Whiskey Review: Weller Antique 107 vs. 12 Year Bourbon

Weller bourbon occupies a relatively small niche in the American whiskey universe, being one of the few wheated bourbons along with the ubiquitous Maker's Mark, lesser known Old Fitzgerald, Rebel Yell and the lauded Van Winkle bourbons. Wheated bourbons take the usual bourbon formula of corn, rye and malted barley and replace the rye flavoring grain with wheat. This makes for a less spicy but generally sweeter bourbon, because rye tends to mask the underlying corn sweetness in the whisky. Wheat lets the sweetness shine, which makes them very approachable spirits.

Weller bourbons are owned and made by Buffalo Trace. BT acquired the brand during the breakup of the old Stitzel-Weller distillery and has been producing wheated bourbon in the same mold ever since. As best I can gather from a bit of research, all of the wheated bourbons I mentioned above except for Maker's Mark are made with the same 75% corn, 20% wheat, 5% malt mash bill, which is also a legacy of the Stitzel-Weller distillery. There are four different bottlings of Weller bourbon - a 90-proof, No Age Statement (previously 7 year old) Special Reserve, a 107-proof NAS Antique 107 (also previously 7 year old), a 90-proof 12 year old, and a barrel proof NAS (but roughly 11 year old) William Larue Weller that's part of the yearly Buffalo Trace Antique Collection. Here I'll be reviewing the middle two, the 107 and the 12 Year.

W.L. Weller Antique 107


Nose: caramel, corn, wheat, a bit of vanilla and oak, cinnamon brown sugar, which becomes sweeter and creamier with more prominent corn and vanilla after adding a couple of drops of water

Taste: sugary sweetness up front, transitioning into sweet cinnamon and spice, then pepper, oak and wheat further back, which becomes smoother with more pronounced pepper after dilution

Finish: good length, pepper and oak, somewhat drying and astringent

If you want to try a wheated whisky, this is what I'd direct you towards. It's usually in the mid-$20 range, which is a very reasonable price given the bottling proof and the intensity of flavors. I was rather surprised by how much pepper shows up in the palette and finish, given that there's no rye in the mash bill, but it does lean more towards black pepper, rather than the chili pepper that I tend to get out of rye-recipe bourbons.

W.L. Weller 12 Year


Nose: sweet wood, caramel, toffee, slightly fruity bubblegum candy, vanilla, a whiff of corn and wheat, which becomes grainier, with fresher toffee, baked apples and brown sugar after adding a few drops of water

Taste: not too sweet, toffee and caramel, softer than the Antique, slight pepper, transitory oak, a touch of wheat, which becomes sweeter and smoother, but with less pepper and reduced complexity after dilution

Finish: medium, pepper and oak

The 12 year old Weller is unsurprisingly more barrel-driven, with heavier toffee/caramel and oak flavors. The lower bottling proof also means that it has a bit less punch than the 107, though this can also be seen positively as increased smoothness over its younger sibling. Given that there's only about $5 between the two whiskies, I'd say that it's going to come down to personal preference rather than value when deciding between the two. I lean towards the 107 because I like bolder whiskies, but for a nice evening sipper, the 12 Year is going to be a good companion. Either way, don't let the somewhat low-rent packaging turn you off of these fine bourbons. While I'm usually wary of plastic screw caps, in this case they hide some really well-made American spirits.

Making Fruit Tinctures

One of the fun things that you can do once you start getting into cocktails is making your own ingredients. Syrups like orgeat or lime cordial are pretty easy. A little up the difficulty scale are alcoholic infusions. The simplest are those like limoncello, where citrus peels are soaked in high proof alcohol, then diluted with sugar syrup. In the picture above you can see a couple of those in progress, with both lemon peels and grapefruit peels soaking in 95% alcohol. I usually buy Everclear because it's only $15 for a 750 mL bottle and it can be diluted down to whatever strength I want to use. While you can use 100-proof vodka or something like that in a pinch, the higher the proof of the alcohol, the more oils will be extracted from the peels. The same does not necessarily hold true for fruit infusions. The compounds that give fruits flavor are not necessarily as oily as the aromatic compounds in citrus peels. This means that different compounds will be extracted from the fruit depending on the alcohol concentration used to make the infusion. It's worthwhile to play around with the ABV of your infusion to see how this influences the final product. I usually let infusions sit for about a month, but you can make them go faster by giving the containers a swirl or a shake every so often to help the infusion proceed more thoroughly. 

