By Jake Emen Rating: A- Knob Creek holds a special place in my heart and on my palate, perhaps more so than any other whiskey. As I shifted from my younger era of the-cheaper-the-better whiskey drinking, dominated by a certain fella named Jim, Knob Creek was what first captured my attention as “the good stuff”, and at the same time, ...

By Richard Thomas In the minds of many bourbon drinkers, Knob Creek is the core of Jim Beam’s Small Batch Collection. A 9 year old small batch that is neither as light as Basil Hayden or as potent as Booker’s or Baker’s, for more than twenty years Knob Creek has been the go-to bourbon for many drinkers in search of ...

By Richard Thomas Rating: C- Of Bird Dog’s flavored whiskey line, their blackberry whiskey is the one that has probably received the most attention and is the best known. Ostensibly, Bird Dog products are supposed to be sweet, flavorful, and smooth enough to drink on their own. Sometimes flavored whiskeys, such as Bird Dog’s own peach whiskey, are the sort ...

By Richard Thomas Fruit-infused whiskeys like Bird Dog are as much a fixture on the whiskey scene now as fruit-infusion was with vodka a decade and a half ago, and just as with vodka, many of those fruit infusions were meant not for straight drinking, but for use in cocktails. A big favorite among the whiskey infusions is the cherry ...

By Richard Thomas Rating: C Just like vodka before it, whiskey is experiencing a boomtime-driven expansion into the area of flavored liquor. These days it seems every big distillery is either getting into secondary maturation, or barrel finishing, or producing flavored whiskey. Honey whiskey has been getting much of the attention lately, both in the U.S. and the U.K., but ...