Here is the followup to a huge side by side tasting I did involving twenty years of Henry McKenna Bottled in Bond. The TL;DR version is after trying some amazing Henry McKennas distilled in the mid 80s that run circles around the current product, I thought it would be fun to run through the years since then to see how the profile has changed. The grand side by side turned into a bit of a disaster though as there were just too many samples involved. In an attempt to salvage some sense of usefulness, I'm running through what vintages I have remaining in a more typical review style. On deck we have:
- Barrel No. 0083, Barreled on 12/05/86
- Barrel No. 0208, Barreled on 05/01/92
- Barrel No. 0232, Barreled on 04/19/93
- Barrel No. 0324, Barreled on 05/09/95
- Barrel No. 0328, Barreled on 05/20/96
- Barrel No. 0842, Barreled on 10/24/01
- Barrel No. 1024, Barreled on 05/30/02
(Left) Aged 10 Years; 50.0% ABV; Barrel No. 324, Barreled on 05/09/95
(Right) Aged 10 Years; 50.0% ABV; Barrel No. 3035, Barreled on 03/14/06
Nose: Pretty typical classic bourbon flavors but also an odd green wood note. It's not overly woody, not overly sweet, and has just a bit of rye spice. Compared to the current product, it smells noticeably more mature though it is a bit muted overall.
Taste: It's sweet and woody but that green wood note is very evident. It's not like it tastes young but there is some overly strong presence of weird young sapling tree. The sweet notes like others in this series are rather condensed like liquid confectioner's sugar. While it's nicely balanced other than that off note, it's pretty muted compared to the rest of these. Side by side the current product again tastes more grain and fruit forward though it has more punch than this one.
Thoughts: This one did poorly in the giant side by side tasting with my main gripe being it was very muted. It's hard to tell from the photo (which is old) but this is the lightest of all these in color and side by side today with a different modern McKenna bottle they are not that different in color. So what's wrong with this one and where is that green wood note coming from? My best guess is that the lesser of these build that note with exposure to air as it was not there when I first opened any of them nor there during the tasting many months ago. I've had this bottle open a long time now and each time I've come back to it that note just keeps getting more and more intense. Same goes for the other bottles where I've picked up on that note like Barrel No. 0083. Overall, this one has some redeeming qualities of being richer and having more depth than the current offering but the flaws make it really disappointing compared to the rest of these.
Rating: B-
Note that price is not considered when assigning a rating.
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