To finally get into some real chemistry, there's a good reason why agitating your infusion speeds up the process - as compounds are leeched from the peels, the concentration of those compounds in the area directly adjacent to the peels will build up, which makes for a smaller gradient between the solid and liquid phases. Moving things around spreads out the dissolved compounds, reestablishing a stronger gradient and causing the oils to extract more quickly.

After your infusion is done steeping, you need to filter the liquid away from the solids. A mesh strainer is a good first step. If you're using fruit, you may want to squeeze it to get out all of the delicious liquid, but you can also use it for making pie. To further clarify the liqueur, a metal or plastic coffee filter is a good way to get more of the fine particles. Actual coffee filters will also work, but they will also absorb some of the liqueur. Personally, I usually just accept that there's going to be some leftover solids in my infusions. It's not going to hurt you.

Once you're filtered your infusion, you have two options - either dilute the liquid with sugar syrup to make a liqueur or keep the infusion undiluted. The first is more traditional and makes for a handy ingredient that can be drunk straight or added to cocktails directly. As long as the resulting liqueur is over 20% ABV, it should be stable indefinitely without refrigeration. A high sugar content will also help to ward off any microbial growth. I personally tend to lean towards the second option, because I'm rarely interested in drinking liqueurs straight. By leaving the infusion in an un-diluted state, I can easily swap out the syrups that I use to sweeten the drink, with some interesting results. Alternatively, as in the cocktail at the bottom of this post, I can use the tinctures as base spirits instead of as liqueurs.

Infusions will often change in smell and flavor, even after the steeping is over and the liquid has been filtered. While they're technically ready to drink as soon as you've got them filtered, another couple of months will probably help to mellow and integrate the flavors and smells. Additionally, if you take the route of leaving the infusions undiluted, it's normal that you won't necessarily be able to smell a lot from the infusion. The high concentration of alcohol solubilizes the aromatic compounds very effectively. When the spirit is diluted with water, the aromatics become less soluble in the liquid and are then more volatile.

Rangpur Bounty
1 oz gin
1 oz mango tincture
0.5 oz lime juice
0.5 oz grapefruit juice
0.25 oz passionfruit syrup
0.25 oz simple syrup
1 dash Angostura bitters

The sip leads off with a bit of syrupy sweetness, which resolves into the tropical fruits of the passionfruit syrup and mango tincture. Near the end, the snappier flavors of gin, bitters, lime and grapefruit lead into the finish, keeping the drink from becoming insipid. I really like how the flavors flow past either other, blending briefly before passing off to the next set. The bitters, as so often they do, seem to be key to really amping everything up. Finally, for being a rather spiritous cocktail (remember, the tincture is equivalent to more than 2x the volume of normal 80-proof spirit), it ends up being rather balanced and refreshing.

Overall, this is a drink that I'm rather pleased with given that it was mostly an effort to use up some lime and grapefruit juice that I had sitting in the fridge.

Tiki Classics: the Q.B. Cooler

This cocktail is one of the creations of Don the Beachcomber and plays an important role in the Eternal Mai Tai Controversy. Simply put, Don claimed that Trader Vic's Mai Tai was a copy of Don's Q.B. Cooler. If you want the full story, pick up a copy of Beachbum Berry Remixed, in which the Bum lays out all the available evidence.

Q.B. Cooler
1 oz orange juice
0.5 oz lime juice
0.5 oz honey syrup
0.25 oz falernum
1 oz soda water
1 oz gold Jamaican rum
1 oz light Puerto Rican rum
0.5 oz Demerara rum
2 dashes Angostura bitters
0.25 tsp ginger syrup

Combine all ingredients with a handful of crushed ice. Blend for 5 seconds, then pour unstrained into a double old fashioned glass with more crushed ice. To be perfectly authentic, garnish the drink with several mint sprigs.

