Woodford Reserve Masters Collection Four Grain

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Woodford Reserve Masters Collection Four Grain

Unread postby cowdery » Thu Sep 01, 2005 4:51 pm

Yesterday, at the distillery outside Versailles, Kentucky, Woodford Reserve unveiled its long awaited four grain bourbon.

The full name of this new product is Woodford Reserve Masters Collection Four Grain Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey. The concept of the Masters Collection is that it will be occasional and very limited releases of unique 100 percent copper pot still whiskey made at the Woodford Reserve Distillery. Four Grain is the first. Only 250 cases of it will be released, at $80 a bottle. It will be 92° proof.

The gimmick at yesterday’s event was that they had me, Gary Reagan, Jim Murray, John Hansell, Lew Bryson and a writer from the Wall Street Journal taste samples from 14 different barrels then, by our votes, we eliminated two. The twelve barrels remaining are what they are going to bottle so we helped "make" the whiskey. All of this whiskey was distilled in the Spring of 1999.

Master Distiller Chris Morris would not reveal the exact mash bill, but did admit that the malted barley component is the Brown Forman "standard" of ten percent. Since it is bourbon it must be at least 51 percent corn, so that leaves us with 39 percent of the recipe still to pry out of him.

Chris said their recipe was inspired by one they found from 1903. They can't say when a four grain bourbon was last produced, but most likely it was before Prohibition. At the event, they also made a lot of hay about their warehouse cycling (artificially creating a hot-cold aging cycle during the winter) and their “designer” barrels (BF is the only distiller that also owns a cooperage). The four grain formula includes a proprietary yeast strain not used for any of BF’s other whiskeys.

The entire event was fully documented, on video and with still photographs, so the results of that promise to be pretty frightening.

Probably the biggest attraction of this product, more so even than the four grain mash bill, is the fact that, unlike standard Woodford Reserve, this whiskey is 100 percent from the copper pot stills. That also is the most prominent characteristic of the taste. You can taste copper. The grain signature I would call muddy, as in confused. A more positive way to say it would be complex. It definitely has a unique flavor, unlike any other bourbon including Woodford itself (which contains no wheat). I don't think it will produce much demand for a mass market four grain bourbon, but in terms of showing us another possibility within the context of bourbon, it's a wonderful thing.

I have been told by other distillers in the past that one of the obstacles to making four grain bourbon is the fact that distilleries are built with three grain mills over the cooker. As Chris pointed out, all they have to do is put the wheat and rye together into the small grains bin in the appropriate quantities.

Although it's not supposed to be in stores until October, I expect there will be some four grain at the festival next month, probably at the gala if nowhere else.
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Unread postby bunghole » Thu Sep 01, 2005 6:05 pm

Fascinating!

Chuck, when you say "muddy" & "confused" do you think that the wheat and rye components are in conflict?

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Unread postby Mark » Thu Sep 01, 2005 7:12 pm

Sounds like a most interesting product Chuck, please share a picture of the bottle and impressions of the final product when you can.
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Unread postby cowdery » Thu Sep 01, 2005 7:14 pm

I don't know about conflict, but it's hard to identify a distinct signature from either. It's definitely not like what you might get if you mixed Old Fitzgerald and Evan Williams together (i.e., two wheated bourbons made at the same distillery). It's a very different flavor but a lot of that is the pot still, not the grains. It's a little confusing. More sampling is in order.

Except for proof, what I tasted yesterday is the final product. I should have a picture in a couple of days. The bottle is proprietary, shaped like a pot still.
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Evan Williams a Wheater

Unread postby Bourbon Joe » Thu Sep 01, 2005 8:33 pm

Is Evan Williams a wheater???????????
Joe :o :o :shock: :?
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Unread postby cowdery » Thu Sep 01, 2005 9:08 pm

No. That was my point. Old Fitzgerald is a wheater, Evan Williams is a rye-er, and they are made at the same distillery, so mixing them together is a fair approximation of a four grain, only not really, based on what I tasted yesterday.
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Unread postby gillmang » Fri Sep 02, 2005 8:18 am

