it.
• 49:22
  Speaker 4: They're sold.
• 49:28
  Speaker 4: Only place they're sold in the US or in the world is right there at Circa 1856.
• 49:31
  Speaker 4: So one of those is a 15-year-old.
• 49:31
  Speaker 4: You tasted the original 15-year-old we did a couple years ago, which was a barrel strength, it was 114 proof and it was basically only sold in Kentucky and it was basically only sold in Kentucky, other than we sold a few online and it was very exclusive.
• 49:46
  Speaker 4: We did what was it?
• 49:46
  Speaker 4: 1,372 bottles, I believe.
• 49:49
  Speaker 4: Total.
• 49:49
  Speaker 4: Every bottle was sequentially numbered and again, it was a 15-year-old 114 proof.
• 49:56
  Speaker 4: This was whiskey.
• 49:57
  Speaker 4: When I was going out and doing my treasure hunting this was one of those days I found a true gem.
• 50:02
  Speaker 4: It was fantastic.
• 50:03
  Speaker 4: I mean I tasted the whiskey, smelled the whiskey.
• 50:06
  Speaker 4: I mean it was phenomenal and so I was so proud.
• 50:10
  Speaker 4: I think it sold for what?
• 50:10
  Speaker 4: $300 a bottle, something like that, but it sold out like that.
• 50:15
  Speaker 4: It was just crazy.
• 50:16
  Speaker 3: It was just gone.
• 50:18
  Speaker 4: Well, what happened was when we bonded that apparently I don't know if we didn't order enough, but I think what happened was they didn't ship enough labels and so we had some of that whiskey left over.
• 50:29
  Speaker 4: So we took the little bit of 15-year-old we had left over, put it in a tank or tote whatever it had there.
• 50:36
  Speaker 4: It's been sitting there until recently Now, when we started the stationery inca 1856, we had this left over, so we decided to go ahead and bomb it and make it exclusive to Circa 1856.
• 50:48
  Speaker 4: What happens is, when whiskey sits in a tank or in a tote, oxygen's going to get in there and so the proof will actually reduce.
• 50:56
  Speaker 4: So the product we have there is still extremely good, but it's 103 proof the 15-year-old we're selling at the Circa 1856.
• 51:05
  Speaker 4: Still delicious.
• 51:06
  Speaker 4: Likewise, we have a barrel pit that's exclusive to Circa 1856.
• 51:11
  Speaker 4: I think it's 124.4 proof single barrel barrel pit that people can purchase as well.
• 51:19
  Speaker 5: Would that quite possibly be one of the three that we didn't pick?
• 51:23
  Speaker 5: No, no.
• 51:26
  Speaker 4: What we picked.
• 51:27
  Speaker 4: Actually the product we tasted CT.
• 51:30
  Speaker 4: It's going to be six years old here on the 24th of this month, so it was five years old when we tasted it and the barrel pick is going to be bottled as six-year-old for the Kentucky Bourbon Festival.
• 51:43
  Speaker 4: That's awesome.
• 51:44
  Speaker 4: Back to my point.
• 51:47
  Speaker 4: You know that tasted far beyond a five-year-old bourbon Every good of eight to ten, Well, I mean.
• 51:55
  Speaker 4: So that's one of the things I do tastings all over the country and people say, oh, I won't drink a bourbon unless it's at least eight years old.
• 52:03
  Speaker 3: I said you know, I'm sorry, but you know, it's all about handling the variables you're given to make a great whiskey and I think that's proof that it doesn't have to be eight, ten years old no, actually, um, honestly, uh, some of the bourbons, uh, it's all about what, what went into it beforehand, the barrels, I mean, for god's sakes, uh, when you think about, uh, buffalo trace, not to whatever, but they basically steam, heat their warehouses consistently, taking them up and down, which is a form of what people call rapid aging.
• 52:43
  Speaker 3: But buffalo trace never says that they rapid age anything.
• 52:47
  Speaker 3: All they do is heat it and and, and nobody can rapid age anything, because three years in the barrel is three years in the barrel.
