Pride of Nelson

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Pride of Nelson

Unread postby bourbonv » Tue Jan 16, 2007 4:08 pm

On New Year's Eve, I went and visited John and Linda and was joined by Marvin Franz. Now Marvin has one of the best noses and palates I know. The only one I would say is superior is his wife Evelyn's. One of the bourbons I took with me was a miniature bottle of Pride of Nelson bottled about 1938. We opened it a tasted it and I scratched down a few notes I thought I would share with you.

1/10 pint
Pride of Nelson
100 proof
2 years old
Fairfield Distillery, Bardstown, Ky.
circa 1938

Nose: Caramel and vanilla with lots of corn and a hint of oak wood.
Taste: Sweet corn and vanilla so strong it is almost a marshmellow flavor.
Finish: Long and sweet with vanilla

Now these are my notes. I will say that Marvin and I agreed on most things, he did get more alcohol fire in the taste than I did. John shas always refrained from tasting notes claiming he is bad at descriptors, but he agreed with the strong vanilla.

Now this was a two year old whiskey because it was made in the early years after prohibition. There was not any aged whiskey to sell for most companies, and those with aged whiskey prefered to use them in blends because they were too woody otherwise. Even at 2 years old, this was an excellent whiskey. I would buy this today if it was available. It had a pleasant taste and really more maturity than many four year old bourbons sold today.
Mike Veach
"Our people live almost exclusively on whiskey" - E H Taylor, Jr. 25 April 1873
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Unread postby gillmang » Tue Jan 16, 2007 6:02 pm

They (often) used small barrels, in that era, to hasten maturity, Mike. But predominantly I'd say the vanilla derives from use of older trees (more lignin).

Time magazine now has its archives open to the public and I summarised some of the information I found in a thread called Time on the other board.

One thing I did not mention there was a story from 1956 when B-F bought Jack Daniels. There is a tasting note in the article on JD of that time but it is a little mangled, unfortunately, due to poor transcription of that part of the article. Anyway, the article quotes the distiller as saying they would not use for barrels any wood not seasoned at least 1 year in the open air. He said if you don't do that the whiskey gets a "persimmony" taste.

I am not familar with the taste of persimmons. (If it is the "red hots" taste of Bulleit though, I like it!). Is this the eucalyptus/green taste some whiskey has? What is persimmon like?

Does JD still buy barrels whose wood was aged at least one year in the open?

Gary
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Unread postby gillmang » Wed Jan 17, 2007 11:43 am

Well, I did a little checking.

Persimmons when unripe have a tannic, bitter taste.

With time (it depends too on the variety) they acquire a pleasing, apricot-like taste. Some people liken them to plums or pumpkins.

I wonder what the 1955 Jack Daniels representative meant when he said that the whiskey, if aged in wood that hadn't been allowed to season at least 1 year outdoors, would have a taste of persimmons. An apricot flavor in whiskey would seem not unpleasant. Many whiskeys, especially from before 1990, have fruity tastes of various kinds.

I think he must have meant to refer to the taste of an unripe persimmon. Unripe persimmons can (I learned) contain high levels of tannin.

Wood seasoned outdoors would lose some of its tannins to the effects of rain and other weather.

I find current JD has a kind of, "fresh wood" character, i.e., it has the banana-like taste most people notice and some smokiness but underneath that I get a woody character. I would not call it tannic or bitter, though.

It would be interesting to know if JD still insists that the wood used to make its barrels be dried outdoors at least 1 year.

Gary
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Unread postby bourbonv » Thu Jan 18, 2007 12:51 pm

Gary, I am not sure what you mean by small barrels. Yes, right after prohibition up to the 1970's the average barrel size was 48 gallons, not 52. That is some diffference, but not much. They also had 1/2 barrels in those days, but from all of the entry ledgers I have seen, I doubt the 1/2 barrel made up more than .5% of the production of any distillery. They were a pain in the butt to deal with and the distillers only did them for special customers.

As far as the aging of the wood for cooperage - yes Jack Daniel's (and Old Forester and Woodford Reserve) use only wood that is weathered for a year. Brown-Forman owns the cooperage that makes their barrels and has complete control over how they are made. Jack Daniel's demands so many barrels, that Bluegrass has virtually quit selling barrels to other companies. This has to hurt the industry becausethat leaves the other companies only one major supplier - Independent stave. Without competition, then who is the distiller to turn to if they feel they are getting substandard barrels? I know Mark Brown was complaining about this very problem a few years ago and that was one reason they looked into the French Oak barrels.
Mike Veach
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Unread postby gillmang » Thu Jan 18, 2007 3:50 pm

Mike, thanks. I read many times that in the mid-30's, small barrels including I believe quarter-barrels, were used to hasten aging by some distilleries. Can't provide any back-up now but I'll try and find some. Of course, this doesn't mean the whiskey you tasted was aged in this way.

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Unread postby bourbonv » Fri Jan 19, 2007 10:55 am

Gary,
I know a lot of companies did experiment with methods such as the one you mention to age whiskey quicker. According to the Bullett family papers at the Filson, that is the main reason Stitzel-Weller developed the wheat recipe - because it tasted better at a young age. Still, I doubt the small barrels made up significant amount of the whiskey being bottled. The small barrels were too expensive to deal with. They could not fit on the ricks in the warehouses so they had to be stored elsewhere increasing storage cost. That meant the they were more labor intensive increasing labor cost.

Other methods included charred chips of wood added to the barrel. Heating and cooling warehouses in cycles. Adding steam heated copper tubes into the bungholes of the barrels to heat the whiskey. My favorite is Publiker who started in business by purchasing used barrels and steaming the whiskey from the wood. The government sued them for the tax money but was defeated. Publiker argued the tax was already paid on the whiskey by the previous owners of the barrel, so they did not have to pay anymore. They won in court and had tax free whiskey to sell - it probobly tasted like the burnt end of a matchstick, but it was tax free.
Mike Veach
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Unread postby drew_kulsveen » Mon Feb 19, 2007 10:12 pm

The Pride of Nelson was a product that came out of our distillery, but not originally. I will do some research.
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Unread postby bourbonv » Tue Feb 20, 2007 11:31 am

Drew,
I know Schenley owned the Fairfield distillery and Made Pride of Nelson in the 40's and 50's, but sold the distillery and probably the brand in the 60's. We do need to get together and do a timeline history for Kentucky Bourbon Distillers and try to figure out some of these details. I did not realise that Willett Distilery purchased the brand.
Mike Veach
"Our people live almost exclusively on whiskey" - E H Taylor, Jr. 25 April 1873
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