Old Forester Rye

A little background

After months of looking at an Old Forester Rye label on the TTB website and then reading about the new mash bill (65% Rye, 20% Malted Barley, and 15% Corn) it is finally time to try out the new offering from Brown-Foreman.  It has a retail price of around $25 and comes in at 100⁰.

(Tasted neat from a Glencairn.)

Color in the glass

Light Amber

Nose

Vanilla, wintergreen, spearmint, barley sugar, and sorghum. 

Palate

Starts very sweet with malted barley and vanilla. The rye spice shows up again as fresh wintergreen and spearmint (gum, candy, maybe somewhat like Listerine).

Finish

The “fresh” sensation from the palate continues and eventually fades to brown sugar.

In closing

I was expecting a little more rye spice given the mash bill but was still impressed with its interesting flavors.  Over the last few months I have found that my palate is sensitive to malted barley and it becomes a dominate flavor in any whisk(e)y that contains a decent amount of it in the mash bill, and that is the case here as well.  Those flavors seemed to morph the rye spice into a wintergreen/spearmint gum freshness that I have not experienced with other ryes and that alone makes this a must have in my liquor cabinet.