Drink What You Like …an Adventure along the Bourbon Trail

Bruce TerBeekFriends of ELO

I have returned from an amazing adventure shared with three friends on the Kentucky Bourbon Trail.  Narrow roads wind past horse farms and through the verdant rolling hills of central Kentucky.  The weather was perfect with the fall colors at their peak.  We shared great conversations and wonderful meals paired with bourbon tastings.

What is bourbon?  It is whiskey distilled from grain.  What makes it unique is bourbon is defined by law!  To prevent unscrupulous distillers from mixing turpentine, battery acid or tobacco juice into clear alcohol, the food and drug administration defined that bourbon must meet the following requirements:

Mash:  The mash bill or recipe must contain at least 51% corn.  Distillers typically               use about 70% corn and mix it with varying percentages of rye and malted barley.

Distillation:  The fermented grain when distilled cannot exceed 160 proof alcohol.

Aging:  Bourbon must be aged in new charred oak barrels, the barrel strength is                  limited to 125 proof when the barrel is bottled.

Additives:  The color and flavors are created by the wood in the barrels.  No                        artificial coloring or flavors may be added to the distillate.

Bottling:  Bourbon must be bottled in clear glass.

Origin:  Whiskey labeled bourbon must be made in the United States.

 

The Bourbon Trail features 46 distillers located in Kentucky.  We chose 16 to visit.  They represented a cross section of the entire list varying in size from Haven Hill, the largest which produces 5800 barrels daily, to Yellowstone, the smallest with only 20.  The site included a mix of architecture from the ultra modern to stone structures which have been in continual use since the early 1800’s.

We also toured a barrel manufacturing plant.  As a woodworker, I was fascinated by the art of cooperage.

Kentucky Cooperage makes over 4000 barrels daily.  White oak is logged in Missouri.  The wood is planed to a constant thickness and ripped to remove any cracks or knots.  Each edge has a 5 degree bevel cut along the length of the piece and a notch milled into each end to receive the top and bottom heads.  The cooper selects the staves judging each one’s width by eye and places them in a ring to form the barrel.  A cable is slipped over the loosely held staves and it tightens to compress the assembly into it final shape.

The barrel is rolled onto its side and passed through a burner where a blast of open flame under high air pressure is ignited inside the barrel for a few seconds or up to two minutes.  This chars the interior surface and will allow the sugars in the wood to color and age the bourbon.  The roar of the blast and the huge open flames are like a scene from Dante’s Inferno.

Next the barrel rolls to the final assembly stage where the tip and bottom heads are installed and the six steel bands hammered into place.  No fasteners or glue are used in the process.  Compression holds the barrel together and makes the barrel water tight.

Each barrel weighs about 100 pounds.  Workers roll them into trucks, turning them upright, and stacking them three high.  The loading is all done by hand!

At the end of each tour we adjourned to the tasting room where we sampled four of the premier bourbons made at that distillery.  We were instructed how to swirl the whiskey and to sniff the aroma.  Then how to sip.  I guess my palate isn’t well developed.  I couldn’t detect the notes of apple or anything else so I tended to leave about half of each sample in the glass.  The tour guide took notice and asked me if there was a problem.

Author enjoying his bourbon “sample”.

I smiled and replied, “I prefer scotch”.

“Then drink what you like”, he responded.

Excellent advice.

Bruce TerBeek
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