• 52:54
  Speaker 3: What happens in between it?
• 52:56
  Speaker 3: You can do a lot of stuff, but in the end that's still three-year-old whiskey.
• 53:01
  Speaker 3: But, like you said, if the right stuff happens, when it's in that barrel and you put it in there for you know, the five in the six, the five it does, it can taste like an eight or nine year old.
• 53:13
  Speaker 3: That just the normal stuff happened, you know, to the bourbon in the barrel.
• 53:17
  Speaker 3: But you know that's just how, how it goes down.
• 53:21
  Speaker 3: But realistically it really comes down to the person who's doing the tasting, knowing that that barrel is ready, because let's just say it's ready now and it tastes delicious, and it tastes like an eight or nine at five or six.
• 53:34
  Speaker 3: What's it.
• 53:35
  Speaker 3: What's it going to taste at eight or nine?
• 53:37
  Speaker 3: What happens by that point?
• 53:38
  Speaker 3: It could have too much, you know, of the char or whatever at that point.
• 53:42
  Speaker 3: So as a person who's making whiskey, you've got to make sure when the whiskey is peaking, that's when it needs to be bottled and sold right.
• 53:51
  Speaker 4: Absolutely.
• 53:52
  Speaker 4: You did a good point there.
• 53:53
  Speaker 4: Most people think the older it gets, the better it gets, and that's not true.
• 53:57
  Speaker 4: It'll improve, improve, improve and at some point it starts flattening out and at some point the wood will taste.
• 54:03
  Speaker 4: I mean, I've tasted some aged bourbons that taste like liquid oak.
• 54:07
  Speaker 4: Some of these older bourbons, just like the 15-year-old we did those barrels were on the first floor and so it's cooler climate down there, slower aging.
• 54:17
  Speaker 4: Most 15-year-olds they can take I'll ask you a question.
• 54:23
  Speaker 4: They can be.
• 54:25
  Speaker 3: There's plenty of variables, okay why would someone apple flavor a 25 year old whiskey?
• 54:31
  Speaker 3: Because the 25 year yeah, yeah, it's like no one would ever drink this.
• 54:39
  Speaker 3: But if we put apple in it and call it 25, we can charge 250 bucks a bottle and it's going to taste good because they put apple flavoring in it.
• 54:50
  Speaker 3: So I just you know there's so much you can do if it's overdone, right, as long as you can market it.
• 54:57
  Speaker 3: It's whiskey, it's not like it.
• 55:00
  Speaker 3: Actually it doesn't go bad, it just tastes bad.
• 55:04
  Speaker 5: I truly think, the the more around this industry that I am, that age statements are probably the least thing that I look at.
• 55:14
  Speaker 5: Like, if I'm looking to purchase a bourbon whiskey, whatever it is, I'm not concerned about the age at all.
• 55:22
  Speaker 5: I'm more concerned about the person putting the product in the bottle, the process.
• 55:27
  Speaker 5: There's a lot more that goes into it and just like great saying that this bottle is coming out for KDF it's a six-year, going to be a six-year on the 24th of this month.
• 55:40
  Speaker 5: It's not even close to the flavor profile that most people would say that.
• 55:46
  Speaker 5: But then you also get people who are like Greg said, that are you know?
• 55:50
  Speaker 5: Hey, I won't drink anything eight years or less.
• 55:52
  Speaker 5: And then you find out they're Canadian whiskey drinkers and you're like, well, there's not even a comparison of an eight-year-old Canadian whiskey and a four-year-old Kentucky bourbon.
• 56:02
  Speaker 3: No, because they're using used barrels in a cold climate.
• 56:06
  Speaker 3: They need 20 years to catch up to the four years.
• 56:09
  Speaker 3: I mean, it's just that simple.
• 56:12
  Speaker 4: There are people out there your point, ct.
• 56:14
  Speaker 4: When we first started making our whiskey at Barschamp Bourbon Company, my responsibility was to go out and try to find good quality whiskey that we could put on the chicken cock label and bridge the gap until ours was of uh, proper age in maturation.
