What rye are you enjoying Spring 2012?

After a full day working outside -beautiful weather- filling dog holes, cutting grass (I think my first March grass cutting day ever), running back and forth to Home Depot 3x etc. I cooked out - my first this year - burgers and sausages with beer and then a Thomas Handy Rye this evening...very nice stuff. I cut it a bit with water and let it rest ala Ralfy's advice, and really enjoyed the pour. Interesting stars tonight..the Venus and Jupiter show continues with the moon joining in for a unique alignment of light...a reverse L.

Sounds delicious! Here in the Boston area, it's cooled down a bit again after a beautiful week last week.

I just had Bulleit Rye for the first time this weekend, and wasn't impressed. Though it was decent in a Sazerac and Manhattan.

Also, I've had some more of my beloved Ryan & Wood rye (from nearby Gloucester, MA) from barrel #2 which has now been open since August, I think. It's been open so long because I've been saving it. And now the spicy complexity has receded, leaving behind a very smooth chocolatey flavor. Though it's not bad, I'm a little disappointed, as I'm not so much a "smooth whiskey" drinker, especially when it comes to rye.

I found Bulleit to be fairly rough stuff, what I would expect from a "cowboy" whiskey.

As a confirmed rye-addict, I'm enjoying the following ryes right now: Thomas Handy, Baby Saz, Rittenhouse BIB, Russell's Reserve, Jim Beam, and Pikesville.

I'm currently drinking some 24 YO Willett Rye that was bottled for BevMo a few years ago. It's... challenging. For starters, there is a lot of sediment swirling around in the bottle -- much more than in BTAC whiskies. After pouring some into a glass, the nose doesn't give up a lot of information. Taken neat, the woodiness stomps all over the other flavors. Some added water brings out more familiar rye tastes like spearmint and nutmeg, along with some grassiness. It's much more enjoyable with water. Overall, a very interesting bottle, although nothing I could drink every day. It's just a bit too oaky for me.

I had a bottle of BMH 23 Rye a couple of years ago. The Willett reminds me a bit of the BMH (at least, as I remember it), but with the wood intensity cranked up to 11. I'd really like to taste the Willett alongside some other older ryes, like a Saz 18, a Rittenhouse 21/23/25, and the Vintage 21 and 23. It'd be interesting to see how much woodier the Willett is than other bottlings in a similar age bracket.

I've been going back and forth between the WT 101 Rye and the Bulleit Rye. While I consider the WT to be the better of the 2, I am finding the Bulleit interesting in that it's so much different than the rest of the rye's I've had. There's just something about it that I'm enjoying.

Enjoyed some High West Double Rye.

Speaking of High West, I just cracked open a bottle of Rendezvous a few days ago.

Very distinctive flavor profile, with lavender on the nose following through with Thrills Gum/Chowers Scented Gum on the palate and finish.

Some have noted that Bulleit Rye has a green label, hinting at it's spearmint-y contents. I think Rendezvous ought to have a purple label.

It's my day off, so I'm doing a triple play right now: small pours of BMH 23, VWFRR and Saz 18 before I run off to do some wedding registry BS (not my cup 'o tea, go figure!) with my wonderful fiancee. I do adore the Saz 18, but it just is nowhere near the VWFRR's league. The nose is where the Saz 18 shines, and by itself it's wonderful stuff, it just always comes off as stale to me. My last bottle hid in the back of the cabinet for a few months and it was literally deflated, utterly just gone. No there there. I've never had a whiskey do this to me in so short a time. I'm a lover of old ryes, so I will continute to snap up the Saz 18 when I can, but this experience has given me a wonderfully perverse incentive: drink that Saz 18 fast. Has anyone else had this experience? After about 3 mo the Saz 18 was limp, flaccid, just totally meh, blah, thppt. I know bottles degrade, yeah yeah yeah, but this was the quickest I've experienced so far.

The BMH 23 is dense and leathery and tobacco-y and makes me want to say if overoaking is wrong, I don't want to be right. (Of course, overoaking usually is wrong!) Had some Rittenhouse distilled in PA at Joe's not-really-going-away going away party, and the BMH 23 reminds me a lot of that. Or I should say, the initial taste of the PA Ritt really, really reminded me of the BMH 23, but now the BMH 23 reminds me of the Rittenhouse. Yeah, basically what I'm saying is that BMH 23 is the "Kafka and His Precursors" of rye whiskey. If you're not a Borges fan, just ignore the reference. Sorry to go literary on y'all.

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Originally Posted by LikeItWasSodaPop

My last bottle hid in the back of the cabinet for a few months and it was literally deflated, utterly just gone.

Has anyone else had this experience? After about 3 mo the Saz 18 was limp, flaccid, just totally meh, blah, thppt. I know bottles degrade, yeah yeah yeah, but this was the quickest I've experienced so far.

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My 2011 bottle is doing the same thing. It's barely been a month and half since I opened it, I'm down to the last quarter and it's lost a lot of vitality. I think the same thing happened with my bottle from last year as well.