Bourbon Heritage Month is upon us. That means that it’s time to celebrate all things bourbon whiskey. So let’s start by celebrating bourbon from Kentucky — the home base of so many brands.
Below, I’m calling out ten bottles of Kentucky bourbon that you really should buy if/when you go to Kentucky. And… maybe go to Kentucky sooner than later if you’re a whiskey fan, y’know?
Look, it used to be that certain bottles simply didn’t make it out of the state at all. But with the aftermarket these days, that clear line is far too blurred as re-sellers drive across the country to carry bottles out of state (and jack up prices). So instead of paying an absurd markup for a bottle of the good stuff outside of Kentucky, hit the road and pay MSRP from a local liquor store or distillery gift shop in Kentucky.
Need some evidence that there are real savings here? Heaven Hill’s famed Green Label Six-Year is about $12-$14 in Kentucky liquor stores with a limit of two per customer (it’s reviewed below). Outside of the state, that bottle hits around $175 on the aftermarket. I think that makes it pretty clear that heading to the Bluegrass State for rare(ish) bourbon is a better idea than trusting re-sellers in your local neck of the woods.
Still, let’s be very clear, while I suggest that you buy the below bottles while distillery hopping in Kentucky this fall, that does not mean you can’t find these bottles in some other states. I’m saying, don’t expect to pay the same low prices in those other states as you would in Kentucky. That said, some of these picks are Kentucky-only releases and might literally be impossible to find out of state. There’s exactly zero black and white in bourbon whiskey when it comes to buying bottles, folks. Let’s just dive in and find you a great whiskey to buy on your next trip to the Bluegrass State!
Also Read: The Top 5 UPROXX Bourbon Posts Of The Last Six Months
- We Blind Tasted A Whole Bunch Of $30-60 Bourbons To See If Any Could Beat Weller
- We Put A Whole Bunch Of Bourbons To A Giant Blind Test And Discovered Some Absolute Gems
- We Blind Tasted Classic Bourbons And Were Shocked By The Winner
- The Best-Known Basic Bottles Of Bourbon, Blind Tasted And Ranked
- All The Double Gold-Winning Straight Bourbons From This Year’s San Francisco World Spirits Competition
J.T.S. Brown Bottled-in-Bond
ABV: 50%
Average Price: $13
The Whiskey:
This is a quality whiskey from Heaven Hill’s expansive bourbon mash bill (78 percent corn, 12 percent malted barley, and ten percent rye). That means this is the same base juice as Elijah Craig, Evan Williams, several Parker’s Heritages, and Henry McKenna. It’s a bottled-in-bond, meaning it’s from similar stock to their iconic Heaven Hill Bottled-in-Bond, amongst others on this very list.
Tasting Notes:
Cream soda with a dash of cherry opens the nose next to dry leather patches, caramel sauce, and a light touch of floral honey. The palate brings forward dry and woody spices with a hint of eggnog creaminess leading toward Graham Crackers and a sweet tobacco chew. The end turns the woody spice into old oak with more vanilla, honey, and leather lingering the longest.
Bottom Line:
This is one of those bottles that you’ll find super randomly in the Ohio Valley (and Washington State) but is on pretty much every shelf in Kentucky. It’s a bottom-shelf bourbon that punches way above its price point. It’s not amazing (don’t get me wrong) but it makes for a great shooter or a basic mixing bourbon.
It’s good enough that I’d recommend getting a case when you’re in Kentucky, especially when you consider the aftermarket price is around $80.
Pure Kentucky XO
ABV: 53.5%
Average Price: $40
The Whiskey:
This is yet another of Willett’s “small batch” bourbons (they have a lot). This expression is a 12-year-old bourbon that’s barely proofed down, making it one of Kentucky’s best-kept secrets.
Tasting Notes:
The nose opens with rich and buttery toffee syrup drizzled over a vanilla sponge cake with hints of smoky cherrywood, dry potpourri, and menthol tobacco. The palate leans into the toffee and cherrywood and layers in notes of wintry spices, green peppercorns, nougat, and old library leather. That toffee and cherry sweeten the mid-palate as the peppery spice, old leather, and cherry tobacco merge on the finish.
Bottom Line:
This is a little pricier but still a very cheap “premium” product. It’s also super easy to find on a lot of liquor store shelves around the state (Kroger’s, Cox, Fast Lane, etc.). All that said, you might be able to find this in markets around the Midwest and South as well.
