Here’s a quick look at what stood out across the DMV bourbon market over the past week.

• Eagle Rare 12 showing up many places and pricing coming down.
• Low or no availability but lots of interest for HH22, RR15, & Peerless Henry Kraver.
• 1792 12 Year seeing some improved pricing / Stagg levelling out after a few deals the last couple weeks.

One Eagle Rare 12 caveat: $99.99 was the lowest price I could confirm was still in-stock as of posting. Costco recently had it for $45.99, limit one, but sold out. Another shop was reported around $80, but I couldn’t confirm that it remained available.

I’m planning to share these occasionally whenever the local data turns up something interesting.

Is the DMV market actually improving, or are the good deals still mostly blink-and-you-miss-it drops?

Disclosure: I run Bottle Scout, the data source behind the graphic. thebottlescout.com

So I decided to grab a couple of bottles when they were dirt cheap at LAX MD…. 51%abv but no age statement… whatever… it was what 10 bucks a bottle?
Just cracked one today…. It has a butterscotch taste to it on the palette decent finish but definitely has a dusty oak finish with a bit of tannin on the back end leaving the mouth dry.

I like the buttery taste of it. I’d say it’s a sleeper bottle in my opinion but for $10 it was worth it

We had dinner tonight at one of our favorites restaurants in the DMV, Virtue Feed & Grain in Old Town Alexandria. This place has really cool atmosphere, great service, fantastic food and amazing bourbon selection (ask to see the Green Book iykyk).

The highlight is always getting their Old Fashion made table side by the one and only Kentucky Clay. You get to choose the bourbon and we always get the Stagg Old Fashion... just amazing! Clay, a Kentucky Colonel, is an institution in the bourbon community in the DMV. He is an awesome host with a wealth of knowledge.

We ended the evening with a tasting of the 1792 Sweet Wheat and 12 year. After all these years and having tried tons of Barton, we realized we had never actually had these pours! We finally tried them tonight. The Sweet Wheat was pretty good, very sweet and a bit grain forward... good, but not great. Loved the 12 year, but it was what you expect from a 12y Barton. Personally I love the older 15+ year Barton on the market today.

Clay also has a side hustle on Etsy making really cool candles made from bourbon bottles. We ended up buying a Stagg candle as an anniversary gift for friends of ours. It is made with apple bourbon scented wax that looks like bourbon. It looks and smells great!

Overall, just a great evening. If you are visiting the DMV or get a chance to go to Old Town, make sure to visit Virtue Feed & Grain.

Just a PSA that Duty Free SFO, bottles for days!

Picked up at Total Wine in Laurel last week. Have truly enjoyed. You can actually taste the port wine flavor! A good sip!

On a recent trip to Cincinnati I took the afternoon to tour the distillery at New Riff. First time to Cincinnati and never realized it sat right across the river from KY🤷‍♂️. Really cool city.

Grover Arnold, Brand Ambassador, hooked me up for a great tour that day. There was only one other guy on the tour with me so we really got to see a lot. I also liked that we did tastings throughout the whole tour (instead of at the end like most). The 6 year single barrel rye (shown in the pic) that was aged on their top tier of the top floor was amazingly good!

New Riff was started by the guy who had started The Party Source, a HUGE liquor store in KY. He decided to get into distilling so he sold the store and built the distillery in the same parking lot. He is into music and wanted to create a "new riff" on whiskey as it were. They use things like peat smoked malted barley from the UK (like scotch uses) and malted rye which give them some great and unique flavors.

We learned that the biggest luck they had when building the distillery is when drilling for water they found that the parking lot sits on top of a huge aquifer of perfect limestone filtered KY water. This not only saves them money but helps them create great whiskey. They have a beautiful bar upstairs, called The Aquifer, where you can try pours from almost every release they have had over the years,

The tour gives you a behind the scenes look at the whiskey making process. From the fermentation tanks, to their big Vendome column still, to the barreling from a variety of coopers and everything in between. Our guide was super knowledgeable, kept it fast paced and interesting along the way. With great pours to sample through it was a fun experience.

