Eagle Rare Aged 15 Years

Found on a dusty shelf in a liquor store. Hard to find anything about it, looks like it’s one of the couple thousand bottles produced by Eagle Rare for the Japanese market. Import label pegs the bottle from 1990, before Sazerac bought Buffalo Trace. Color: Deep copper, like a new penny. Nose: Ton of vanilla and fresh cream. Almond, apricot, and bit of spun sugar come through. Palate: Holy crap, that’s rich. Smooth as butter, with the almond and cream coming through stronger. Toward the back, it sharpens with some allspices, oak, smoke, and salted caramel. Finish: A little fiery, but given the proof, that’s expected. Calms down and leaves a nice oily finish with notes of heavy cream, vanilla pudding, and lingers with a sweet stone fruit. Adding a couple drops of water rounds the edges and really allows the sweetness and caramel to pull through. Overall sweeter than the 17 year, maybe a touch over sweet, but balanced well and a lot richer on the palate.