Beverage Truth

[MoonlightVFR]

I have fond memories of the Bardstown Convention

Loved the C170 airplanes. visited a distillery . Took the tour.

Now I have been informed that ALL distilleries are changing their advertising and labeling.

A label that stated 12 years aged will subtly be morphed to "recipe" no 12, 8 Years aged will be recipe 8 *.

Supposedly an insider has stated the 12 Yr is actually age about 9 years.

Expect litigation when they start messing with scotch. The barristers will not tolerate deception.

Now I wonder if the Proof is truthful.

Regards

[wingnut]

I can recommend at least one way to find out. Bring your spirits to Mena Arkansas. I know a few guys that'll be happy to test them

[GAHorn]

The Japanese have been buying up all the distilleries. It appears Bourbon has become popular over there. (and we're simply For-Sale.)

[blueldr]

Boy, I sure hope they don't get to fooling around with ol' George Dickels #8 Sour Mash formula.

[MoonlightVFR]

BL


you speak of George Dickel # 8 .

Made in Tullahoma TN. Site of several airplane conventions. I remember Stagger wings,Cessna 170s and Spartan classics. Early 1980s.


Sadly George Dickel # 8 and #12 are now labeled "recipe".

Still tastes great for "hanger conversation.

Regards

[blueldr]

"Recipe"???? What in hell are they making ?? Flapjack Batter ???

[hilltop170]

Boy, I sure hope they don't get to fooling around with ol' George Dickels #8 Sour Mash formula.

Dick-
Why are you concerned about the japs buying George Dickel? By your own admission, since all you do is smell the cork every so often, your 30+ year old bottle of #8 should last at least another 30 years! I know we both took a couple of snorts off of it a few years back but there should still be plenty left unless you took to doing a little more than sniffing!

[170C]

Every time we go down I-24 south and I see the George Dickel sign I think that one of these days I need to stop by for a tour and maybe a sample Many years ago, while on a business trip to Nashville, some of us guys took the Jack Daniel's tour and found it to be really interesting. That place continues to grow to now be a huge distillery. When flying over it, its amazing how many new barrel houses they have built and more under construction. TENNESSEE WHISKEY

[MoonlightVFR]

I am originally from Tennesse so I noted the term Tennessee Whiskey typed in all caps in previous post.

While at the C170 convention in Bardstown KY I went on a distillery tour. I asked a question of the tour guide about "whiskey" and he quietly, politely stated We produce BOURBON, not whiskey not whiskey!

Suddenly I felt like he was looking down his nose at me. Have you ever had that feeling like you are as dumb as a Box of rocks?

A simple question about whiskey and he changes the subject to French Cooking!

[GAHorn]

He was drawing the distinction between "whiskey" and Bourbon....and there is an actual difference.
A Professor of History from Louisville Univ. wrote an interesting book I once read in which he explained that the Whisky Rebellion was a term applied to an uprising by some western Pennsylvania Deutsch (German) farmers who took offense at the new U.S. gov't placing an excise tax on hooch (to pay off the nat'l debt on the revolutionary war).
They planted and grew the rye wheat, they harvested it, they distilled it into whiskey... but the tax required payment in CASH immediately upon distillation...not when it was sold. So they rebelled and George Washington sent 15,000 soldiers to enforce the law.
To escape their plight, some of them moved west into what they thought was French Louisiana...into an area known and named after the French Monarchy... Bourbon county... where they could not find rye wheat.... but found lots of Indian Corn... which made white spirits. Unfortunately for them, Thos Jefferson had just bought Louisiana and so once again they found themselves in the U.S. and owed the tax!
So they decided not to sell it in the new U.S., but instead to ship it down to New Orleans where French descendants might buy it. They couldn't find any barrels except those used to store salted fish, which tended to spoil the flavor....so they burned-out the barrels to get rid of the fish smell and taste. After a month or more bobbing around on a flatboat down the Mississippi, the charcoal in the barrels absorbed the bad taste of the formaldehydes, etc, ...thereby mellowing-out the taste and imparting a pretty, warm, amber color, which the Frenchmen in "Nawlins" had heard came from "Bourbon country"...so they called it that.
To be called "Scotch" whisky the product must come from Scotland. To be called "Tequila" it must meet certain standards and come from Jalisco Mexico. To be called "Champagne" it has to come from a certain area of France. But the term "Bourbon" is only allowed on American product.
To be called "Bourbon" it must be 1) more than 50% corn, 2) made in America, 3) aged 2 years in new white-oak barrels to be referred to as "straight", and 4) diluted to "proof" with nothing but plain water.
"Whiskey" however... can be any kind of spirit distilled from grain, stored in anything from buckets to bathtubs and diluted with whatever.... so the man at the convention-tour was making the point that their stuff was NOT mere "whiskey"... it was much better than that definition... it was "Bourbon".
IF the folks over in Tennessee prefer to be identified with that other stuff called "whiskey" or "whisky"... that's their choice they'll have to explain... as to what they've made it with and what they've mixed it with ... and how it was stored. But the term "bourbon", by laws recognized internationally, speaks for itself as to it's quality.

[Bruce Fenstermacher]

George, always a wealth of knowledge, or at the least a good story. I'm glad you specified it was the renegade WESTERN Pennsylvania Deutsch who started the controversy. My ancestors in the east would have no part of an uprising. They would have simply paid off the soldiers.

[blueldr]

Any guy that knows that much about "whiskey " and "Burbon" must spend a lot of his time imbibing just to keep his memory refreshed.