Review: Jellybean Wines

This new brand is attempting to muscle its way into the mass-market wine space (Yellow Tail, Cupcake, Barefoot, you know the ones), choosing to head to the ever-popular “desserts” branding strategy for its identity. Jellybean wines come from just about everywhere. We reviewed two of the company’s offerings, with predictable results. 2011 Jellybean Berry Smooth…

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Review: Lost Spirits Distillery Leviathan I Cask #3 Heavily Peated American Whiskey

Recently we featured Lost Spirits Seascape, a peated American single malt whiskey. Now we’re back with what may be the company’s flagship dram: Leviathan I. Leviathan is bottled as a single-barrel release of heavily-peated (110ppm phenol, or thereabouts) single malt whiskey, aged for under 4 years in casks formerly used for late-harvest Cabernet Sauvignon. The…

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White House Beer Recipes Are Finally Here

Obama’s homebrew recipes are finally available to the public. And here they are! White House Honey Porter Ingredients 2 (3.3 lb) cans light unhopped malt extract 3/4 lb Munich Malt (cracked) 1 lb crystal 20 malt (cracked) 6 oz black malt (cracked) 3 oz chocolate malt (cracked) 1 lb White House Honey 10 HBUs bittering…

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Whisky From Space?

Space whisky? Not exactly, but Ardbeg is releasing an homage to a grand experiment going on with space-based whisky maturation in this limited-edition bottling. Read on for the full press release. Ardbeg Galileo launched to celebrate Scottish distillery’s “world first” experiment in space Limited Edition of legendary Islay Distillery pays tribute to Galileo, the father…

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Review: Scotch Malt Whisky Society Late August 2012 Outturn

Keeping up with the SMWS is going to be tough, but we’re up to the task. Here are thoughts on the four newest releases from our “secret whisky” friends. This outturn covers the second half of August 2012. SMWS Cask 4.153 – 11 year old Highland Park from Orkney – Very hot HP, at a…

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Review: Larceny Bourbon

Heaven Hill has just released this new bottling, called Larceny and named in honor of John E. Fitzgerald. Who’s that? A treasury agent with “the only set of keys to the rickhouses,” he reportedly stole whiskey from the best barrels as he traipsed through the warehouses around the turn of the century. There’s a long…

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Review: Brugal Especial Extra Dry Rum

Our friends at Brugal weren’t happy with one white rum. Now they have two. Brugal’s Especial Extra Dry looks frighteningly similar to last year’s white rum release, Blanco Especial, but they differ in a key way. The new Especial Extra Dry is aged for one more year (for a total of three years) before it…

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Tasting Report: Blue Chip Wineries of Oregon’s Willamette Valley, 2012

A recent trip to Portland afforded an overnight to the Willamette Valley, where Oregon’s best wines are made. On this trip I made advance plans to visit the best of the best, Oregon’s blue chip wineries in a long day of driving up and down the valley. This trip took us up and down the…

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