The Ultimate Guide to Bourbon Store Picks | Ep. 139

Bourbon store picks are everywhere, but how do you know if you’ve found a good one? From red flags to hidden gems, not all picks are created equal.

In this episode of Arsenic Culture, Matt, Jason, and Drew break down the world of store picks: how to tell if a pick is worth grabbing, which distilleries are known for great picks, and the common traps to avoid. Whether you’re a bourbon beginner or a seasoned collector, this is the store pick guide you didn’t know you needed.

What’s the best store pick you’ve ever had?


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Transcript

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That's That's what I, I'd also wanna try it like, let me, let me try it and see what I think. That's that's That's never once crossed my mind, I' em opened. they've got, 'em opened. So that's probably number one. That's probably Big tip. Big tip. Welcome back to Arsenic Culture I'm Matt. I'm Jason. I'm Drew. And, uh, we are coming back to you after a long weekend. We just came back from. the Nashville Derby. Was that last It was last weekend. It feels like a month ago. It a blur. We'll have some stuff online. Uh, soon. I've been inundated so I haven't been able to process everything, but uh, that was a blast. Had a good time. It was awesome in there. coming? Ja. Uh, Jason, you weren't there. So, I was there. in Spirit. you. Try to get Jason to go. Thanks for everybody from NSD thanks. never say die for, uh, sponsoring us. And that event, um, and their$2 million purse for that race that they were sponsoring that was pretty cool. Wow. Um, but yeah, we had a, a good time and I lost an entire day. The next day, uh, I, I think I spent, I was on the, I took two poops and then I got on my phone and was on Instagram for like six hours. Took a nap, laid back down. I was just like, dude, I, I, I'm done today. So the opposite of pay it forward? This is like, it is like subtracting from whatever you had. It, yeah, it Was like the the equivalent of like, fall, fall backwards, with it back. baby. Yeah. So, but um, yeah, it was a good time. Happy to be there. Thanks again to never say die. So, um, but I have recuperated after seven days finally. So, uh, let's drink, let's talk about drinking. Um, we are going to discuss, um, something that I think a lot of, I guess regular. regular people's, The wrong No, I think, I think beginners and seasoned professionals, right? So when you go into a store And, um, a lot of stores will have their own picks there for bourbon primarily, almost exclusively. Sometimes you'll see other stuff, but you'll see store picks for bourbon. Uh, some of them can be great. Some of them not so great. It's really hard to tell though if you don't have a frame of reference. Um, and it would suck if you're traveling or if you're visiting family or something and you go into a store. and You pass on something because you did not know that it was, you know, worth its weight in gold. So maybe we can kind of outline, And give people a little advice on what to look out for when it comes to a store pick. And uh, Jason, you bought a lot of store picks. Drew's brought, some store picks with, so, uh, we're going to be trying some different things, but start out, so tell, tell me, uh, for the layman, what is a store. pick? So essentially a store pick is, is like a limited edition. So it's a single barrel limited edition most of the time. Single barrel. Sometimes they can be blends. So if you were to buy a Woodford store pick, that would be a blend, So they're gonna take three bottle, three barrels and blend it together, get their taste. But most of them, like you've got here, drew, so you got Elijah Craig, single Barrel, barrel proof pick, and a 1792 single barrel. So that's one single barrel that's picked by that store or that entity. Um, so essentially, again, limited edition. So if you think of a limited edition run nowadays, like if you do a four rows is just released theirs, There's probably over 10,000 bottles. Yeah. On this, on a single barrel as a limited edition, you're probably looking sub two 50, guaranteed. It's usually going to be limited to just one barrel. More often Correct. 