Old Pepper Finest Kentucky Oak Rye Whiskey Review

By Richard Thomas

Rating: A-

Old Pepper Finest Kentucky Oak Rye
(Credit: Richard Thomas)

It’s been little more than a year since the James E. Pepper brand came home to it’s a new distillery in its old building in downtown Lexington, so it will be some years before their sourced whiskeys are replaced with their own stuff. Even so, that does not mean that the brand doesn’t have some surprises left for us.

Late this summer, the company released Old Pepper Finest Kentucky Oak Rye, or Old Pepper FKO, and it has promptly gone on to win garlands and high marks. It’s another entry into the “double oaked” or “double barreled” category, meaning it has received a round of secondary maturation in new oak barrels. This is distinct from the usual pattern for secondary maturation (“finishing”), which puts used barrels to work for the specific purpose of drawing on the flavors of its previous contents: Sherry, Port, Rum, some type of wine, beer, what have you. Choosing new oak is essentially doubling down on the flavors one gets from new oak aging, flavors intrinsic to American Whiskey. In this case, Pepper chose to heavily toast and then lightly char that second set of barrels, and bottle the whiskey at 110.7 proof.

The Whiskey
In the glass, Old Pepper FKO has a murky amber appearance. Swishing the glass left a sticky, thick coat that dropped only a single, long tear.

It’s an aromatic whiskey, but it was also a little hot, so I put some drops of water in. That toned down the alcohol and brought out the gingerbread, molasses, vanilla and cedar. Underneath this were hints of toasty oak and pepper, giving dry tinge to a thorough nosing of the whiskey

The flavor is richly sweet, a certain product of the double oaked aging. Molasses and vanilla with a touch of apricot flood the tongue initially, but this subsides to leave more modest notes of oak and pepper. After that, just a hint of barrel char rises on the back of the palate. With things turning tannic on the palate, the finish dawns spicy, appropriately enough. Initially that takes the form of fruit pie spices, but these slowly turn over to lightly peppered ending.

The Price
Old Pepper FKO retails for $70 a bottle.