• 56:30
  Speaker 4: You know, I tell people the last thing I want to know is this age or it's proof.
• 56:35
  Speaker 4: I want to taste it.
• 56:36
  Speaker 4: It smells good.
• 56:37
  Speaker 4: If it tastes good, that's what I'm looking for.
• 56:38
  Speaker 4: I'll find out those details later.
• 56:39
  Speaker 4: As far as age, mass, spill and proof and all that stuff.
• 56:41
  Speaker 4: I want to taste it If it smells good.
• 56:43
  Speaker 4: If it tastes good, that's what I'm looking for.
• 56:44
  Speaker 4: I'll find out those details later.
• 56:45
  Speaker 4: As far as age, mass, build, the proof and all that other stuff, I just want to smell it.
• 56:48
  Speaker 4: I want to taste it.
• 56:51
  Speaker 5: And we'll go from there, because even on barrel picks, people will tend to gravitate towards a higher proof, because, oh, it's 124 instead of 108.
• 57:01
  Speaker 5: And you're like, well, wait a minute, you should try it first.
• 57:02
  Speaker 5: The 108 is probably actually better.
• 57:04
  Speaker 5: But people get hung up on it, and I think that's even true.
• 57:09
  Speaker 5: Do that tasting blind and see what they say.
• 57:11
  Speaker 5: I think that's even true of the industry, though.
• 57:13
  Speaker 5: Like even the people that are out buying these bottles.
• 57:16
  Speaker 5: They get hung up on that kind of thing instead of does it actually taste good or is actually one better than the other?
• 57:25
  Speaker 5: And I think barrel picks are the place where you really get to see that.
• 57:27
  Speaker 5: But if you just go in blindly and say, you know what, I'm just trying to pick the best flavor that suits me, um, may not be the highest proof, may not be the oldest bourbon, it may just be the best tasting, I agree well, if you remember, um, at when you and uh alan were on one time at the same time and he was talking about aging in a barrel and he had a little bit different of opinion, difference of opinion.
• 57:59
  Speaker 3: But I will tell you this, the last barrel pick we did at French Lick, which was in March, I got to taste one of his oldest, lee W Sinclair's, which is a four grain bourbon and it's at eight years because he started in 2000 and it might have been a nine year, it might have been his nine year, it might have been his nine year, the oldest.
• 58:22
  Speaker 3: That it's the first thing he laid down and I'm telling you in the barrel that he had it in and whatever it was, starting to pick up big kentucky caramel flavor and it was fantastic.
• 58:35
  Speaker 3: I mean it was like wow, and I'm just.
• 58:39
  Speaker 3: You know his stuff was is good and I love his respect for the grain and he likes to keep a lot of the grain flavor in there.
• 58:46
  Speaker 3: So you pick up a lot more of that fresh bread or butter or baking or some of those fruity notes that are in there by doing that pot, still that way, but at the same time it was starting to mix with that getting a little bit of age on it and it was fantastic.
• 59:02
  Speaker 3: So I mean, it's just.
• 59:05
  Speaker 3: You know, I think every single barrel that you put in has its own personality.
• 59:10
  Speaker 3: And as a person who distills, and it's you know, when you're distilling like a Jim Beam at that level with those many barrels, it is tricky to be able to watch the stock to make sure the stock doesn't go this way or that way that you're always they got to have a huge tasting team tasting those barrels.
• 59:28
  Speaker 3: You know, it's just it's skill, you know.
• 59:35
  Speaker 4: Everybody has their opinion of what's worked for them over the years.
• 59:37
  Speaker 4: You know, I know what's worked best for me through my years in the business and experience and knowledge that I've been able to gain.
• 59:45
  Speaker 4: You know through every aspect and so again, you're right.
• 59:50
  Speaker 4: I think there's some things that Alan was doing with the barrel and.
• 59:53
  Speaker 4: I didn't necessarily agree with, but you know deeds are old.
• 59:56
  Speaker 4: I mean, he's found it works for him and that's great.
• 59:59
  Speaker 3: Well, yeah, yeah.
