Boone County 1833 12yr Single Barrel

Boone County 1833 12yr SiB

COST: $70 for 750 mL bottle (I’m reviewing a sample)

AGE: 12 yr

MASH BILL: 75% corn, 21% rye, 4% malted barley (MGP)

PROOF: 109.36

Old MGP barrels are generally some real bangers. Boone County used to bottle some of the oldest MGP bourbon out there in the form of their Boone County 1833 Single Barrel, reaching as high as 14 and 15 year offerings. This 12 year expression was distilled in 2005, purchased by Boone County Distilling Co., and allowed to age up to 12 years before bottling it up. Does it live up to the reputation of setting a standard of what old MGP barrels can do? Let’s find out!

This sample is from barrel B0506 bottled in 2017 for Wiseguy Lounge. Reviewed neat in a Glencairn.

APPEARANCE: Burnt umber (1.7), leaves a ring of tiny beads around the glass that take a long time to coalesce and make slow, oily looking legs.

NOSE: Loads of spicy oak and vanilla. Ethanol is forward and detracts a bit from other notes less dominant notes. After calibrating to the ethanol after a few minutes, I can pick up chocolate, caramel, and orange peel. After about 30 minutes, the ethanol has died down significantly and this is rather robust. I’m also picking up a little honey cake now.

PALATE: The mouthfeel of this is extremely thick and oily. There’s an incredible amount of vanilla! A toasted graham cracker pie crust with a caramel drizzle. The oak is not as spicy as it was on the nose, but does have a very mild tobacco note along with it. The oak note is generally very mellow and slightly sweet. On the backend of this sip there’s a lot of fruit notes that stand out: baked apples with cinnamon and nutmeg and an orange and raspberry compote.

FINISH: Expressed orange peel on a damp barrel stave rich with vanillin and a hint of brown sugar. These flavors are very well integrated. It’s almost like an…orange oak-sicle… There’s hardly any hug or indication of the proof in the finish.

RATING: 8.2/10

VALUE: 8.8/10 (this value is based on a ratio of the $/mL to the rating above compared to this same ratio for all other r/Bourbon reviews I’ve made and normalized to 10)

OVERALL: What a fantastic pour! My first impression wasn’t great with the ethanol really greeting me at the door. But that first sip…WOW! Completely shocked me. Rather involved and incredibly robust. All the notes were extremely well integrated without losing the identity of those individual notes. With a bit more time, the nose did eventually taper off on the ethanol allowing the ability to really enjoy the nose before going into the very enjoyable sip and finish. This is an excellent example of what older barrels of MGP can provide! If only you could find old MGP for $70 a bottle today…

1 | Disgusting | ...I've not subjected myself to this level

2 | Poor | Balcones Lineage

3 | Bad | High West Double Rye, Jefferson's Ocean 28

4 | Sub-par | Weller's SR, Woodford Reserve Distiller's Select

5 | Good | Buffalo Trace, Sazerac Rye, Green River Wheated

6 | Very Good | Blanton's, Holladay Bourbons, Widow Jane Decadence

7 | Great | Baker's 7yr SiB, WhistlePig PiggyBack SiB, 1792 BiB

8 | Excellent | Most ECBP batches, JD SiB BiB, High West MWND Act 11

9 | Incredible | Barrel Bourbon Batch T8ke, BBC DS #7, Four Roses OESQ

10 | Perfect | Found North Batch 08