A Spirited Father’s Day Suggestion-A Look at Four Roses Small Batch
Last year we took a look at Four Roses Small Batch, the 2009 bottling. With Father’s Day coming up, we figured we’d revisit the latest edition of this spirit as we were left pretty impressed last year.
And again Master Distiller Jim Rutledge leaves his mark on us. With the 2010 release of Four Roses Small Batch, we were left with just as an amazing impression we did when we first tried last year’s Small Batch offering.
Jim was kind enough to break how this incredible spirit is created. But we before we go into the details of how specifically Four Roses Small Batch is created, we first need to go back a step and understand how all Four Roses products start.
Any bourbon originating from the house (or distillery) of Four Roses starts off with ten unique bourbon recipes.
Courtesy of Jim Rutledge:
The recipes are created by combining 5 proprietary yeast cultures with two mashbills. The two mashbills are very high in rye grain content – more than any other Bourbon distillery – which generates a gentle spiciness in the flavor profile, which is uncharacteristic of Bourbon. The mashbills:
Mashbill Code: E B
Corn 75% 60%
Rye 20% 35%
Malted Barley 5% 5%
The basic characteristics of the five yeast cultures are:
Code
V – Light Fruit
K – Gentle Spice
O – Rich and full-bodied Fruit
F – Herbal Essence
Q – Floral Essence
By combining the individual yeast cultures with each mashbill 5 unique flavors/recipes are generated with each grain recipe – or 10 flavors/recipes in all.
All ten recipes are used as a target formula for our Yellow Label, and the formula tweaked to provide product consistency from bottling run to bottling run.
One recipe (“B” mashbill in conjunction with “V” yeast) is used consistently for Four Roses Single Barrel.
Now on to the details on what makes up Four Roses Small Batch:
Small Batch uses 4 recipes: ~70% each of B and E mashbill and K yeast + ~30% each of B and E mashbill and O yeast.
It takes approximately 18 total barrels of the four recipes to achieve, as close as possible, the target flavor profile.
Note: The recipe we use for our Single Barrel Bourbon is not one of the 4 recipes used for Small Batch.
Now that we’ve taken a look at how Four Roses Small Batch is created, we can get to the fun part. What’s it taste like?
Well folks, as mentioned earlier, Jim’s done it again!!
The latest bottling of Four Roses Small Batch starts off with a sweetness that grabs you and just makes you smile. Hints of cinnamon and blackberries lead the way into incredibly well defined notes of cardamom, orange marmalade and cocoa. As you slowly allow the spirit to take over and seduce your palate further, touches of allspice and vanilla reveal themselves in cream like finish.
At a retail price of about $30, Four Roses Small Batch is at the perfect price point for a gift for dad. Whether it’s Father’s Day or just to say thanks for not killing you during those teenage years.
Final Score: 10/10
