Diageo

Interview with Tom Bulleit

Last week during Tales of the Cocktail in New Orleans, Tom Bulleit, founder of Bulleit Frontier Whiskey,  paid a visit to WGNO-TV for an on-air interview for News With a Twist (you can find that here).   When they were done taping, I sat down with him for a few minutes to chat.  We talked Bulleit Bourbon, New Orleans, Tales of the Cocktail, and more.

Tom, how are you?

Very well, thank you!

I haven’t met a person that didn’t like Bulleit bourbon.  What makes it different?

I think a couple of things.  One, certainly the people that make it happen.  We have wonderful master distillers and chemists and engineers for both the bourbon and the rye.  I think it’s a unique proposition, really, in American spirits and bourbon.   For instance, at one end of the bourbon bookshelf we might have Maker’s Mark, which is a great iconic bourbon that’s made with winter wheat.  It will have a little bit lighter flavor… a great sweetness and smoothness.  At the other end of the spectrum you’ll have Bulleit bourbon.  It’s very heavily ryed bourbon.  Shall I divulge the secret recipe?  68% corn, 4% malted barley, 28% rye.

I was close.  The first time I tasted I guessed about 30% rye.

Exactly – as implemented today.  The historic family recipe is two thirds corn and one third rye.  That’s about double the rye of most bourbon.  So, it would be the driest of the bourbons.  Very spicy.  It’d be more towards the scotch palate, maybe, because of the dryness.

I find the drier bourbons, the ones higher in rye, make for a nicely balanced cocktail. 

Well, they make a different cocktail, certainly.  I always plead ignorance when it comes to mixology.  I can break glasses, but aside from that… that’s about as far as it goes.  We’ve had, historically, this wonderful partnership in chemistry, with the bartenders and the mixologists.  They will tell me exactly what you just said.  They will say ‘you mix sweet with sour’, ‘sour with sweet’, not two things that are sweet.  Bulleit is on the dry side.

I like the way it tastes in an old fashioned, and I keep a bottle around for just that purpose.  Your rye whiskey is 95% rye.  That’s a pretty high rye content.

Well, rye whiskey has to have 51% rye.  A straight rye is 80%.  Bulleit is 95% rye, 5% malted barley.  It is also 90 proof.  (A large portion of the next sentence in the audio recording is quite unintelligible.  I’ve tried my best to transcribe it as closely as possible.) I guess another characteristic might be we just use the heart of the whiskey for making… in column stills here in the United States. We’re making several number of alcohols, but primarily phenylethyl alcohol and you know the ethyl alcohol is called the ‘heart of the whiskey,’ and we’re just using that.  It’s a little bit lighter in the throat and mouth.

A couple of years ago you introduced the 10 year Bulleit bourbon.  It’s getting a lot of high marks.  What’s next for Bulleit?

Well, we’re going to stay on course.  I love the way Bill Samuels has managed Maker’s Mark through the years.  I think he’s one of the great iconic distillers and business people in our industry.  He stayed on course for decades and decades.  I have great respect for him.  He’s a very good friend of mine.  I have great respect for that approach.  We’re in an area of innovation.  People do different things.  We won’t do flavored [whiskies].  I think they’re wonderful, but it’s not who we are.  We make straight whiskey.  We’ll probably bring out variants of that in the bourbon and the rye as years go by.  Nothing right now that’s planned.

You’re in New Orleans for Tales of the Cocktail.

We’re here for Tales of the Cocktail, which we… actually I’ve been here for all of them through the years.  Ann Tuennerman has gone from a few bartenders around a few bars to I think last year there were 17,000 career bartenders that came here.  It is the defining gathering of mixology and bartenders in the world.  People are here from all over the world.  It’s an amazing event.  I’m always struck by how entrepreneurial it is.  This is an entrepreneurial city.  I travel all over.  You may not know this is maybe the most hospitable city in the world.  The people are just wonderful.  They are so charming.  In that character, there is an entrepreneurship for everyone.  One of the things we did this year was we sponsored the apprentice program lunch yesterday.  These young people come in and work like thunder supporting all of the cocktails and all of the food service that goes on in this enormous event.  Each one of them… I mean they’re bar owners coming here as apprentices.  They’re bar owners!  They are unbelievable bartenders.  They come to help out.  There’s a huge group from Tampa.  The United States Bartender’s Guild in Tampa.  Tampa is taking this very seriously.  But we’re getting these folks from every place.  I love that entrepreneurship.  I guess I would call myself an entrepreneur, bringing back my great-great-grandfather’s recipe.  Certainly he was one.  I think this city just boils with that in it’s food and beverage service.  Just go to Las Vegas and see who’s restaurants are there.  Look how many of them came from New Orleans.  It’s amazing.

When you’re down in New Orleans for Tales of the Cocktail, what’re you drinking?  What’s your favorite cocktail?

I think my favorite cocktail is… dad and I would drink bourbon on the rocks.  My other is a highball.  I don’t hear it called that anymore much, but you add water to bourbon on the rocks.  My aunt Sister Jean Claire(sp?) was a Catholic nun.  She drank it straight.  I guess she gave herself a dispensation.  I’ve tasted thousands of cocktails through the years made by incredible mixologists, and I’ve never had a bad one.  They’re making cocktails with all sorts of things.  This is not a rebirth.  It’s really the birth of the cocktail movement to me.  Historically we made cocktails, but certainly not with the variety of ingredients, the creativity and the enthusiasm that we’re doing now.  The cocktail movement has been a huge growth driver for Bulleit.  As you say the mixologists and bartenders like the way we’ve configured Bulleit.  It’s compatible with mixology.