99% of the time. right? Yeah, yeah, But in that, you're looking at 250 bottles max. Usually a lot of them are running 50 to 150 Bottles. So, I mean, it's very, very limited. Um, so that's what they are. Single barrel. Just of that Now. Go ahead. Do you have a, question? well, no, I think like this is a good conversation for somebody like me because I think out of the three of us here, and when it comes to bourbon, like you're probably got the most into it and you know, um. Experience with it. Yeah. Matt, you're a second. And then I'm sort of like tertiary. Remember we're using that word again, but I think this is a good conversation. know, you got two single barrel picks. That's probably two more than That's, that's more than, but it, it, this is a good conversation for people like me Yeah, for sure. you know what, my, my brother I think told me about these and because he, this is his accounts, but this is a good conversation to have because for people who are just like, oh, I'm interested in bourbon. But I don't know all of the ins and outs. And if I see a barrel pick at a store, a store pick, you know, what do I need to look for? You know, you gonna waste your money or is it gonna be worth it? it? Correct. Well, you know, and I do know, I feel like, I think I do know what to look for, but I've still wasted some money on some picks. Right. I mean, you're not a hundred percent, you're not batting a thousand. you know, So what I look for though when I go in there is do they have tasty notes first off. Okay. That's, that's the first thing I look at. If they have like a little signup of Tasty Notes, not that I believe everything, but it's a good start. It's like they put some time and effort into making this something worthwhile they just print it off some website. It's true That's true too, gt. chat GPT. Yeah. but you can usually like look at it and tell, you know, there's m dashes everywhere. Or, you you can, the next couple things I would ask, so if you're talking to the store owner, Do they have a ball open that you could try. Okay. So that's, I've never even thought about that. that. Well, most of them do it, so like if you go liquor bar now or total wine, they'll have an area, like a tasty area that they'll just say, Hey, ask us. We'll give you a taste. But most of your mom and pop stars stores will have 'em under the counter right now. Some states, some stores might not allow that or something. but 90% of 'em do, do and they'll just be like, especially if it's a mom and pop operation, like, eh, you can try a little and even if you go to Taste is free, you know? then I you gotta pay for a bottle. Well, Even if you go like a, like a restaurant or a bar, a lot of times they'll be like, Hey, this pour is$20, but if you like it and wanna buy a bottle, that $20 will go towards. your bottle. So that's pretty cool. that's pretty cool. So like dark arts here in town. So that's a, that's a distillery here. They're not making their own stuff. They have it sourced, but some of their very expensive bottles are like four, $600 a bottle. But they might be $50 or pour. Yeah. But if you want that pour and lock it, that $50 goes towards, your, I mean, it's pretty nice. to have the option At The very least. Yeah. I So other things I look for, are, you can talk to the owners about this people working, did they have a pick team that went. Right. That goes on the pick. is gonna be my question. Yeah. Who's So that's, that's one thing. And honestly, even if I don't know the people tasting, I'd rather know that people actually went on a pick than like they just distillery sent them a couple samples and said, screw it. Or even worse, if they just like, oh, the master distiller picked it for you. Like, Do you think the master distiller gives a shit Well, they're, they don't, It's like I picked all these barrels anyway. Just, take 'em. probably like, this is the one we need to move. so here you take this one. this is today's special. Yeah, Special. Because we accidentally made too many of 'em, you know? Yeah. So other things you look at, I know it's a long list, but just my mind kind of thinking like this. Other things I look at in the store is, or there are a lot of store picks there? You know, if that's, that's a plus. For me. I like to see a lot of store picks. It shows me that they're, they're vested in that process. Somebody in that area wants to do store picks. They might be the ones who want to do it or somebody in their pick team. But if I walk in and see 10 store picks, I'm probably more inclined to buy one or try one than am if I walk in and see one. Okay. Because a lot of times, if you just you're not familiar That's right. A lot of times too, if you're doing a lot of barrel picks, you might have a better opportunity, like through the distributor you're going. They might give you better barrels when you get there. The distillery, 'cause you have a little more clout. Yeah. But if it's just like me and you do one barrel pick and that's it. We might get the three reject barrels to try that. Drew's pick team like, we don't like these. Yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah. So that's something I look How, so when it comes to, just let's, let's back up to the beginning for just a second. Yeah. The whole concept of a store pick It's essentially, it's a barrel pick. Same idea. um, the store's going and picking, picking a barrel, more or less. But why a store? It's, It's a legal thing, right? Like, well, no, I think, I think entities like