The sip leads off with rich rum flavors augmented by the Angostura bitters. Fruit flavors and the ginger syrup follow, leading into the falernum spiciness and honey sweetness, then finishing with the return of the rum and bitters. If I really squint, I can kind of see how you might confuse this with a mai tai, but it's not a completely obvious connection. The lime and Jamaican rum are both there. Falernum has almonds in it, which could in a sense sub for the mai tai's orgeat. There's orange juice instead of orange liqueur. The sharper flavors of the ginger syrup and falernum might be analogous to the agricultural notes of rhum agricole. But even if this was the inspiration for the Mai Tai, Trader Vic's creation is superior, both in terms of results and ease of construction (the Q.B. is pretty fiddly, even for a tiki drink). So while this is definitely solid, it's entirely warranted that the Mai Tai outshone it.

Homemade Lime Cordial

As we head into spring, it's going to be time for warmer weather cocktails again. Break out that bottle of gin that's been hiding in favor of richer spirits. And what better drink to make than a gimlet? But if you're going to make a proper gimlet, that calls for lime cordial. What's that? The nasty, HFCS-ladden monstrosity of Rose's Lime Cordial found on every liquor store shelf? Perish the thought.

Lime cordial began in the 19th century as a way for sailors to preserve lime juice that could be consumed on long voyages to hold off scurvy. In essence it was simply a mixture of lime juice, sugar and lime peels simmered briefly to make a syrup. It's relatively easy to make and adds a new dimension to a number of different classic and tiki cocktails. This recipe comes from Imbibe magazine's "Mix It Up" feature in their Jan/Feb 2011 issue.

Lime Cordial
6 limes (enough for 1/2 cup of juice)
3/4 cup granulated sugar

Zest the limes and save the peels. Don't worry about getting some of the bitter pith as it will actually perk up the resulting syrup a bit. Juice the zested limes and strain the juice into a saucepan. Add sugar and simmer for ~20 minutes. Let the syrup cool for 5 minutes, then add the lime peels and steep for 15-20 minutes. Strain the syrup through a mesh strainer into a clean container and store in the refrigerator. The cordial should keep for several months.

While a gimlet is the classic use for lime cordial, there are a number of other recipes that call for it, from the tiki-style Suffering, Dying and Dead Bastards, to classic drinks from the Cocktail Database, including this little number:


Limey Cocktail
1 oz light rum
0.75 oz lime cordial
0.5 oz orange liqueur
0.25 oz lime juice

Combine all ingredients, shake with ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

While this drink calls for light rum, I decided to tweak it a bit by using the rather potent 100-proof rhum agricole blanc from La Favorite.

The nose is dominated by the vegetal funk of the rhum agricole, backed up by a bit of lime oil from the cordial. The initial sip is rather syrupy with hints of the orange liqueur, making it seem like the drink is going to be overpoweringly sweet. However, this quickly transitions to snappy lime juice and the alcoholic bite and funky pear flavors of the rhum. There's a bit of lingering bitter sweetness from a combination of the rhum and syrups, making it interestingly more-ish.

On the face of it, this is simply a rhum-based New Orleans sour, but the use of lime cordial makes for a more interesting drink than one would get with a more standard recipe.

Tiki Classics: the Luau Scorpion

The Scorpion is one of the drinks that made Trader Vic rightly famous. It was a potent and voluminous drink designed to serve a number of customers at once who would drink out of a communal bowl. This spawned a number of copycat drinks, each with similar but distinct recipes. This variant comes via the Luau restaurant in Beverly Hills, dating from 1958. Personally I find it to be the best variant, largely because of the inclusion of lime juice instead of lemon and the addition of gin. For a comparison of all the different types of Scorpion, check out Kaiser Penguin's epic post.

Luau Scorpion (Beachbum Berry Remixed)
2 oz gold Puerto Rican rum
2 oz gin
1 oz brandy or Cognac
2 oz orange juice
1 oz lime juice
1 oz simple syrup
3/4 oz orgeat syrup

Combine all ingredients, add a handful of cracked ice, blend for 5 seconds, then pour unstrained into a double rocks glass or tiki bowl with more ice cubes or cracked ice. Serves two.

