Booker's 30th Anniversary Bourbon

I suppose this is a review for me as this is gone and anyone paying secondary better want the box for their shelf as I'm just gonna say it now. I'm not sure it's worth 200 for the liquid, let alone secondary. Nose - Brown sugar, perhaps some cherry or maybe it's just a varnish, oak, oak and more oak,. There's more here but I can't get past the alcohol. OK with water I'm getting rich heavy leather. More varnish. Vanilla but I'm not really getting caramel. Taste - So I'll leave out the opening. The mid pallet to finish are those peanuts you get at the steak houses with the shells and the oak from those barrels. The up front notes are hard to get, it's so high alcohol but it's sweet and has this shoe varnish. With water still intense, still kicks, still has that peanut and oak. The sweetness is more spread out and lasts longer. I need more water. The opening is non descriptive sweet bourbon notes, I can't get any more detailed. So I'm kinda torn here. it's darn good bourbon. I'm really a fan of oak and the peanuts and oak work well here. That said it's not that complex, it's not that nuanced, and it doesn't really have a lot of a transition. Just that sweet opening and then the rest. It's great but it's not special. 3.5 stars just because of the higher abv and it letting me really play with it. But hey the box is really cool and I hope that's worth a few hundered bucks for me cause I paid a bit too much for this. Leaving off the cost as I bought this from a good friend who sold it to me below secondary but it was still painful. But hey he got to drink it with me as I opened it the second I gave him the cash and we had a nice couple of hours to catch up.

A generous sample from dthom as part of the "whiskey transfer program". Very excited to try this as I really like Booker's and Little Book. Nose: Very complex. Right away I'm hit with caramel apples but there is a vanilla malty undertone almost like I'd expect from an Irish Whiskey. Some funk in here too that reminds me of tropical fruit changing that initial apple in to more of a mango. As it sits in the glass I start to get the signature Beam roasted peanuts with honey and dried figs. Flavor: Caramel cream, boiled peanuts, vanilla, dark sugars, crème brulee. Wow this is good! Thick mouth feel and punches way under its weight for the proof. Finish: Very long. Starts off nutty and then quickly turns sweet/spicy and gets oaky but not very drying. As it sits the spice fades in to a pleasant black pepper note with more toasted nuts and toasted coconut. This stuff is delicious! I could see paying MSRP of $200 for it but the secondary over $600 I'd have a hard time doing. Definitely the best Booker's I've tasted and it should be. Extra points for the cool packaging with the box being reclaimed wood from a rickhouse floor described as "reclaimed wood that Booker Noe once walked on."

Neat. Bar pour! Because I needed it today and found a cool local place that had it ($45 for 1.5 ounce). I proceed to knock over the Glen and lost .5 of it…. Got enough left to taste it for the first time. The bar I am at is also a cigar bar. May influence the nose a bit. On the nose, oakier than expected. The wood actually dominates the typical Booker’s nuttiness. Dark cherry and lots of nutmeg and cinnamon. Getting a nice elephant ear sprinkled with a powdered sugar but also a vanilla glaze. There is a melody of fruit under all of this…. Mango and passion fruit? Interesting. On the taste, mouthfeel is syrupy dense and even with a grit to it. Flavor upfront is intense and immediate. Sweet caramel syrup, rock candy, nutmeg and cinnamon. Mid-palate is a caramel covered salted pretzel that morphs into a chocolate covered pretzel. The finish brings an immaculate oak, slight nuttiness and more chocolate. It brightens up on subsequent sips with a bit of vanilla in places and those fruits are emerging too. Especially on the finish. Delicious pour. I love every second of it. I can’t knock it for any aspect.

Damn. Another one that I almost wish wasn’t so good, given it’s complete lack of availability. The nose is full of intense, rich caramel, rye spice, roasted peanuts, and barrel char. There’s also a slight underlying note of stewed apples, and pralines. The palate is incredibly complex, opening into creme brûlée, espresso, honey roasted peanuts, dark chocolate, and the slightest hint of peanut butter cups. While quite oaky, the oaky tones are perfectly balanced, presenting as toasted sugars and black coffee, with the slight bitterness perfectly complementing the sweet sugared notes present throughout. There is a slight, but quite pleasant astringency rolling into a rich, nutty, toasty, caramel filled finish and a warm Kentucky hug. Truly phenomenal.

Water needed to calm it down straight out of the bottle, though the uncut is not unpalatable. Still, a few drops cots down the raw alcohol and allows the actual flavors to shine. Not a strong nose, with mostly corn and a little oak. The palate is pleasantly warm with the sweet corn and a hint of spice present near the front of the tongue. There's a purity of taste here, unclouded by distracting strains. Some light spice on the finish that is easily masked by the heat if you don't water it down enough. On the flip side, it's a pretty simple whiskey with only the couple of notes keeping the path throughout. Clearly the price tag is for rarity only.

Tasted this again over the weekend. I wish I had some standout flavors to describe here. Overall, I am still disappointed in this pour. When you spend $200 retail on a bottle, you have a certain level of expectation. The nose is still great, the flavor profile is still a typically average good bottle of Booker's. The finish still ruins the whole experience. It's dry, it's fast, it's flat, it's tart, and it's just not something you want to savor. I tasted this SBS with the Backyard BBQ (2018-2) and it just did not prove to be worth the price. If I'd paid the same price as a regular release, I probably wouldn't be as disappointed.