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Vantage is a blend of straight bourbons finished in three distinct expressions of virgin oak: Mizunara, French, and toasted American oak casks.
Already an established force in the world of blending, Barrell Craft Spirits has demonstrated its finishing prowess with a series of creative releases that marry different cask types together. Vantage is the most recent, and to us, the most successful. The nose has a bake shop sweetness, with aromas of sugar cookie, nutty chocolate brownies, and Funfetti cake, plus earthy dried tobacco leaves and strawberry candies underneath. The creamy palate delivers rich chocolate, Red Hots, and with water added, dried leaves and snickerdoodles. Big cinnamon spice on the finish ties this one up beautifully. —Ted Simmons
Barrell Craft Spirits Vantage Bourbon
Vantage is a blend of straight bourbons finished in three distinct expressions of virgin oak: Mizunara, French, and toasted American oak casks. The result is a warm, elegant bourbon that highlights the many dimensions of oak.
The BCS team has drawn on years of experience with three-part barrel finishing, used previously in Armida, Dovetail, and Seagrass. With Vantage, those same techniques were applied to the oak itself, using different char levels, toast levels, and oak origins to create a multidimensional blend.
Each component whiskey in Vantage is finished separately, then systematically combined according to a blending process fueled in equal parts by a scientific approach, experience, creativity, and experimentation. This process focuses on the wood characteristics and the specific flavor contributions that each cask contributes to the blend. The result is a masterfully blended, perfectly balanced representation of the harmonious synergy between bourbon and barrel.
Barrell Craft Spirits Vantage Bourbon Tasting Notes
Flavor Notes
Selected Mizunara, French, and toasted American oak casks create multifaceted dimensions to this unique blend. The unique aspects of each wood and treatment are layered atop one another, precluding the singular taste of oak. The nose is creamy, spicy, and resinous, and the palate is richly textured and oily, soaked with barrel influence.
Neat
Appearance: Burnt sienna.
Nose: Creme brûlée, coconut oil, and chocolate pudding invoke the creamy richness of toasted American oak. Tarragon, nutmeg, and warm cola are among the dry, extractive spices highlighting the French oak. Mizunara’s incense and grilled pineapple notes, meanwhile, take the profile in a totally different direction.
Palate: Sweet and oily with a pronounced espresso note. It’s pleasantly rich on the tongue, which obscures much of the tannin – surprising given how much wood is present. The French oak’s robust spice notes inflect a maple syrup sweetness.
Finish: Green grapes and red plums burst above the barrel notes for the first time. It’s spicy, too, with za’atar, crystallized ginger and Szechuan peppercorns.
With a splash of spring water
The nose grows earthier, exhibiting graham cracker and dark chocolate. The spirit’s rye grain emerges, not just with pumpernickel but also celery and chive blossom. The palate grows sweeter, tasting of maraschino liqueur and pavlova. It finishes on grapefruit zest and kola nut.
About Barrell Craft Spirits
Louisville-based Barrell Craft Spirits is the original, pre-eminent independent blender of unique, aged, cask strength whiskey and rum. Recognized for our blending expertise since 2013, we skillfully design, produce, and launch leading, unique products that surprise and delight whiskey aficionados and novices alike.
As the most innovative, forward-thinking, and progressive whiskey blenders in the nation, we have an unrelenting drive to break the status quo by selecting and blending products that explore different distillation methods, barrels and aging environments, and bottle them at cask strength.
All blends are not created equal – experience matters. We don’t simply follow a recipe or blend by consensus. Rather, we blend based on years of expertise and experimentation. We personally taste and blend hundreds of products each year and have experimented with thousands of unique blends over the past 10 years. We are passionate perfectionists fueled by curiosity.
As industry trailblazers, Barrel Craft Spirits is passionate about continually pushing the boundaries of blending and exploring opportunities to source and blend outside the box. The goal is to elevate barrels of whisky into something greater than the sum of their parts and to showcase the world’s most exciting spirits. In the process, we’re flattered to have inspired many others to begin blending with whiskey.
Barrell Craft Spirits was awarded Best Bourbon twice at the internationally acclaimed San Francisco World Spirits Competition (SFWSC) – in 2017 and again in 2020.
Barrell Craft Spirits award-winning line of products is currently sold in 49 U.S. states as well as in Puerto Rico, Canada, the UK and Australia.
For more information, please visit the Whisky Advocate website at https://whiskyadvocate.com/ or on their social media sites at:
Sources & Photo Credits: Barrell Craft Spirits and Whisky Advocate
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