As far as ingredients go, I like a fairly rich Puerto Rican-style rum, something like Ron Abuelo 7 Años, Bacardi 8 Años or Flor de Caña 7 Year. These will given the drink a solid rummy base and play well with the fruit juices. The best gin I've had in a Scorpion so far is Hendrick's. It's floral notes dance nicely around the drink and it's just bitter enough to give the drink some snap without dominating. Aviation is another good choice, though I find that it doesn't play as well. Plymouth also gets tossed around as a good choice, but I find that it's a little bit too assertive. For brandy, something on the younger and fruiter end of the spectrum is going to be a good choice. I usually go for Hardy VS, but Jacques Cadin VSOP is also tasty if you want something a bit woodier. Pisco might even work, but it's fruit flavors will stand out much more in comparison to an aged spirit.

The sip leads off with the fruity flavors of the cognac and orange juice, livened by the floral and herbal notes of the gin. There's a brief interlude while the flavors retreat slightly, followed by the rum poking its head out and a return of the gin leading into the finish. Throughout the sip, the lime and syrups balance each other out, keeping any one aspect of the drink from getting out of hand. A tasty, but decidedly potent, potable.

Whisky Review: Speyside Showdown

A few months ago I reviewed three different Speyside cask strength whiskies from Aberlour, Glenfarclas and Macallan. It so happens that I have the 12 year old whiskies from these three distillers as well. They present interesting facets of the way that Speyside whiskies can be produced. So it seemed logical to compare them to each other.

Aberlour 12 Year


Nose: richly fruity - red wine, raisins, raspberry preserves or fruit leathers - slightly sour, creamy sherry, very floral, a wisp of vanilla, nougat and toffee, nutty honey, which becomes sweeter, creamier and more rounded, with more dried fruits, Oloroso sherry, and an even more pronounced floral/perfumed character after adding a few drops of water

Taste: sharp, gingery sweetness up front, ginger continues throughout, fades into mixed creamy oak tannins, pepper, sherry, malt and slightly sour peat, which becomes sugary sweet up front with a slightly diminished ginger bite, gaining heat a bit further back after dilution

Finish: dry chocolate, figs, ginger, peat, sherry, slight bitterness, oak, peanuts and toasted marshmallow

This is the older version of the Aberlour 12 Year, at 43% with chill filtration. It was the first scotch whisky I ever bought. It was on sale in Oregon for $30, which made it the cheapest I could get my hands on. I was completely unprepared for the flavors it presented to me, especially because of my lack of experience with straight spirits. I tried it a number of different times over the last year or so, but it never really engaged me until recently. It may have just been a matter of trying it in a different setting, but everything finally clicked. Unlike the other two whiskies I'll be reviewing here, Aberlour ages this whisky in both ex-bourbon barrels and used Oloroso sherry casks, then marries the two varieties together before bottling. My guess is that the preponderance of the whisky comes from the ex-bourbon barrels as the sherry influence seems less pronounced than what is found in the other two whiskies. This lets the extremely floral nose of this whisky shine over the other elements. However, the nose is definitely the highlight of this whisky. The palate is pretty decent, but the gingery spiciness is just a bit too dominant and the flavors could do with a touch of a punch-up. But hey, for a $30-40, 12 year old single malt, it's really good. This makes me interested to try the newer version that is bottled at 48% without chill filtration. However that version has also been priced around $55, at which point it's going to be tempted to pony up the extra dollars for Aberlour A'Bunadh. But if I can ever find it closer to $45, I'll be sure to snap up a bottle.

Glenfarclas 12 Year


Nose: raisins, dates, chocolate, malt, raspberry, fresh sherry, honeyed malt underneath, some floral perfume, which becomes slightly diminished, with more honeyed grain, retaining plenty of gentle dried fruit and floral character after dilution

Taste: rich sugar and honey sweetened malt through to mid-palate, ginger spice arrives early and holds throughout, chocolate and dates come in near the back along with pepper, with the ginger bite becoming a little more gentle after adding a few drops of water

Finish: pepper, ginger, chocolate, dates and malt, which becomes slightly bitter like cocoa powder after adding water

Glenfarclas's whisky is aged entirely in ex-sherry casks, and it shows. The flavors are strongly driven by its aging, with the dried fruits and chocolate taking center stage with strong ginger in the palate and finish. However even with all of the sherry presence, it's actually a drier whisky than the Aberlour. Also, the chocolate/date/malt combo reminds me uncannily of Chocolate Brownie Clif Bars. Given that the 'Farclas often has roughly the same price-point as the Aberlour, I think it's close to a toss-up between the two. Go for the Aberlour if you want something with more malt character, go with Glenfarclas if you'd like a more sherried whisky.