me and you could do a barrel pick, but but we'd have to go through a store, wouldn't you? do through in most cases. But if you go to like some of these NDPs, I don't know if it's legal, but I know it happens that me and you could literally buy a ball barrel bourbon. Really? So I was under the impression that the reason the store pick is even a thing is because legally. I Maybe, maybe do the whole three tier they changed this, a few years back though. Remember it's like something, you can sell 'em outta the gift shop. You can sell 'em outta Sure, sure. Because used to like four OS is Was that a pandemic change? I actually, it might have been right before or right during it. so I'm wearing my four rose of shirt. But something about them, they have a distillery in Lawrenceburg, right? They have a bottling plant outside like Bardstown. Okay? So what they would have to do distill in Lawrenceburg, bottle it in Bardstown, put on a truck. Bring it back. And that would be their like distribution. I don't think they have to do it anymore. So the little things like that change, right? Like it's like nuance, but yeah. but's like, It's like, what? That's crazy. You know, I wonder if that's the same thing as like you could go get a to-go margarita at the Mexican place during the pandemic. Yeah. But back to that, I don't mean me, and you're looking at, if we're gonna buy a barrel, let's say Elijah Craig. That bottle is probably a hundred dollars a bottle. Let's just say we get it cheaper than that $70. You got 200 of them. I mean, you're coming out of pocket a lot of coins. Right. cost. But even if you had that much money And you were willing to spend it or maybe you had a group of people. It was my understanding,'cause we've done this before. We did it with the, the Cock Block Beer Group Group Coalition of Craft Beer Love in Kentucky. And we had to go through a liquor store, which is the one in Georgetown at the time. The um, the Liquor Box. Slicker Box. Yeah. Um, That wasn't an option, that was a necessity. if you win the single barrel, select through B Buffalo Trace, which I enter all the time, number one. But you have to go through a liquor store there too. Yeah. So in general, I would say yes, you would. But I do think there's there are, there are situations, scenarios I don't wanna name the places you can do that, just in case it's not legal. but you know, Okay. Okay. Well that's, that's kind of where I was going with that. that's, that's why the store picks are more less even a thing because there is some sort of legality. There is some sort of, you know. rule a money thing, control thing with the distributors as I think it came from the three tier system. Just to kind of keep control with the with the, um, distributing bodies and the, retailers and stuff like that. So, um, so tell me about like, some of the distilleries, because you can get a, you can a store, pit could be from anywhere. Theoretically speaking, but there are some that you're gonna see and overall it might just be immediate bye and There might be some to where you're like, eh, yeah, probably a good idea to, to do a little more homework on it to see if it's any good. So we're gonna start with one from our friends. So this is the mashup from Nashville Barrel Company Nash Up podcast. Yeah, they did one through Nashville Barrel Yeah. Redo that sentence. So So this is from the mashup, the, the podcast. So our friends, Anthony, Kenny and Steven. Yeah. They did three barrel picks. I think Kenny actually did 'em. That's through Nashville Barrel Company down there. So what they did, Nashville Barrel Company ships 'em themselves. They'll ship 'em out. Okay, so they do the store pick there and then they will distribute the bottles for them. Correct. But Kenny, for example, had to go down there, in this specific case and pick it up. right. That's right. Okay. Okay. When with a group, but what was your other question? I got off track. Well, no, that's, so I was talking about distillery. so like for more, for the most part you, it'll kind of follow a, a, a similar logic as just buying regular bottles. So something from That heaven Hill puts out. something Buffalo trades puts out. Probably going to be good. not every brand, so like, so example, Buffalo Trace, not every brand they do, every label has a single barrel store pick available. Sure. Like Weller 12. Weller twelves had maybe a couple, handful. Yeah, they had it on their list you could sign up for, but now it's gone. So I kept it on mine and hopes maybe one day, it'll come right? Elmer t Lee used to, it's a single barrel product. They used to do single barrel store Could you imagine Well that's coming back. Really? awesome. That's great. Yeah. It's awesome. But it also tells you why would it come back? Yeah. Well, and this is what we've addressed in Previous episodes is that we're, it's like you