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 3: Well, that's why it's such a special thing Everybody can produce a little bit different something or another.
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 3: I mean, you know, that's what people are doing and you, you know, when I first started, there was a lot of small, small craft distilleries, maybe not doing it the way they should, but that's not really those people that those, those things.
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 3: Those days are over.
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 3: Those distilleries, the ones that weren't doing it right, they went by the wayside.
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 3: And the ones that did it right, they're the ones that keep going.
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 3: The industry takes care of itself, right.
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 5: Good point, yeah, absolutely.
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 5: All right, great, so back to the real quick.
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 5: Before Jeff finishes up the Mesonara cast, are you able to say what that price point is going to be, do you?
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 4: know, I'm not sure what they settled on CT.
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 4: I think it's at least $250, maybe a little bit more, but it's 105 proof.
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 4: I went down here two months ago maybe and to work with the Travis Cantrell at at Bardstown Bourbon Company.
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 4: You guys, I know you're aware that you know most all of our recommendations we put out.
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 4: I actually decide what the bottle proof is going to be and again I started barrel proof and I started knocking it down.
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 4: You know, I get it to the point where I feel the alcohol burns its size and really allows the flavors to overtake the profile.
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 4: And for this Mizunaro finished oak 105 proof.
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 4: It's a sweet spot on this one.
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 4: So yeah, it's something special.
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 5: And again, that's what makes you special for your brand is that you're not setting it in at a certain proof.
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 5: You don't have a company that's saying hey, greg, we don't care, it's gonna be 90 proof.
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 5: You know, or it's got to be 80 proof, or it's got to be 101 proof.
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 5: You are the one deciding that based on the most important factor that there is, which is the way it tastes, because if it doesn't taste good, people aren't gonna buy it, they're not gonna drink it.
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 5: So what's the use?
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 5: So kudos to you and understand it.
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 5: I mean obviously you understand it better than anybody, but it's great for the industry to have people like you still in it that aren't just corporate.
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 4: Yeah, that's when I started my consulting company.
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 4: That's when I said I want to get out of the corporate rat race and do my own thing.
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 4: And you know, if whoever I work for doesn't agree with me, that's fine, you don't have to agree.
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 4: But if you want to validate your proof, more power to you.
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 4: I'll go on to my next question.
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 5: But let's not do that with a $5,000 barrel though.
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 4: No, for sure, that's right, that's exactly right.
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 3: All right, that's exactly right.
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 3: All right, yeah, he's been really good tonight.
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 3: He's been by you, but not.
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 5: He's been around here whining the whole time because he's a freaking baby.
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 5: He seriously can't take it.
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 5: He's like Dad, Dad, pay attention to me.
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 5: What are you doing?
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 5: Tell everybody, hi, yeah, at Tate.
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 5: And he's like Dad, Dad pay attention to me.
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 2: What are you?
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 5: doing Right, tell everybody hi.
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, luca, yes.
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 3: Good baby.
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 3: Yeah, he seems to mellow out.
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 3: Is he mellowing finally a little?
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 3: No, no, he's a good dog.
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 5: Oh, he's a great dog, but he's a good dog for me.
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 5: But man, when anybody else is around, holy crap, he's a pain in the butt Because he howls the whole time.
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 5: He's a good dog.
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 5: Look at him chewing on my arm.
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 5: He's good.
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 5: He's just chewing on my arm, can you get down please all right, all right.
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 3: Greg, thank you for coming on tonight.
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 3: Uh, really appreciate it I.
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 3: You know, every podcast we do there's a little bit more to learn.
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 3: Uh, we've kind of evolved them.
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 3: You know, it's like uh, I really think that you know doing it, doing this, and thank you for doing it 10 times.
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 3: You know, at one point, you know, I guess when we start doing the, when we start doing the tv show, you're gonna have to be on.
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 3: Now that you guys, you have to be the first really produced tv show we do and we'll just have to.
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 3: You know, whether it's at 1850, circa 1856, or at Bardstown, we'll have to come down and have you just do it and we'll get you on there.