Macallan 12 Year


Nose: moderately sweet sherry, PX/Oloroso split, red wine, raisins, raspberries, malt and vanilla underneath, slightly floral, with the raisins being emphasized over the sherry, and more vanilla after adding a few drops of water

Taste: jammy sweetness up front, with a burst of pepper mid-palate and chocolate-covered coffee beans leading into the finish, with more honeyed raisins, but less expansive flavors after dilution

Finish: sherried malt, edging towards bitter cacao

This is where the review gets slightly unfair, because I was tasting from a mini of Mac 12 whereas I own full bottles of the Aberlour and Glenfarclas whiskies. However, Macallan's 12 Year is also hands down the most expensive, reaching a moderately eye-watering price of $55 here in Oregon. I did try to get some breadth by tasting small samples over the course of a few months, so I still feel reasonably comfortable with my assessment. I wouldn't mind giving it another try, but only if I wasn't the one paying. Macallan sherry oak whiskies are, unsurprisingly, aged exclusively in ex-sherry barrels and it really shows. My initial impression was of very high proof sherry, without much else going on. After a couple more tries I was able to find some other smells and flavors, but the sherry still takes center stage. Its flavors were also somewhat less robust than the other two, which, when you also consider the small price differential between Macallan's 12 Year and Cask Strength whiskies, means that I'd strongly recommend buying the Mac CS instead of the 12 year. If you want a lower proof sherry driven whisky, the 'Farclas would be my recommendation, both in terms of flavor and price.

Looking over all three whiskies, I think they're already arranged how I would rank them. The Aberlour edges out the 'Farclas by a bit, having a bit more complexity and a slightly better price point. The Macallan trails in my opinion, with the whisky almost being overwhelmed by the sherry. However if that's what floats your boat, it's still an interesting dram. It's just that, as noted above, I think the Cask Strength version is a much better representation of what Macallan can do.

Further Adventures with Arrack

Batavia arrack is a rather peculiar spirit that I first talked about last spring. While it can be a bit hard to use to good effect in cocktails due to its strong flavors, with the right combinations of ingredients it can be harnessed to produce delicious drinks.

Atalanta

1 oz Batavia Arrack
1 oz Laird's Bonded applejack
0.25 oz St. Elizabeth's allspice dram
0.75 oz lemon juice
0.5 oz grapefruit juice
0.5 oz demerara syrup
1 pinch nutmeg

Combine all ingredients, shake with ice and pour unstrained into a chilled glass.

For a drink that looks both very stiff (the arrack and applejack are both 100 proof) and with lots of strong, potentially clashing flavors, this drink turns out to be quite pleasant and almost subdued. Don't shake too hard, because you don't want this kind of deliciousness to get tepid. The nose and initial tastes are mostly the arrack's funk, though it's not beating you about the head. The applejack provides a pleasant, whiskey-like base and subdued fruitiness. The lemon and grapefruit juices give the drink a bit of snap and bitterness to counteract the rich sweetness of the demerara syrup. Finally, the allspice dram gives the drink a delightful spiciness that wraps around the other flavors in the drink. As is, this is a great drink to sit and sip over the course of a warm evening. Minus the fruit juices, it could even become a pretty good hot winter drink.

Javanese Crusta
1.5 oz Batavia arrack
0.35 oz lime juice
0.25 oz cinnamon syrup
0.25 oz orgeat
2 dashes Angostura bitters

Combine all ingredients, shake with ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass with a large strip of lime peel.

This drink is a variant of the classic Brandy Crusta from Frederic over at Cocktail Virgin Slut. The nose of this drink blends a hefty dose of lime oil from the peel with a touch of hogo from the arrack, the subtle nuttiness of the orgeat and the spice notes of the bitters and cinnamon syrup. The taste reprises these elements, but with a definite order. Less sweet up front than I would have expected, the arrack and lime attack mid-palate, fading into the nut/spice interplay of the syrups and bitters. The gentleness of this drink is rather surprising given the robust hate it/love it nature of Batavia arrack, but the other ingredients do a good job of tying it down into something quite enjoyable.