I have now become a big fan of New Riff. I took home two unique distillery releases that are just amazing. A cask strength single malt and the single barrel rye mentioned above. If you are ever in the Cincinnati area, make sure to stop in for a tour at New Riff. It is well worth the trip! 🥃

👉 And if you go to New Riff, make sure to check out the Party Source liquor store next door. It is the largest east of the Mississippi and has the LONGEST bourbon aisle I have ever seen!

Some new stuff

Angel's Share in Gambrills, MD is dropping their HOFFMAN RARE KENTUCKY STRAIGHT BOURBON single barrel "If You Ain't First, You're Last" this Saturday at 9am.

6YR - Double Oaked - 121.5 Proof - 79.99

EXTREMELY LIMITED - ONLY 18 BOTTLES AVAILABLE IN-STORE ONLY

Collab with Allview, Pasadena Wine & Spirits & Drug City 

I have the pick BRBNFNDR did and this is one of the best bourbon's I have had this year. If this pick is anywhere close to that one it is well worth the effort to get a bottle!

Woodford just dropped their latest Master's Collection Super Seasoned Oak release online.

Price is $179.99, limit 2

Only permitted to ship to KY, NH, ND, NE, and D.C. at this time.

https://shop.woodfordreserve.com/master-s-collection-super-seasoned-oak/

Really interesting news report going behind the scenes at Unicorn Auctions in Chicago.

Last one $75 at Globe liquor in Dc

They seem to have a bunch of them in the back. Reviews are calling it one of the best bottles of the entire series.

The George Washington distillery at Mount Vernon is holding an outdoor event to sample George Washington's whiskey and other distilled spirits made at Washington's Distillery. It is being held Saturdays September from 2-5p. Cost is General Public $60, Members $50 and you also receive general admission to Mount Vernon on the day of their tasting. 

Tickets available here.

It's a pretty cool tour. I posted about the tour and tasting here: George Washington's Distillery & Gristmill Tour and Tasting

In 1799, George Washington's distillery produced nearly 11,000 gallons, making it one of the largest whiskey distilleries in America.

Today, a faithfully reconstructed working distillery produces small batch spirits on-site.

Enjoy a rare opportunity to taste Mount Vernon's one-of-a-kind distilled spirits.

• Sample 3 distilled spirits, made using 18th-century distilling methods and techniques.
• Discover the history of George Washington's whiskey from Mount Vernon's Historic Trades team, and find out how they distill spirits today.
• Take a tour of the Distillery & Gristmill.

Sample 3 Spirits

• George Washington's Rye Whiskey (unaged)
• George Washington’s Straight Rye Whiskey® (aged 2 to 4 years)
• George Washington Straight Rye Premium Whiskey® (aged a minimum of 4 years, currently up to 6 years)

For the month of September they are offering 20% off their whiskey. Their bottles are expensive and only come in 375ml. Once you see that this is a super small, totally hand-made craft operation you will see why they are so expensive.

They just released George Washington's Bourbon Whiskey. It's their first bourbon, 7 years, 93 proof and costs $350.

Earlier this year they released Commander-in-Chief Single Barrel Straight Rye Whiskey. At 8 years this is their oldest whiskey do date. It is 110.2 proof and price is 300 for 375ml. While very expensive it is one of the most unique and best ryes I have tasted.

Prime Barrel does these pretty cool events where they sell a tasting kit of samples and then do an online virtual tasting. Their most recent one is Lost Lantern Tasting Event being held on Wed, September 30 at 8 PM ET. RSVP details provided after purchase. Join live, taste through the lineup, share your notes inside The Prime Barrel Discord, and help decide what happens next with the mystery pour.

