The definition of whiskey
Well, by law anyway:
For around 150 years, the words Tennessee Whiskey have meant one thing: You take bourbon fresh from the still and then filter it through sugar-maple charcoal before you seal it up in a new, charred, white oak barrel to age.
It’s quite simple, and for decades that was the accepted definition through handshakes and likely the clinking of glasses over sawdust floors. It was essentially a marketing ploy to distinguish our product as something distinctly different from that other juice being made up north in Kentucky.
Among the distillers who held to this gentleman’s agreement were Jack Daniel, who claims to have first embraced this particular use of charcoal filtering that’s called the Lincoln County process, along with George Dickel and Charles Nelson.
There might or might not have been other distillers who adhered to this understanding, but the significance of these three is that they continue to subscribe to that narrow definition today.
December 11th, 2014 at 7:32 pm
The article doesn’t mention that the distillate has to be aged at least two years to be labeled “bourbon”, and at least four to be labeled “straight bourbon”.
ut let there be no law passed on the subject. Then the cognoscenti can say “‘Tennessee whiskey’? Oh, you mean ‘
December 11th, 2014 at 10:32 pm
Now we have Pennsylvania Rye Whiskey up here. My first review of it was that it was not all that flattering, their recent batches that I’ve tried have been quite a bit bitter. It is developing its own style. A far better product now than a year ago.
December 11th, 2014 at 10:40 pm
I’ve been to a few talks by the Dad’s Hat CEO (where they conveniently hand out samples), and he’s been pretty serious about studying the historic Pennsylvania Whiskey industry before it was destroyed by prohibition. He’s trying to revive the style.
Now that I know of a 5th great-grandfather who was a distiller, and had a hand in the whiskey rebellion in western PA, I’m becoming more interested in the history of whiskey making in this state.
December 12th, 2014 at 10:05 am
While making beer at home never interested me, home distillation of spirits has its attractions. I am after all a Chemist by training.
While whiskey is the drink of Tennessee, down here in Austin, TX, vodka has become a local product of some renown. Try the Tito’s brand if it has made its way up there.
December 12th, 2014 at 10:54 am
Too bad they ruin perfectly good whiskey by letting it sit in a barrel for two years and pick up the bitter taste of the tanins from the wood. Filter it and drink it right away!
December 12th, 2014 at 9:14 pm
During a tour of the distillery in Lynchburg several years ago, I was told that ‘ol Jack Daniel used to work there, then he left and went north, came back with the intentions to purchase the distillery, and the rest is history.
The main reason he wanted to buy that specific distillery was that the water from the natural spring on the property used to make the sour mash whiskey contained no iron; and that was extremely important to Jack.
Yeah, I’m a sour mash man, and yeah, I’ll take Gentleman Jack on the rocks over any other brand any time…with the obligatory CAO Moontrance cigar, of course.
Hmmm…I think after the long week I’ve had, I’ll do some luxuriating.
Crawler, over and out.
December 13th, 2014 at 3:04 am
Don’t believe anything you ever hear on a distillery tour, ever. It’s all marketing BS, and I mean all of it. I remember asking the tour guide at Maker’s Mark, after she described how long they charred the barrels for, what char level that equated to. She hadn’t a clue what I was talking about.
But it ain’t Tennessee whiskey if it ain’t filtered through maple charcoal (e.g. it ain’t bland and maple syrupy).
December 13th, 2014 at 8:05 am
Jack Daniel’s is a Brown-Forman brand. They’ve had this same argument, but about Bourbon in Kentucky, over Early Times. Outside the US, Early Times is sold as Bourbon.
I’ll have the Sacred Cow, straight up water back, please. Outside the industry, we have a lot of fun with brand loyalties that really don’t run all that deep (look down quick now, and check your tats). In the business, where little details influence who keeps and loses their job, you can get rick-yarded over these fine points.
For what it’s worth, most Bourbon is sour mash.
December 16th, 2014 at 11:54 am
I’d get wound up and try something for taste, but mostly I just liked getting drunk, so pure corn ethanol cut with some cola would be quite sufficient. Can’t really do that any more; the liver doesn’t appreciate it. Stoopid liver.