Irish Whiskey Auctions Introduce – The Bourbon Mans Guide to all things American whiskey!
A collaboration with Bourbon Paddy and Sinead Gormley- IWA Team.
If you’ve been following IWA’s meteoric rise to success in recent years, you’ll be well aware that they’ve gone from a having 200 bottles per auction to almost a couple of thousand available each month! Although much of the growth has been in Irish whiskey, the rising tide has lifted all boats, with the American Whiskey category seeing tremendous growth too.
In this two-part introductory guide, we’ll dip into the two main styles of American whiskey, look at what defines each, explore why each has a distinct flavour profile, and suggest the brands you may want to keep an eye on in upcoming auctions. We’ll demystify the mysterious, split hairs where necessary, and leave you with a solid enough understanding of what the US brands are up to in their concoctions. With all this, you’ll be set to bid with confidence!
Similar to Irish whiskey, American whiskey has seen a massive resurgence in popularity in the past 15 years. Once an industry on the brink of collapse, the modern golden age of American whiskey has picked up a nearly unstoppable momentum as distilleries open in their tens of thousands, established distilleries invest billions of dollars in expansion to meet demand, and shop shelves strain under the selection which has flooded the market. As a result, the American whiskey scene has become a hodgepodge of offerings from traditional distilleries, modern craft distilleries, and what are called Non-Distiller Producers selling sourced whiskies. When it comes to the two main styles of whiskies produced, these are Bourbon and Rye. Smaller categories are Wheat Whiskies, Corn Whiskies, And American Whiskies – all this to say you’ve covered everything in between and malts. Each distinct style of whiskey produced in America must adhere to strict legal guidelines which specify:
- Where it’s made.
- How it’s made.
- How it should be aged.
- How it should be bottled.
- What you can call it.
- What you can, and cannot do to it. Serious business altogether.
Bourbon Whiskey
Similar to Irish Whiskey , Bourbon is a term which describes a larger category consisting of different styles of bourbon. According to the American Bourbon Association and the Kentucky Bourbon Timeline, the distillation of spirits in North America was started by early European settlers coming from Ireland, Scotland, and further afield.
They brought small stills with them for personal use and at the time, many farmers with excess grain after harvest were distilling these for social and economic purposes. It wasn’t until the early 1800s that this corn-based spirit was actually aged in barrels and began being referred to as ‘Bourbon’ whiskey.From these humble beginnings bourbon evolved over time into its current form during the late 19th century and was legally defined by Congress in 1964. That’s your fun fact for the next party!
Today, there are four different types of bourbon- as defined by law: bourbon whiskey, blended bourbon whiskey, straight bourbon whiskey, and Bottled-in-Bond bourbon whiskey.
As a standard, all types of modern-day bourbon must be:
- Produced in either America or its Territories (e.g.Puerto Rico)
- Made from a grain recipe that is at least 51% corn, with the remaining portion typically consisting of “flavouring” grains such wheat or rye, along with malted barley for those precious enzymes.
- Aged in new, charred oak ‘containers’ (typically a barrel)
- Distilled to no more than 160 U.S. proof (80% abv)
- Entered into the chosen ‘container’ for aging at no more than 125 proof (62.5% abv)
- Bottled at 80+ proof (40+% abv)
- State on the label if anything additional has been done to change the final flavour of the whiskey, e.g., finished in wine casks, or toasted barrels, etc.
Now is where we start splitting hairs. Yes, going by these requirements, technically you could pass qualifying ‘new make’ through an oak bucket and legally bottle it as bourbon which would be maximum level shenanigans. Thankfully, however our American friends thought of this and defined three more types of bourbon, with each type containing less room for rogue techniques and ingredients than previous.
First up is blended bourbon–Blended bourbon became popular in the mid-1900s as drinker preferences started to move towards white spirits and producers were trying to recover from the impact of Prohibition on their aged stock inventories. Bourbon that’s labelled blended (or being a blend) may contain added colouring, flavourings, and other spirits, such as un-aged neutral grain spirits (NGS), but at least 51% of the product must be straight bourbon. This style has mostly fallen out of favour in recent decades but some older bottlings of blended bourbon containing NGS still pop up from time to time so keep an eye out!
