By Richard Thomas Rating: A+ Although Pappy Van Winkle has only a middling history as Kentucky bourbon’s go, the label is one of the most rarefied on the market today. As the story goes, Julian P. Van Winkle graduated from Centre College in Kentucky in 1892, went to work for a wholesaler, and gravitated into whiskey-making when he bought the ...

Editor’s Note: This review is of the original 15 year old version of this bourbon, not the current NAS version. By Richard Thomas Rating: A- Admirers of old fashioned, pre-Prohibition style bourbon love to hear two words in connection with a new bottle of Kentucky straight bourbon whiskey, namely “cask strength” and “small batch.” Granted, “single barrel” and “cask strength” ...

Updated July 5, 2020 By Richard Thomas Average Rating: A- I was visiting my family in My Old Kentucky Home in March 2011, and while there I did what I always do when I’m in Kentucky on an unplanned visit: I visited the Liquor Barn to pick up a couple of bottles of bourbon to bring back to Portugal with ...

By Richard Thomas Updated April 9, 2015 Rating: B+ Knob Creek is arguably the most well-known of Jim Beam’s line of signature small batch bourbons (the others being Baker’s, Booker’s and Basil Hayden). Each label of that signature line has its own distinctive character, with Knob Creek representing what is probably the most old fashioned and traditional of the four. ...

By Richard Thomas Rating: A Jim Beam’s grandson, the late Booker Noe, introduced his namesake bourbon in 1988. The original Booker’s started out as bourbon hand-selected by Noe and bottled straight from the cask, which was then given out only to a select group of close friends and family. The practice of creating what amounts of a private reserve of ...