said, we're in a glut bourbon is, is. is, is. It. It's not what it used to Same with the canners, you'll see Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. about that. Well, another another episode. But yeah, so what I'm, you know, different, different distill, ways, different things. Um, well, so like, let me, let me give you, uh, an example that you can expound on. Um, there's one distillery in particular that has a very nuanced way of doing their picking process. and that's Woodford Reserve. Um, we've talked about this a little bit in the past. but if somebody were to go to Woodford Reserve and do a store pick, Woodford Reserve is, they're a very mass market, you know, distillery. They make a ton of product, Yeah. um, from the layman's perspective. You might think, oh, okay, that's a reputable brand store pick might be good. Tell me about their actual picking process. been on a store pick, but no. lot of people that have, I've been on a tour, got to taste a lot of things there. So what they do, they're gonna bring you out X amount of barrels, probably three to five. Okay. You'll try 'em. I think you get a try 'em at cast strength first. You do. Because I've been on But the problem with that is again, he says he's tertiary. I'm, because I don't know shit about what I was tasting, good though. so, so let's say you're trying a Woodford product, a brown foreman product at 130 proof. Well, essentially, that's King in Kentucky. I mean, you're, you're, it's gonna be great. Most of the times there might be something you don't love. But they're going to take King in Kentucky. I know. It's not really King in. Kentucky. Yeah, Take that and proof it down to 90, You're like, what the hell is this? Not only proofing it down, you're gonna blend it with two other barrels. You're gonna get three total and do a blend. It almost, it almost renders the entire process beforehand, obsolete. Why would you even do one at a at a place like Woodford? that's think, I think it's a cool experience. if You could go on that Exactly. And it's a it's more of like, if I go in a store and they're like, oh, we got a Woodford pick. I'm like, cool. I, I just walk off. like, I, So that's my question. no reason for me to buy a Woodford pick. Exactly. That's, that's my question. Like, and the thing is, maybe it is, it turns out to be something it is better. But it's, it, you don't really have that kind of, uh, recognition beforehand of what you're getting. If you send in a group of defacto experts that could pick, you know, out the best barrel in the entire warehouse, they're not gonna get it. Would've reserve, well, you know, they're. Still only gonna get to pick between like three or five, or whatever. But still, it's the whole process. It kind of limits their potential. Oh, for sure. If By do, if, you know, and I've heard many, many other people say this, but if they would do barrel strength picks, people would be lined up at the door. You'd be, you'd be, I'd be sending an email every week, like, please God, Yeah. How does that compare with some of the other distilleries? So Buffalo Trace, and me and Drew, were talking about this too. So you'll go there and you'll get a try their products. I've been on a couple, one or two of those. Right. You'll get a, try their product at Barrel Strength if you like. Then they'll proof it down. They'll show you like they'll have it proof down for, you or have a little water in there, right? So whatever you're picking, if you're picking a, you know, well or full proof, it's 114 proof. Yeah. If you're picking the Buffalo Trace pick, it's not E proof. Yeah. So you get a true single barrel product. Right. And you will try to cast strength, and you will also try it at the proof down point. So you can really pick it. So from that standpoint. it's Truly It's a very true, it's unique. So if I'm the lay person walking into a store and I see a few barrel picks there. Yep. What are the things you wanna look for? I mean, you just said a Woodford product is gonna be a blend, right? And it's gonna be considerably lower. What are some of the other things that somebody like myself who is just sort of like, eh, I'm in it, it's, I think it's a great question. I think going into it though, even me, I'm going in blind. I don't know sometimes. like I can see the label, but if I'm looking at like an old Forester pick, I might look at the location of the warehouse. I mean, I might have to Google some things like, Hey, we, how's this one fair? Or Who likes this one? Your be your best resource though is if you could actually talk to somebody that went on that store pick, that would be huge. If it's possible. Or maybe the owner's there that could talk to you a little bit about Is it considered a red flag if the owner did not go on the store pick, or is that a normal thing I don't. I don't think so. I mean, you'll have