The second style is Straight bourbon whiskey. Straight bourbon is bourbon whiskey that has met the standard requirements but has also been aged for at least two years, and is not blended with any other spirits, flavourings, or had colouring added. Additionally, bourbon that is labelled as straight which has been aged under four years *must* be labelled with the duration of its aging. These additional requirements mean that when you see a bourbon labelled as straight you can rest assured there has been very little wiggle room in its production.
Third, is what is called ‘Bottled-in-Bond’ bourbon – zero shenanigans here. Although this strict legal designation can be applied to any type of spirit, for a bourbon to be legally designated as ‘Bottled-in-Bond’ it must go even further than Straight bourbon and also be:
- Produced in the same distillation season (split into Spring season and Fall season)
- Made by one distiller at one distillery
- Aged in a federally bonded warehouse for at least 4 years under U.S. government supervision
- Bottled at 100 proof (50% abv) with nothing but water added to adjust the proof (no colouring allowed), and,
- The label has to identify the distillery, where the spirit had been bottled, and the distilling season in which it was produced and bottled in.
The Bottled-in-Bond Act of 1897 was passed in response to the heavily unregulated whiskey market in the 1800s.
On one side, reputable producers made straight whiskies from grains: distilling, barrelling, ageing them for the required 2 years or longer, bottling these once mature, and hoping to sell them and make an honest living. On the other side, you had ‘Rectifiers’ who bought their distillate from unknown sources, aged it for questionable amounts of time, often blended it with whiskey from several distilleries, sometimes added substances such as tobacco spit, iodine, colouring, and even more shockingly, sometimes poisonous additives.
These heavily adulterated whiskies were sold alongside false claims of age and quality for a good deal cheaper than the straight whiskey distillers. In basic terms, dishonest Rectifiers flooded the market with cheap, sometimes poisonous, ‘whiskey’ which damaged the industry by breaking consumer trust and risking the health of consumers whilst putting honest distillers out of business.
The Act was a massive step towards solving the problem.
Suddenly the US government became guarantor for the authenticity, quality, and traceability of any spirits labelled as ‘Bottled-in-Bond’, consumers were protected from rectified spirits, and distilleries received a tax incentive for producing bonded whiskies as taxes didn’t have to be paid until spirits were bottled and removed from the bonded warehouse for sale.
Tax strips were also helpful as they provided consumers with an approximate age of the whiskey within a 6 month period as each distilling season was 6 months long (spring season covering January to June, fall covering July to December) and distillers were required to state the distilling season and year that the whiskey was made and bottled on the tax strip. In today’s market Bottled-in-Bond bourbon still provides a sometimes much-needed safe-haven by providing drinkers with a style of bourbon that’s well produced, properly aged (often much longer than the 4 year minimum), bottled at a decent proof, and comes with full traceability as to where it came from.
As an added fun fact, the Bottled-in-Bond Act of 1897 was the first piece of consumer protection legislation passed in the US – talk about having your priorities in order!
In general, the flavour profile you would expect from bourbons depends on the type of flavouring grain the producer has used and can include caramels of various types, vanilla, berries and stone fruit of various colours, earthy baking spices such as cinnamon or cloves, and chocolate notes thanks to the charred barrels.
That is our Bourbon side rounded up, tune in next time for a deep dive into Rye Whiskey and Tennessee Whiskey!
Check out our Current Bourbon Offerings in our LIVE JULY AUCTION!
Bourbon Paddy is an American Whiskey Enthusiast, based in Ireland. What started as an Instagram page aimed at raising the awareness of America’s finest export to Ireland and the UK quickly got out of hand and now he has his own blog and socials accounts to further review and discuss, with plenty of cool photography and info, he is definitely an authority on his beloved American Whiskey!