Lastly, the popularity of bourbon in the country is skyrocketing.  We just did a piece here (at WGNO-TV) about the bourbon boom… and it is booming.  Where do you see the bourbon industry in the next couple of years?

Those things are really hard to project.  I have been more-or-less a heads down… I come from a pot-stirrer family.  We stir the pot, and in due course it comes out.   We see in the 40’s and the 50’s bourbon and beer in America was huge.  It goes through cycles.  I can’t tell… at this point we don’t know whether this is a cycle.  I suspect everything goes in cycles.  The whole world does.  I think the whiskey industry has come on very heavily.  Not just bourbon.  I don’t know if people are aware that scotch is huge.  They sell more scotch now than they ever have in the history of distilling scotch.  I think people are identifying the whiskies, and I think it may calm down.  I think it will be a settled part of people’s appreciation.  It’s like the culinary arts.  I don’t think we’ll go back to basics in restaurants and I don’t think we’ll go back to basics in mixology.  I think vodka is a wonderful mix, but I don’t think we’ll go back and depend on it exclusively.  I think the whiskies are coming forward and probably will stay forward.

 

Tom was cheerful and enthusiastic during the entire interview.  He seemed to have a genuine passion for the whiskey industry.  The part of the interview that stood out for me was when Tom teased possible future releases being variants of their current bourbon and rye whiskey.  Could we see an aged rye whiskey from Bulleit in the future?

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Barterhouse 20 Year Old Bourbon Review

Last week I posted about the first of Orphan Barrel’s new releases – Old Blowhard.   Now we’re looking at their 20 year old Barterhouse Bourbon.  Where Old Blowhard is a one time release, Barterhouse might be with us for a little while longer.

(Disclaimer:  I was sent a small review sample of Barterhouse from Diageo.)

Barterhouse Bottle Shot_Hi-Res

What a difference six years in the barrel makes!  Where I found the 26 year old Old Blowhard dry, Barterhouse packs a slightly bigger kick, even at a slightly lower proof (90.2 versus 90.7).  There’s much more of that signature bourbon caramel smell, but at 20 years you can make out a lot of oak.  Barterhouse isn’t an overly sweet bourbon.  It’s an earthier, spicier whiskey than Old Blowhard.  The finish is long, and you get a little oak and some brown sugar.  I like this finish more than that of Old Blowhard.

At $75 a bottle, Barterhouse is half the price of Old Blowhard.  It’s not as complex a whiskey as it’s 26 year old counterpart either.  Don’t get me wrong – Barterhouse is not a bad whiskey.  Quite the opposite.  I just think it’s a bit overpriced.  $50-$60 a bottle would have been much easier to swallow.  Then again, I’m not in the business of selling or pricing whiskies.  Have you tried Barterhouse?  Comment below and share your thoughts.

Try before you buy.  7.5/10

Old Blowhard 26 Year Old Bourbon Review

Diageo introduced a new line of whiskies – Orphan Barrel Whiskey Distilling Company.  Its purpose is to release rare and old whiskies from its stocks.  The first two releases, Old Blowhard and Barterhouse, have recently hit shelves, with more releases planned for later this year.

(Disclaimer:  I was sent small review samples of both Old Blowhard and Barterhouse from Diageo.)  This review will cover Old Blowhard.

Old Blowhard Bottle Shot_Hi-Res

Old Blowhard bourbon was aged for 26 years.  I was in third grade when this was distilled.  Yikes!  Before I get into how it tastes, I want to talk about packaging.  Like I said in a previous post, the most important aspect of a whiskey is how it tastes and smells.  However, packaging plays a small but important factor.  If you go to a liquor store and browse the shelves, a bottle’s shape and label can draw you in or get lost on the shelf.  Old Blowhard’s old-time inspired label is among my favorites.  It’s a gorgeous nautical-themed label affixed to an elegant bottle.   So, how does this 26 year old 90.7 proof whiskey taste?

Oaky.  Then again, you have to expect that from a whiskey this old.  It’s not all oak, though.  There’s some faint caramel when you smell it, but it’s hiding behind oak.  There’s some depth in flavor here. It’s rich and a little spicy.  There’s a little sweetness.  Not caramel-sweet…  more like dried fruit sweet. It’s definitely not your average bourbon.  The finish is quick and dry.  No slow burn here.  I really wish it lasted longer.

I like this whiskey.  So much in fact that I decided to treat myself to a bottle.  I went to three different liquor stores before I found one and picked it up $20 cheaper than the suggested retail price of $150.  There are older and more expensive bourbons out there (Pappy Van Winkle 23 and Jefferson’s Presidential Reserve 30 year), so Old Blowhard is cheaper in comparison. However, $150 is still pretty pricey.  Note, all three stores I visited did not have them on the shelf.  You’ll probably have to ask for it.

Tasting Old Blowhard was an interesting and pleasant experience.  It’s the oldest whiskey I’ve tasted (remember, I’m still new to the game).   I’ll gladly go back to Old Blowhard again.  Not too often though – once this release of Old Blowhard is gone, that’s it.   Get it while you can if you’ve got some spare cash and are looking for an older, occasional sipper.  Have you tasted Old Blowhard?  Share your thoughts below.

8.5/10