some owners that don't drink. You know? that's fine. As long as you have five guys going that do, or girls, you know, whatever. Um, but that's, that's what I, I'd also wanna try it like, let me, let me try it and see what I think. That's That's never once crossed my They got 'em opened, they've got.'em opened. So that's probably number one. That's probably number Big tip, pro tip. you look at it. So do mom and pop stores have better picks or do the big box stores have bigger, better picks? Right. I don't know the answer to that. I don't think there's a clear answer. I think in general you're gonna have more variance, um, on your mom and pop stores depending on who's on the pick. Okay. Your big box stores, are probably gonna take things closer to the profile. So like if you go in a buffalo trace, you know, it's like caramel, sweet. oak. That's the three things you get. That's what they're looking for. Right. They're not looking for spice. Yeah. They're not looking for anything other tasty note. If you have a a barrel pick group, they might want something off profile. And that's, that's huge. You know, if, again, if I go, I would probably tend to lean off profile. Yeah. But if I'm picking for a group, that's like mass people I'd probably stay on. profile. Makes sense. It's got massive people. You want to do something But when I want a single barrel limit edition, I want something special. I want something off profile. So what are some under the radar? um, bottles, some under the radar, uh, either NDPs or distilleries That are putting stuff out that people may not, they may pass on because they don't know what it is, or they don't know if it's good or not. But in your mind, you might be like a, you need to take a second look at that. one. Um, I think NDPs are probably your best bet right now. Okay. Um, but all of them, not all of them, but there's so many. There's so many. variables. That's the problem. So like example, I do have this one here. This is a single barrel pick from rare character from Liquor Barn. Um, and you can see they got their little chairs lined up. out there for all the people, All the people sitting I think that, that third one, I think that's yours right I'm the first one, actually. first one. The first one, yeah. Drew's number two. You're number two. I just set your chairs out and left. You'll come back like how it goes, I mean, yeah. So in a store, pick like this. So rare characters are pretty, they're pretty high in brand. I mean, this bottle here. I think it's like one 40, but Okay. You know, it's not crazy high, but for what it is, I'm very happy to have, if you can open that, that'd be awesome. So that good luck with that That's stuff I'm looking for. But like, again, I wear a character, I have to look that up. So they have a, a code on there. It says KOA, the first three letters. Okay. I have to go online and figure out what in the hell recipe that is, what MASH bill that is. Okay. Who made it? that's their own proprietary system. Kind of like, uh, four roses when they do their, if you go to other, other NDPs, they might, they might be able to tell you what it is. Exactly. They might not have signed an NDA so they can say, this is Barton, this is Heaven Hill, this is MGP. Right. So those people might be able to tell you, but some can't. I feel like that would prob I, I think people would do more of the former than the latter. Yeah. Like more people would not tell you because it is more, The whole industry is just. a Very much just kind of like a, we made this, not literally, but the idea is, you know, we made this in our kitchen. This is, a close to our heart and we want to be sure that everything that we do is, you know, stays in our family. It's overwhelming. when you go in there and see that, but the thing that you, I would tell somebody looking, if you're looking at NDPs, which I'd say is probably the best value, you need to be able to Google, like, use your Google machine and look it up. It's pretty easy to find it. If you can find the. mash bill. So where do you get one of these newfangled Google Google. You got, you got It's on the, on the interweb interweb. On the interwebs. eBay, Facebook marketplace, whatever. MySpace. Can you get it on one of probably could. Yeah. Good luck. So looking at this, one, let me show you, let me show you how you go with this particular bottle. Okay. So, KOA, it's Kentucky Bourbon. I find that out quick on the internet search. That's the K. That's the K. That's the K. So, well, I guess, so the, the research I do real quick tells me the mash bill. 75% corn. 21% rye, 4% malted barley. It was aged in Bardstown, so I know it's Kentucky. Aged in Bardstown. I know the mash bill. Then I can narrow it down from there. So I go and search for the mash bill. That gives me options. The First one MGP, That's an MGP Nashville. But it Can't be mgp, right,'cause