Max drinks stuff in Los Angeles

[compliance]

Hi from Los Angeles. I've been lurking a while, doing lots of reading and tasting since last fall when I decided to branch out from scotch and give more bourbons a try. I also used to drink a lot more beer, but now I find myself passing up on beer to drink more whiskey.

I noticed one problem when coming into bourbon with a beer mentality, the bottles stack up fast! When I see a bottle of beer I want to try I never think twice about buying it, the bottles disappear very reliably. Not so with bourbon! It takes a lot more than one drink to kill a bottle, and while this is a very great thing, it means the half empty bottles are stacking up! I now know how all those bunkers SB members have have been amassed. I am starting to get a nice stock of my own going and have already taken over one whole cabinet in the kitchen.

Some favs:
Pappy 20
JPS17 and 18
Weller 12 and Antique (Can you tell I love wheaters yet?)
I have a great bottle of ORVW10/107 going right now
Baby Saz
4Roses SB OESV from K&L
Rittenhouse BIB
Stagg

On the lookout for:
PHC 10
Sazerac 18 (a billion Handy's out there in LA, never seen one Saz18)
Vintage 21 rye and other older ryes

You can see I definitely lean towards wheaters. I have also ended up making my way through a lot more of the BT catalog than some of the other labels so far. The 10 Four Roses recipes are kind of intimidating, but my K&L OESV has opened that door and I'm looking forward to trying others. I also grabbed an EC18 to sample some HH, just holding off on opening it until i kill some other bottles.

I've grabbed some dusties and have a few questions about those. There's a mid 70s Old Fitz mini I have that had a very strong nose and taste of model glue. Seems like it could have come from the lid, but I'm not sure. I have a few more I haven't opened yet and I'm hoping they don't have that note but I'll see. I have another normal size Old Fitz Prime bottle from the early 70s that has a strong attic/Goodwill Store taste. I was told that could be normal for that era. The bottle is good, but I assumed at first that that note was something that developed in the last 40 years. The seal wasn't in very good shape anymore and it had leaked a little.

You can check out my blog for a few whiskey reviews and thoughts, but I ended up not posting to it as much as I had intended to. I am still going to try to keep it going. http://maxdrinksstuff.blogspot.com/

I will save the rest of my questions for later. I have already learned a ton here, and am looking forward to contributing to the community.

Last thing I want to share is a peek at my other great love. Espresso!

-Max

[c2walker]

Welcome, Max! That was a great introduction. The PHC 10 and V21 will be tough to find, but I've seen plenty of Saz 18 around the LA area the past couple winters. Just keep an eye out this fall and don't overlook the big stores like BevMo.

[compliance]

Thanks c2walker. I am just hoping to get lucky with the PHC 10. I started reading SB in time to catch all the talk about how good it is (was), but too late to get any. I do know of one bar that has it, but they want something like $25+ for a pour. I might give in eventually.