Review: Parker’s Heritage Collection Malt Whiskey Finished in Heavy Toast Cognac Barrels 14 Years Old (2024)
This year’s Parker’s Heritage Collection release, its 18th edition, is a bit of a mouthful. In fact, what you see in the headline isn’t even the full name. That monster of a name is: Parker’s Heritage Collection Kentucky Straight Malt Whiskey Finished in Reconstructed Heavy Toast Cognac Barrels 14 Years Old. Parker’s has done malt…
Review: Bardstown Bourbon Origin Series High Wheat Bourbon
Break out the cigars. Bardstown Bourbon Company’s Origin family is welcoming a new addition. High Wheat is the latest in the distillery’s house-distilled core range, and it is distinguished by, unsurprisingly, a whole lot of wheat. In fact, at 39%, it’s one of the highest percentages of wheat in any mashbill across the industry. This…
Review: Wines of Carpineto, 2019 Vintage
Carpineto is a relative newcomer in Tuscan wine production, dating back to “just” 1967. The winery produces all the classics — Chianti, Brunello, and the like — plus a super-affordable Super Tuscan called Dogajolo, which just celebrated its 30th anniversary. We didn’t get any Dogajolo, but we did get three more readily identifiable releases from…
Review: Siempre Tequila, (Near) Complete Lineup (2024)
Our first experience with Siempre Tequila was not wholly memorable — and that fact was perhaps not lost on its Canadian brand owners, which, since that 2019 review, dumped its original distillery and upgraded to a new NOM, the well-regarded but fairly busy NOM 1414, Feliciano Vivanco. The new expressions also carry “vintage” production information…
Tasting Sagrantino Wines, Fall 2024
Montefalco is not a city commonly invoked when discussing red wine destinations. Umbria is not a region immediately surfacing to top of mind when thinking about Italian wines, and Sagrantino is certainly not a wine frequently discussed here in the United States. But this dense, fairly disease-resistant grape is starting to quietly make waves, with…
Talking Rebirth and Barley with Bruichladdich’s Frazer Matthews
Bruichladdich is arguably the poster child for the renaissance in Islay single malt over the last two decades. It caught the whisky world’s attention in 2001 after a group of investors led by Mark Reynier resurrected the mothballed distillery and gave an eager Jim McEwan in the prime of his career free rein to push…
Review: 2019 Mascota Vineyards Unanime Signature Cabernet Sauvignon
Whatever the vintage or varietal, red wines from Mendoza-based Mascota tend to lean in one direction: big and lively. Their sublabel, Unanime, and this Cabernet proves no exception to the rule. Based on the nose, one would be reasonably forgiven for assuming this was a Malbec if handed a glass free from contextual clues. Loads…
Review: Mount Gay Single Estate Series 24_02
Mount Gay launched its Single Estate Series rum last year to great acclaim, the end-product of an eight-year journey that began with acquiring its own 324-acre sugar cane estate in 2015 and using that cane to make its own molasses, ferment its own juice, distill rum from that juice, and age it in barrels —…