it's in Kentucky. Right. So I keep going. Okay, so next up you're looking at, is it Willett? Willett's made. some of these, right. Okay. I don't think Willett's gonna let a bottle barrel go, especially for that price, 'cause if Willett had 10-year-old juice, they'd be, they'd sell it for 500. plus. Right. So, it's not that. Next one's Barton. Barton's a good one. I mean, that's, that's, that's probably what it is. That's, that's what it. is. I mean, it's, it's Barton. Okay. The other option. You have one more option. Bardstown Bourbon Company. Bardstown Bourbon Company makes that mash bill, but they actually have a Huge. uh, facility where they actually sell. They're essentially the MGP of Kentucky. Oh, Kentucky. Right. But they, they only started to steal it in 2016. That's a 10-year-old barrel. Can't be them. So it's gotta be Barton. So you can see my thought process again. It starts out overwhelming. But if you just start with one thing and keep going, you can find all this within a five minute search. Okay. Yeah. pretty easy. And honestly, if you can do that, you probably know more than 90% of the store. owners when you, When you walk in. seriously. Exactly. Yeah. You can look like an expert and you did five, five minutes of research. Ah, Interesting. That's pretty And while Drew is not killing himself with that we'll try, we'll, we'll try this bourbon tomorrow, that is a tough, wax, man. That is a tough wax. I'm waiting for you to slice. your, um, accidentally remove your appendix? Well, I, I put the good knife down. There we go. what'd you think of this one? What'd you think of this one we're sipping on right now? This is good. This, was the Nashville, um, company, Nashville Barrel company. So are they they are an NDP. NDP. Okay. so So this is MGP. This is MGP. and It's also AED in Kelvin Barrels. Kelvin. they're, It's actually a, um, cooperage. So. I think It's in Louisville now. I think it used to be in like Scotland or somewhere overseas, but it's a different top of wood I guess they use and different cooperage, how they string it together. Yeah, but one thing, Kelvin barrels are famous for like variance. They can get very off profile. You can take a standard MGP and it tastes totally different. than Somebody has Oh, it's real fun. Yeah, it's great. You can find some really good barrels and that's that's what's nice about the experience is being able to do something like that. Not everything has homogenized. You can get, you can get a one off and it's like. Oh my God, did you try this one? Barrel, pick the store, pick from who and such, and they had some off barrel that just completely opened up. It's amazing. Yeah, that's, that's kind of what it's all about, is being able to find those unicorns. Thanks, drew. you. Didn't kill yourself. That's a good job. I've got all my fingers. So I think if you walked in the store, Matt, what barrel pick would I look for first? If I'm new to bourbon, I'd probably lean towards a Buffalo Trace product. If you can find just your regular Buffalo tray store, pick across the board, they're usually gonna they're. really good. Uh, They're not gonna taste a whole lot different, most of them aren't than the standard one. But your stores shouldn't have it marked up too much. And you know, you're getting a quality product. getting a quality product. It's a quality product. I think Old Forester can be super not great. Okay. It's not my pick, it's not my thing. Yeah. I don't, I don't love them. Uh, That's the barrel strength one. So blue labels, Mm-hmm. what I would go for, if you're looking old foresters, a black label, it's a hundred proof. It's not barrel strength. Right. Much more consistent. Uh, I think a better flavor profile. Okay. So those those are things that I look for. Um, other ones, again, I'm looking for probably NDPs. this is, I think this is what people want to know. Like If you could glance at our label Yeah. name names, and give me a percentage, on whether I should buy or not buy. I think Elijah Craig, the single barrel products. So you're gonna find a lot of these, if you go in any liquor store now, like this is from Kroger. Any, any store in Lexington's gonna have some. You might have some barrel strength ones that look very similar. The only difference, this just says private barrel. Right. So this is a 10 year product. 