More tastings today!  After breakfast, we headed out under more grey skies to Woodford Reserve distillery, the smallest distillery in the US. They are also one of the oldest but we’ve gotten some conflicting info about that which we haven’t worked out yet (see below).  The grounds are lovely and the buildings are designated as part of a national historical landmark. We pulled in behind a hummer limo and were dismayed to see a gaggle of girls emerge – a hen party from Chicago.  Really?  Ten women came down from Chicago to taste bourbon for 3 days.  Okay Stephanie – it’s your wedding.  At least they were not a giggling gaggle.  This was the first distillery where we actually got to see some of the equipment working – the bottling line was really cool.

 

This of course puts in question the comment we heard at the Wild Turkey distillery yesterday that all the distilleries shut down in the summer. Woodford Reserve produces only two bourbons, their signature one and a double oaked version that gets recasked after the 6-9 years in a second new oak barrel for an additional 9 to 12 months.  They also triple distill their bourbon ala Irish whiskey like Jamesons and this was the first tour to show and discuss the spirit safe (still no head, heart and tail of the run discussion though.)   Like Maker’s Mark yesterday, the distillery and tasting was very classy.  The tour guide explained how to do a three sip tasting to wake the palate so that the third sip was really appreciated.  And we got the bourbon ball which really changed the flavor profile of the bourbon when you sipped after eating the chocolate.  I think their double oaked is by far my favorite bourbon.

Now bourbon isn’t the only beverage that comes in a barrel – Kentucky has a wine industry don’t you know! 🙂  There were several that we could visit but we did get a personal “recommendation” for one from Chris and Amy; by recommendation I mean they conceded that it was “pretty good for Kentucky wine” so off we went to Equus Vineyards.  It was very laid back and friendly and we did a tasting (so now we have MORE wineglasses from wineries) and actually purchased a few bottles.  Nothing earth moving but they did have a nice steel chardonnay (Frank actually preferred it to the oaked version for a change) and a pretty smooth cab sauv. So we now have wine from at least 4 states in our collection (not including commercial ones we pick up a the grocery store) as we are equal opportunity wine industry supporters!

Then we nipped into Frankfort to snap a pic of the capitol.  Keep your eyes out for my new page ‘Capitol Selfies’ – I’m going to see how many states I can get photos of the capitol building for.  I’m sorry I didn’t think of this when we were in Charleston WV the other day so we’ll just have to go back.  Snapping a photo was about all one could do in Frankfort on a dreary Saturday though.  What a lonely and depressing place! We couldn’t even find a restaurant open to have lunch – we had to settle for the celiac fast food standby – Wendy’s!

But we got some sustenance before heading to the last distillery of the trip: Buffalo Trace.  Executive summary:  best tour for technical information, otherwise not particularly impressed.  This was the only tour where they discussed the barrel making process in detail and explained the technical process of distillation.  Otherwise, the best part about the tour was that it was free! The distillery is one of the largest and claims to be the oldest continually operating distillery in the country.  It was opened in 1787 and operated even during prohibition when they were one of four distilleries allowed to make “medicinal whiskey” [Note: I have as yet been unable to craft a Google search that will return the names of the other three.  There are pages of dense text that make up the results of the searches I’ve done so far and I haven’t yet had the patience to sift through it.]

The distillery supports *18* brands of bourbon and I’m not sure either of us think they do them particularly well.  They did start bottling some pretty good vodka though and we picked up a bottle of that instead. They also were not operating and so similar to Wild Turkey yesterday, we got to sit and watch a video instead of seeing how things were actually done.  That was more painful today because the script was appallingly maudlin and soppy.  I think it was written by someone at Hallmark. Some memorable phrases: “amber hued treasure” and making “whisky as bold as their spirit”.  Yak.

And like Wild Turkey yesterday, there was no organized tasting.  There were four options for tasting: white dog (moonshine), vodka, Buffalo Trace bourbon and Eagle’s Rest 10 year old – and everyone could taste two.  I opted for just the vodka but Frank tried both the bourbons and wasn’t a fan of either.  So we are calling it a day and are off for the evening repast and possibly some bluegrass!