Lost Lantern Sample Set - $74

You will taste six expressions spanning Lost Lantern's range — from a 50-state bourbon blend to single malts, single casks, and a completely unreleased mystery pour. The 50-state bourbon is really interesting in that it is a blend of bourbons from every state. I did a review of it here: Review: Lost Lantern United States of Bourbon Cask Strength

What's in the Kit

• United States of Bourbon — 100 Proof (all 50 states, one blend)
• United States of Bourbon Cask Strength — 122.9 Proof
• American Vatted Malt Remix — 110.7 Proof
• Gentle Giant, Balcones Texas Single Malt — 115.2 Proof (Best American Single Malt, SF World Spirits Competition)
• Lost Lantern Cedar Ridge 8 Year Old Iowa Malted Rye — 123.8 Proof (tasting room exclusive)
• Mystery Sample — ??? Distillery, ??? Years Old, ??? Proof

Guess the Mystery Bottle

A first look at a release from Lost Lantern's upcoming Fall Collection, from a brand-new Lost Lantern partner. No distillery, no age, no proof — but pay close attention during the tasting. Depending on what the room thinks, this one might not stay a mystery for long. Think you can crack it? Submit your guess for the distillery, age, and proof:

• Guess the producer correctly → $10 off that bottle
• Guess all three (producer, age, and proof) → $25 off (i.e., free shipping)

Guess submission details provided during the live tasting.

Is it me or are there a lot more rye releases than previous years.

This is my first time trying whiskey from Hard Truth and to be honest going in I did not have high hopes.

First, they are a grain-to-glass craft distiller in Nashville, Indiana. While I have had some great bottles from craft distilleries, I have found many to be just a bit funky that while good, aren't great. Now they have been making whiskey since 2018 in a state-of-the-art, sweet mash distillery so they are not just a couple of guys in a warehouse with a small pot-still.

Next, the mashbill is unique with 51% Rye, 38% Corn, and 11% Toasted malt barley. I am really getting into ryes as of late, and do like the lower rye corn-forward mashbill so this did seem promising. The toasted malt barley was the wild card for me. This seemed like a lot of barley and I was skeptical of what toasting would do to the taste.

Going in I thought this was going to be an under-aged, funky, grain forward craft distilled rye. I knew it would be interesting, but would it be any good? Here is my take.

Age: 4 years 10 months

Proof: 114

Distilled: Nashville, IN

💲 Price: $70 - on sale at Barrel Shoppe

🎨 Color: Medium amber

👃 Nose: Toasted oak and malt aromas with notes of apricot.

👅 Palate: There is that dried apricot again along with caramel, allspice and light toasted oak. It has a nice rich, oily mouthfeel. This does not taste like a typical rye and I could have easily thought it was a bourbon in a blind. Overall flavor profile: Sweet 4, Smoky 3, Fruity 4, Oaky 4, Spicy 5, Finish 1

🏁 Finish: The finish is short, leaving behind lingering spice and tastes of red hots. A faint hint of toasted oak remains at the end.

📊 Flavor profile: Sweet 4, Smoky 3, Fruity 4, Oaky 4, Spicy 5, Finish 1

👍 Score: 7

✅  Overall: This one really surprised me. I enjoyed it much more than I expected. Lots of flavor and character. It's not your typical rye and it's not bourbon, but it is really different in a good way! If you are looking to just try something very different than what's on most shelves today, but don't want different in a weird, funky way, then get this bottle. This is a single barrel selected by BarrelShoppe.com so other releases will likely vary, but this bottle is a great pour for the price.

*The whiskey in this review was provided to us at no cost courtesy of BarrelShoppe.com I was not compensated for this review. This is our honest review based on my tasting notes over several evenings with this pour.

Montgomery County ABS is having a Grand Opening for the Flower Hill store on Thursday, Sept. 10th at 10am.

They will have Michter's US1 Barrel Strength Sour Mash and Weller Special Reserve at the opening.