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 3: So I think that's going to be a lot of fun coming up.
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 4: So it's always a pleasure.
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 4: You know I love you guys and always have.
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 4: We've got a great relationship.
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 4: Again, appreciate it.
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 4: I mean you guys do Not just for Jake and Guy, for the whole industry.
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 4: You guys make it work and get people out there that understand and appreciate.
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 3: I've spent my whole life on this.
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 3: Well, yeah, I mean, as you know, and that's why you love it so much, it's not so much just the whiskey, it's the people, because that's what brings people.
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 3: The whiskey brings people together.
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 3: And then when people are together, that's where friendships and life happens, and that's one thing that I've always found.
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 3: That's what's so good about this industry.
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 3: The people in the industry are completely different than any other industry.
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 3: The people now, the owners maybe not, but you know there are certain aspects that are corporate, but you know, overall, the industry, the people that you know make the whiskey and are in charge of making just, whether they're in a big distillery or a little distillery, they seem to just be such down home people and you know, it's just.
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 3: Life is happening every day and that's something that you know we get lost in, and to be able to be a part of that is something special and we appreciate you letting us be a part of you and your family.
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 3: You know, with Susan and just, you know, I know I've met your children.
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 3: Uh, chris has been spectacular, you know what I mean.
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 3: It's just like, overall, it's just been great, and that's why we can't get enough of you.
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 5: So and we get to see you in less than a month we'll be, that's right.
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 5: I'm just gonna say I'm looking forward to seeing you guys in September, for sure it's always great Kentucky Bird Run Festival is special in so many ways, and people that haven't been there I keep saying oh my God, I don't know why you haven't.
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 5: Especially for us in Ohio it's not that far.
• 1:06:35
  Speaker 5: It's not like you live in California but it's a must-go-to and to meet people like you anybody who comes there and meets a Greg, they're going to be like, oh my God, you know he's so down-to-earth.
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 5: You don't get that in many industries and for sure especially an industry as high-end as the bourbon industry is the people are.
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 5: I always say it's the maturation process and what it takes to distill and make product is a result of the people that are in it and they are a result of the maturation process that literally it takes.
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 2: So long that they're just chill.
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 5: They're just easy to get along with.
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 5: They're not going to get worked up over not meeting a quota for today, because they're not worried about today's quota.
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 5: They're worried about it four to eight years from now, so that I can appreciate and I love.
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 3: Well, it's patience.
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 3: The people have patience.
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 3: Most people aren't just spazzing out all over the place.
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 3: Everybody's about enjoying themselves and having some, and patience is one thing that's needed.
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 3: And when people don't have it, the whiskey will force you to have it.
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 3: So there you go.
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 3: All right, everybody.
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 3: Um, great podcast.
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 3: Uh, remember wwwscotchiebourbonboyscom for all things scotchie bourbon boys.
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 3: Uh, check us out there.
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 3: And then also check us out on all the major podcast formats, which would be Spotify, iheart, apple and I'm also going to say if I need some of our listeners to go to Apple and give us a good current feedback and stars, because right now where we're at, we've been kind of stagnant.
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 3: So I'm going to, for the first person who puts it up there in the United States and gives me a good review, I'm going to send them a Glen Karen, so we'll see if that gets somebody to do it.
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 3: We'll see.
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 3: All right, everybody.
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 3: And then also we're on all the major social media X, facebook, youtube, instagram.
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 3: Check us out and remember the reason why we're all here is for good bourbon and good friends.
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 3: It equals good times.
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 3: And remember, drink responsibly.
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 3: Make sure that you don't drink and drive and go out and live your life adventurously Little Steve-O is going to take us out.
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 2: Oh, show me the way to the next whiskey bar.
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 2: Oh, don't ask why.
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 2: Oh don't ask why.
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 2: Show me the way to the next whiskey bar.
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 2: Oh, don't ask why.
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 2: Oh don't ask why, for if we don't find the next whiskey bar, I tell you we must die.
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 2: I tell you, we must die.
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 2: I tell you, I tell you, I tell you we must die.