I was tasting through single barrel selections with a supplier last week, and I mentioned how much more I liked the rye whiskey samples than the Bourbon samples.
“Oh yeah,” he responded in complete agreement; “Yet, we still sell our Bourbon casks ten to one against the rye because Bourbon is Bourbon.”
Talk to any major distiller of both rye and Bourbon, and I promise you the same conversation will occur. Heck, you can see it for yourself during the Instagram Live chat I had with Conor O’Driscoll from Heaven Hill. Which whiskey is he most excited about from his stable? The Pikesville 6 year rye whiskey.
Yet, far more people are after Larceny Barrel Proof and Parker’s Heritage Bourbon.
Whenever there’s a sale disparity like the one currently taking place on the market, where Bourbon sales are heavily outpacing rye—10 to 1, as one supplier put it—it has a serious effect on available quality. Hence, why I’ve recently found four to five serious contenders for single barrel purchases in the rye department, but scarce few in the Bourbon category.
That’s not to say I haven’t been tasting Bourbon single barrels. I taste at least a dozen a week.
It’s to say I’ve been turning them down. Meanwhile, I’ve purchased three different rye single barrels in the last month: one from Beam, one from Stellum, and one from Ry3.
Because rye isn’t nearly as in demand as Bourbon, a number of producers are sitting on barrels with serious age at this point. In the case of the Stellum cask I bought, it’s a marriage of MGP rye whiskey as old as 7 years, married with Kentucky and Tennessee rye whiskies of 9 and 10 years of age, at full proof.
And the quality was simply outstanding! As Toucan Sam used to say: “Follow your nose; it always knows.”
-David Driscoll