124 proof. That's really good from them. those are good stats. So this bottle was probably a sub a hundred. Good stats. Yeah. I feel like we're building our character in our M-M-O-R-P-G. Yeah. Online. So we're gonna try This plus four to lock plus five to charisma. the yeah, baby. Roll the dice. So gonna try this one in a minute. So this is Barton. We decide on, we think it's Barton. So this is also Barton the 1792 single barrel pig. So this is probably 40 bucks under 50. I mean that's a really good product. So it's 98.6 proof. Okay. Higher than Woodford. That's a buy, I mean Trium, right? Yeah, that's a pretty good, So Barton, a lot of the products, like thinking Buffalo Trace. It's a Buffalo Trace kind Yeah. Yeah. Well I think, I think I paid 39 9 9 or something for this, and I think this one was 79.99 or 74.99 or something like that. So, uh, for me, again, like I'm, if I'm gonna go in and spend, you know, a hundred, 150, $200 on a bottle of bourbon, I sort of have to know ahead of time what I'm looking for. Hundred hundred percent. If I go into a store and I see a store pick that's, you know, between 50 or 45, whatever, and 80, a hundred dollars. I'll lean maybe that way. Yeah. But now I've got a little bit more ammo, you know, understanding of like what I'm looking for, because obviously I'm not gonna do a Woodford pick. But yeah, I mean it's, it's good to know.'cause again, the amount of money that I spend on bourbon is probably 40 to $80 a bottle. Yeah. On a consistent basis. That's, I wanna be able to find something that I like, a little bit higher proof. My wife likes something that's 95, a hundred. Sure. Um, but. That's good information to have because I'm, I feel like I'm the lay person that this is specifically for, you know, I I wish I could give you just clear cut answers, but I think I mean, I'm not the expert. in Well, there are clear cut answers. I'm I'm like a lawyer, right. It's like, it depends. It, it depends because I wanna know information. I wanna know those questions. I wanna, I wanna talk to the store owner or the manager there. Um, there's a liquor store in Bardstown area I went to, uh, actually not bars town. Where the hell, where the hell is that? I'll think of it here in a minute. But John Os liquor. so it's John Os, so it's John Os. I never met John, but there's a manager down there. She's, she's a lady a little bit, a little bit older than me, knows her shit. I mean, I'm talking to her about, Hey, what about this barrel pick? She's naming off this and that. You want, you know, this is what we think of this one. This is what the pick team said. This one was unanimous with the pick team. That's a huge thing, right? Like if you got five people that went on the pick and all of them love it, that's rare. Yeah. Yeah. this is good. This is spicy. Yeah. that's got a lot like, almost like a Candy. This one's hazmat, so it's 140 over 140 proof. 10-year-old. Yeah. Don't drink it, does it? No, not at all. That's fantastic, man. Some of the rare character barrels are just, they're really good. Yeah, they're really So of you who don't know, this is the, that's the Hamburg Liquor It is Hamburg Liquor Barn, that's right. That's what I would say. it is. I've been there a few times. or Once or thrice or we got lucky and got this bottle. That was, a, that was a hot bottle to find. I don't know what the bottle count on. Oh, actually, Nope. I don't know what it is. So overall the idea is, you know, if you see a buffalo trace barrel, it's probably gonna be good. See Woodford, you might wanna think twice, but ask for a poor, I think that is super valuable information. And, uh, do your own homework. you like you said, you can do homework within five minutes. and You can whittle it down to ask for the pick team, and you might not get their phone number, but is there a local group you could get into? Local Bourbon group on Facebook. Can the address of the third guy that was, uh, that, that tried this, the one that raided this an eight out 10. I wanna talk to that. again. Not the one raid at I need to, can you gimme his email address? need his last four of his social Yeah. And it is MySpace It's MySpace tag. Thanks, man. No, I appreciate you doing that. What do you think of this, uh, what do you think I think uh, I, I think it's very. Good. Uh, very good. I've been, I've been pretty hassed in a lot of things. Rare character's done, but this is very good. Yeah, I really enjoy it. I like the heat on the front end. Yeah. But I like the heat on the back end. yeah, I like it all. I don't feel, I don't feel like it drinks. What'd you say, one 40? No, Yeah. Well, that's this. This is probably like the bottles that people want. You want a hazmat bottle over 140? That drinks 110. 120. That's pretty crazy. when you think about that. Yeah, it it's like, it's almost like cinnamon candy. like, man, that's fantastic. It's almost like sitting in a line in front of a Liquor Bar.

at 4: 28:56

00 AM

when They don't open until 9: 28:57

00 AM Yeah. Not that I know. but coffees and two, two, uh, Chick-fil-A burrito yeah. That's right. That's right. All right. uh, that's, you got anything else guys? If you enjoyed it, please share. We appreciate you. Uh, for more information, for more arsenic culture, you can check us out, all out on all the socials we are @arsenicculture. Like and subscribe on YouTube. We'll see you on the next one.