smooth ambler old scout-where to start?

[RiverRat]

The 7 year is good but sometimes runs a little flat.  Give your bottle some time, it will likely over 2-4 weeks sitting around having been opened.  Probably won't ever develop sweet notes, if that's your thing though.

I found the rye less uninteresting that the bourbon (though not flawed by any stretch), my current bottle has been steadily going into darn good sazeracs (sazeraci?).

SAOS BP offerings are a horse of a different color - much richer.  I've been universally impressed drinking these neat.   But if you're watering the 7 yr, don't bother with the BP bottles.

[b1gcountry]

This was much much better the second sitting! For the most part,  the extremely dry taste was gone

[starhopper]

To me, the 10yr bourbon is much better than the 7yr bourbon - but then, I'm not a fan of high rye, and the 7 has a higher rye content than the 10.

Edited January 11, 2016 by starhopper

[taddraughn]

3 hours ago, starhopper said:

To me, the 10yr bourbon is much better than the 7yr bourbon - but then, I'm not a fan of high rye, and the 7 has a higher rye content than the 10.

I also like the the 9 and 10 year bourbons from them better than the 7 that I have. It's worth noting that there are also high rye recipes for the 10 year barrels from them.. Got an email from Jamie Farris down at Lincoln road a little while ago and these are the barrels that he had.

 

2021 - LR 9 yr 119 prf

2012 - LR 9 117.6 prf 

2066 - HR 10 yr 107.6 prf

1631 - LR 10 yr 102 prf

1863 - HR 10 yr 98.8 prf 

1839 - HR 10 yr 105 prf

 

LR - 75 corn, 21 rye, 4 barley

HR - 60 corn, 36 rye, 4 barley

 

No rye available right now from SAOS 

 

Edited January 11, 2016 by taddraughn

[starhopper]

3 hours ago, taddraughn said:

I also like the the 9 and 10 year bourbons from them better than the 7 that I have. It's worth noting that there are also high rye recipes for the 10 year barrels from them.. Got an email from Jamie Farris down at Lincoln road a little while ago and these are the barrels that he had.

 

2021 - LR 9 yr 119 prf

2012 - LR 9 117.6 prf 

2066 - HR 10 yr 107.6 prf

1631 - LR 10 yr 102 prf

1863 - HR 10 yr 98.8 prf 

1839 - HR 10 yr 105 prf

 

LR - 75 corn, 21 rye, 4 barley

HR - 60 corn, 36 rye, 4 barley

 

No rye available right now from SAOS 

 

Pleny of the 7Yr SA Rye here in Middle GA! 

[taddraughn]

18 hours ago, starhopper said:

Pleny of the 7Yr SA Rye here in Middle GA! 

Recently got an 8 year bottle that was an Ace Spirits pick.. Unfortunately I haven't even seen SAOS anywhere in MS (much less the rye) except for Lincoln road. It also seems like he only picks barrels.. never seen a bottle of the regular 7 in there. Not complaining about that though!

[The Black Tot]

Hard to go wrong with a store selection, but it DOES HAPPEN. Keep trying and find the store that has a taster with the same priorities as you.

I've got wonderful bottles from SA. And the rye selections I've had from them made me kick myself that I didn't load up.

But I don't sweat it because MGP is making tons more of it and SA is aging more of it, too. Patience is the key, but even today I'm sure there are stores who have access to picks, no matter what the unofficial status of the barrel picking program is.

Good luck!

[Knilas]

Buy em all.  Yummy stuff!

[starhopper]

I just read an interesting post (posted today) by John Foster, Director of Sales for Smooth Ambler Distillery, in the reddit bourbon forum.  In response to the question as to when their in-house bourbon would be released, he stated the following....

"We decided to wait. It was and is a fine young whiskey, but we thought it would be better with some more time. I hope it'll come out this fall. But when we taste it in August, if we again feel like it could benefit from the oak some more, we may wait.

We realize not everyone is always gonna like what we do, no matter what, but we're taking great pains to only put the best stuff we can at bottling time.

Thanks for being so patient with us."

 

All I can add to this is - what a CLASS act.

Edited February 4, 2016 by starhopper

[Spade]

32 minutes ago, starhopper said:

All I can add to this is - what a CLASS act.

Agreed. This is one I've been curious about, but if they think it'll be better with a little more time, I'm willing to wait. SA definitely understands that one thing enthusiasts are looking for is a little bit of transparency.

[Paddy]

^^^I'm a buyer whether it's judged to be good or not, just because they care (and actually tried)! 

[Harry in WashDC]

In spite of their being an NDP, their dumps of the barrels they have picked  (10 yr, 7 yr, even an 8 yr I found, Contradiction, BP, rye, etc. - have NEVER disappointed me - somebody there knows how to blend (John Little, was that you?? I kneel in awe.).  I even liked their Yearling, the wheated, which I bought in a 375 - imagine, a one+ year old wheated bourbon that tasted good.  If they say  THEIR OWN MAKE isn't ready, I'll trust them.  Thank goodness I live close enough to know I'll have a shot at getting some.   AND, thank goodness I'm in good enough health at my age to likely live to see it.  And taste it.

Edited February 4, 2016 by Harry in WashDC

[smokinjoe]

This is good news, as I honestly felt that their 2yr-6mos and 3yr-0mos offerings were nowhere near being ready.  Still way too doggish at those junctures, IMO.  So, good on them for hanging on to them longer to see if they come around. 

I have very few craft distillers on my personal watch list, but these guys are one of them because I appreciate and admire how they have handled their business on the sourced whiskey side.  I'll be pulling for them to succeed with their own made whiskey.

[flahute]

I'm in favor of anyone that will wait for their product to really be ready instead of rushing it to market to make faster money while trying to convince us to buy it with well written ad copy.

Kudos to Smooth Ambler for being patient. 

[Fort Knox]

Agree with everybody else's comments.  Thumbs up to the SAS guys for doing things the right way.  As much as I'm looking forward to getting ahold of some of their product, I was a little concerned, because I do tend to think that wheated bourbons need a little more time in the oak to get to where I like them.

[b1gcountry]

So how was the contradiction?

[jaxn slim]

10 hours ago, b1gcountry said:

So how was the contradiction?

It was the best of all time. It was the worst of all time.

Edited February 5, 2016 by jaxn slim

[tanstaafl2]

10 hours ago, b1gcountry said:

So how was the contradiction?

We took a run at it about a year ago in the Wednesday tastings. Over all I liked it although it was a bit spendy but as noted I was perfectly happy with the older sourced whiskey in the blend and would likely prefer to drink that on its own. But their stuff has great potential to me and I look forward to trying it when they think it is ready.