I am not clear if the small grains contain wheat. If it does, unless used in large quantities (see Chuck's current newsletter on this) I would think the taste effect would be minimal since wheat, even more than corn, is not a flavor grain. This is why wheat-recipe bourbons tend to be mild in taste and only ramp up in flavour from long barrel aging. Corner Creek is an example (probably) of mingling two bourbons, one a rye-recipe the other a wheat-recipe. I find it mild in palate and this is because the wheat in a sense dilutes the rye grains from the other bourbon. The fact that the new, special edition WR has a "muddy" taste may as Chuck posits derive mostly from the all-pot still production. There is an intense flavour something like that in recent batches of the regular WR (eg, the ones in the 160's, in my view). I speculate these have a high proportion of pot still in them, higher than most earlier batches.

I wonder though if the fourth grain might be, not wheat, but unmalted barley, unmalted rye or oats. All those were used before Prohibition in whiskey manufatcture (e.g. the first by Poindexter Distillery - see Sam Cecil's note in his book). That point about mixing wheat and rye in the hopper made by Chris Morris would suggest though it is wheat, unless he is being coy! By the way I don't think you can always mix ground grains unless each can be added to the mash at the same temperature.

Gary
Last edited by gillmang on Fri Sep 02, 2005 12:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Unread postby bunghole » Fri Sep 02, 2005 10:03 am

Not to worry. If I can get a good taste - I can nail it down.

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Unread postby cowdery » Fri Sep 02, 2005 3:24 pm

Sorry if I was unclear in my original post. The fourth grain definitely is wheat. The only "secret" is the proportions. Wheat is considered a "small grain" and a "flavor grain" as well, in common bourbon-making parlance, despite its mild flavor contribution relative to rye.

Your best bet for experiencing the real taste of wheat will be with Heaven Hill's new Bernheim Original Straight Wheat Whiskey, which is being released even as we speak.
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Unread postby gillmang » Fri Sep 02, 2005 5:45 pm

Okay, so wheat it is. I would say, if wheat is used in a small percentage (say under 10%) it will have almost no effect on the flavor. But if used to any degree above that, I think it may show some flavor and of course Bernheim Wheat will especially since it is approximately half wheat. When you taste a typical wheater bourbon against a rye one, the wheater seems always to be missing something - the rye, in other words. But I can see that used in a sufficient amount wheat develops the flavor described in Chuck's current newsletter. One might say the relationship of wheat to flavor is not linear, but with rye it is, is my view.

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Unread postby Joeluka » Fri Nov 25, 2005 11:10 am

Can anybody help me get a bottle of this?? From what I understand its only available in Ky. I hope someone out there can help this poor soul.


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Unread postby Bourbon Joe » Fri Nov 25, 2005 2:04 pm

I haven't seen any in PA or I'd grab one for ya.
Joe :)
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Unread postby OscarV » Mon Nov 28, 2005 3:42 pm

there has been a 4 grain bourbon on the market for some time now. "Corner Creek" It is not at all good.
quick finish, but with this, that is not a bad thing.
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Unread postby Mark » Mon Nov 28, 2005 4:14 pm

LeNell and I, or actually I think it was Ben and I, were discussing that when Drew Kulsveen was at their place a few weekends ago... We were saying how we thought Corner Creek really isn't a 4 grain persay in that it is wheat and rye whiskey mixed together whereas the WR 4 grain has all 4 ingredients in the actual mash. Maybe we're wrong about the CC being mixed after being aged etc... Interesting nonetheless.
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Unread postby angelshare » Tue Nov 29, 2005 8:20 am

Mark wrote:LeNell and I, or actually I think it was Ben and I, were discussing that when Drew Kulsveen was at their place a few weekends ago... We were saying how we thought Corner Creek really isn't a 4 grain persay in that it is wheat and rye whiskey mixed together whereas the WR 4 grain has all 4 ingredients in the actual mash.


Re: CC we're not sure, but this sounds familiar to us, too.

As for the taste, though, we like it. We find it to have a pleasant tea like flavor that is distinctive and enjoyable.
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