Will one of those pickups feel as special as the bottle you got when you visited the Willett Distillery? I dare say not.
Heaven Hill Aged 6 Years
ABV: 45%
Average Price: $13
The Whiskey:
Heaven Hill’s Old Style Bourbon is always affordable and very palatable. This expression adds an extra two years (or so) of aging to the entry-level juice. Beyond that, we’re talking about a very standard bourbon that’s meant to be mixed, shot, and enjoyed without breaking the bank.
Tasting Notes:
Sweet oak comes through on the nose with a hint of dried mint and maybe some brown sugar. The palate holds onto that oak and gets a little bitter, thanks to the char of the wood, while vanilla arrives with a touch of pancake syrup. It’s really the oak that holds on the longest, as the sip creates a warm buzz on your senses and slowly fades out.
Bottom Line:
As mentioned above, this Kentucky-only release hits high prices outside of Kentucky. You really can walk into liquor stores and find this for around $13. Hell, once it was on sale for $9.99 at a shop I randomly walked into in Lexington. I grabbed my two and went along my merry way.
Weller Special Reserve
ABV: 45%
Average Price: $30
The Whiskey:
This is classic wheated bourbon that’s blended, proofed, and bottled as a just-north-of-budget whiskey expression. We don’t know the age or mash bill though since Buffalo Trace keeps all that information very close to its chest.
Tasting Notes:
Tannic old oak really pops on the nose with sweet cherries, soft vanilla, and a hint of wet leather. The palate is creamy with plenty of stewed apples and winter spices next to a hint of raisin and nut (kind of like a nut cluster with caramel and a touch of ginger snap). The finish arrives with a dark cherry sweetness that’s almost candy, as brown sugar counters a hint of sharp winter spice with a twinge of pipe tobacco next to a final note of old leather and dry wicker.
Bottom Line:
This is very classic and a great get when you’re in Kentucky. Go to the Buffalo Trace Gift Shop. They’ll be selling this or Buffalo Trace Bourbon depending on the day. If it’s a Weller day, you can get this bottle for $30. That’s about a third of what you’ll spend in the aftermarket out-of-state if you can even find it.
Evan Williams Single Barrel
ABV: 43.3%
Average Price: $33
The Whiskey:
This is Heaven Hill’s hand-selected single barrel Evan Williams expression. The juice is from a single barrel, labeled with its distillation year, proofed just above 86, and bottled as is.
Tasting Notes:
This has a really nice nose full of woody cherry, salted caramel with a tart apple edge, and a soft leatheriness. The palate feels and tastes “classic” with notes of wintry spices (eggnog especially) with a lush creaminess supported by soft vanilla, a hint of orange zest, and plenty of spicy cherry tobacco. The end is supple with a hint of tart apple tobacco with a light caramel candy finish.
Bottom Line:
Heaven Hill just made this a Kentucky-only release. That means there are still bottles on liquor store shelves across the country but they’re dwindling quickly. These days, this excellent value bourbon is still on Kentucky shelves for around $30. You cannot beat that price for this single-barrel bottle.
Wilderness Trail Single Barrel Bourbon
ABV: 50%
Average Price: $55
The Whiskey:
Wilderness Trail is the whiskey lovers’ whiskey. This bottle is made from a mash of 64 percent corn, 24 percent wheat, and 12 percent malted barley with a special yeast devised by Dr. Pat (the mad genius behind most of the brewing and distilling yeast strains over the last decades). The mash is a sweet mash, meaning that the tanks were completely cleaned and no leftover mash was used to start the next batch (like a sour mash). After distillation, the hot juice spent at least five years in a two-story rickhouse where the barrel was moved once a year.
Tasting Notes:
The nose opens with a sense of mossy forest floors next to used vanilla husks, cherry bark, and a hint of clove. The palate leans toward a sense of singed cedar bark with a cherry cough syrup vibe with a dose of Red Hots and maybe some cherry Dr. Pepper before a slight note of walnut banana bread kicks in with a hint of nutmeg and buttery warmth. The end leans into the earthiness with a line of dried cherry tobacco wrapped in cedar bark.
Bottom Line:
This is a great barrel pick that you can pick up Justins’ House of Bourbon (linked in the price). Generally, local barrel picks are always a great idea when visiting Kentucky. Pretty much every liquor store will have them from brands big and small. Just look for familiar bottles with the name of the shop somewhere on the label.
