The Full Bar - all my pages

Thursday, July 26, 2012

Heaven Hill's Larceny

Time for honesty: usually when I get samples, even whiskey samples, they generally sit on my kitchen table for at least a couple days. The boxes are annoyingly wrapped, I've a tendency to procrastinate (I hear a whisper of chuckles from my editors), and, well, they'll still be there tomorrow.

But today, when I got this box from Heaven Hill...I was pretty sure what it was, so I opened it as soon as I got home. Sure enough, it's the new Larceny. Here's the description: "Larceny is a true small batch Bourbon produced from dumps of 100 or fewer barrels that have been selected from the 4th, 5th and 6th floors of Heaven Hill’s open rick warehouses in Nelson County, Kentucky. Larceny is drawn from barrels that have aged from 6 to 12 years at this high storage, and is bottled at a full-bodied 92 proof, or 46% alcohol by volume."

But the key -- heh, heh -- point is that Larceny comes from the wheated bourbon that Craig and Parker have been making since Heaven Hill bought the Old Fitzgerald brand back in 1999, and Larceny references the story of John Fitzgerald. Or at least, one of the stories. It's the story that Fitzgerald was a treasury agent who had the keys to distilleries' bonded warehouses...and used them to pilfer whiskey -- the best whiskey, as he apparently had plenty of time to taste them. 

Enough talk. Let's drink! Well, it smells like Heaven Hill: hot sweet corn, light cinnamon notes, an edgy oak note. Mmmm, tasty. This is what I love about Parker's booze: it's always stuffed full of flavor, from the cheapest bottle of Heaven Hill white label all the way up through Evan Williams, Elijah Craig 12 Year Old, all the way on up to the Parker's Heritage bottlings. This is no exception, and it's sharp and lively with it. Imagine a hot sheet of whiskey glass snapping in your mouth and flashing to liquid; it's that quick and light. It's not sweet, it's spicy, oaky, shot with cornbread and a drying heat. The finish is encouraging, a warm tingle through the whole mouth.

I could see drinking this all night -- with a small application of water and a certain amount of pretzels or nuts -- with a group of friends, talking till it's gone. And at $25 suggested price, it wouldn't be a bad idea to have a spare.

6 comments:

Jay said...

That sounds great! I can't wait to try it... I'll swing by a State Store on my home and pick up a bottle!


:(

Lew Bryson said...

They'll probably get it -- because they know they suck, and they've been buying everything that goes in glass lately -- but they'll put it online only -- because they know they suck, and none of their clerks know how to sell good whiskey.

Alan said...

I've probably told you this by my Dad's stag in 1956 was fueled entirely by bootleg Scotch nicked out of the Greenock Scotland Excise Office lock up by one of his pals who was in charge of the keys. His fiance had to go find them after three days. They were still in the same room.

sam k said...

I hope this shows up at WhiskyFest New York!

And yes, I am chuckling.

Unknown said...

Looking forward to trying this one Lew!

Unknown said...

Looking forward to trying this one Lew.....I'm a big HH fan.