Fort Nelson Michter’s Barrel Strength Bourbon
ABV: 55.3%
Average Price: $100
The Whiskey:
Michter’s fills their barrels with 103-proof juice. After a handful of years spent aging, that proof inches upwards as the angels take their share. Usually, the whiskey is cut with that soft Kentucky limestone water before bottling but not in this case. This is pulled from single honey barrels that were just too good to cut and bottled at the Fort Nelson Distillery right on Louisville’s Whiskey Row.
Tasting Notes:
The nose draws you deep into the classic bourbon ecosystem of rich and buttery toffees next to salted dark chocolate-covered cherries, a touch of smoked stone fruits, and a minor note of spicy tobacco leaf. The palate delivers on those notes as the tobacco spice amps up before being smoothed out by rich and creamy vanilla, salted caramel, and apricot stone dryness. That dryness drives the mid-palate towards the finish with a pecan shell vibe next to slightly bitter singed cedar bark.
Bottom Line:
This is the bottle that you get at the end of the Legacy Tour that you also get to fill yourself from an actual single barrel of whiskey. That makes this pretty much the ultimate bottle to get while you’re in Kentucky.
Rum Barrel Finished Peerless Bourbon
ABV: 55.35%
Average Price: $149
The Whiskey:
The juice is Peerless’ signature sweet mash bourbon that’s finished in hand-picked rum barrels. After vatting, those barrels are bottled as-is with no fussing whatsoever.
Tasting Notes:
The nose on this runs deep with hints of burnt orange tea leaves next to a mild sense of dark molasses with a hint of dark chocolate-covered espresso bean flaked with sea salt and wrapped in dry cedar bark. The palate opens with a burst of dark orange oils next to burnt sugars and woody winter spices with a warm mid-palate. After a big crescendo of woody spice and burnt sugars, the palate falls into a creamy sense of honey with a smoked plum vibe in the background and more of that winter spice wrapped up in old cedar bark with a hint of sweetgrass and raisin.
Bottom Line:
This brand-new release from Kentucky Peerless is another winner. It’s deep and lush and kind of mysterious. This is a must-have when you hit the distillery tour at Peerless in Louisville this fall.
Bardstown Bourbon Company Fusion Series #7
ABV: 49.05%
Average Price: $65
The Whiskey:
The latest in the Fusion Series from Bardstown carries on the tradition of blending Bardstown’s own juice with expertly sourced barrels. In this case, 70 percent of the blend is from three different three-year-old bourbons with varying high-rye mash bills. The remaining 30 percent is from two 12-year-old barrels with a low-rye bourbon mash. Those barrels are vatted at Bardstown and touched with a little water before bottling.
Tasting Notes:
The wood comes through on the palate as a cedar plank that’s had nectarines crushed on it and then thrown on a grill with supporting notes of crushed almonds, floral honey, and buttery toffee rounding out the nose. The taste leans into the sweet wood and toffee as a touch of old malt cookies with a hint of vanilla leads to a spiced mulled wine with a little more of that honey. The finish is bold and warm with plenty of cedar, dark spice, and mellow toffee.
Bottom Line:
This is another no-brainer pick-up if you’re in Kentucky. You can generally find these on liquor store shelves around the state. But the best place to pick one up is at the distillery after a tour of the massive new campus.
Old Carter Straight Bourbon Whiskey, Very Small Batch 2-KY
ABV: 59%
Average Price: $180
The Whiskey:
Old Carter is a hidden-away bottler right off Whiskey Row in Louisville. It’s still very insider. Their process is all about finding great barrels of whiskey, blending them, and bottling them for whiskey lovers in the know. In this case, that was a three-barrel small batch blend that yielded only 688 bottles.
Tasting Notes:
A thickness comes through on the nose with creamy vanilla and maple syrup vibe with a buttery underbelly accented by old corn husks, woody cinnamon, allspice, and lush nutmeg with a hint of hazelnut. Thick salted caramel sauce vibes with a black-tea-soaked date feel as cinnamon syrup and smoldering orchard wood leads to a big mid-palate Kentucky hug. That warmth fades quickly as hints of dried cranberry tobacco and cedar braids filled with wicker and sweetgrass end the sip on a dry note with a touch of floral honey lurking underneath it all.
Bottom Line:
These releases are always stellar. You’ll have to get a little lucky to find this one, but it’s not impossible. That said, the secondary market for these bottles is astronomically high, price-wise. They’re also too good not to drink though.
