Vatting with Pappy

[MikeK]

The 2005 release of Pappy is much woodier than in the past. I also must say that while Pappy 20 is an excellent extra aged Bourbon, I find it much too dry and woody.

So as we sat looking at this fine duo on the table, Art jokingly (I think) suggests that we vat them to see what an 18yo Pappy would taste like. An evil grin spreads across my face. You know, I reply, I think we can do something with these, and besides that, it will offend the crap out of most people. Let’s do it!

We started out with a 50/50 mixture, ½ oz of each Pappy. The result was a predictable middle ground. Art thought it was still too dry and I knew just the way to fix that. In came a dribble of Forty Creek Barrel Select, perhaps 1/8 oz. OK, now we’re getting somewhere. All the refinement and dignity of the Pappy with a better sweet/dry balance. But it still wasn’t right, we needed just a little more sweetness, but with some complexity as well. Art reached for the Old Grandad 114. Yes, perfect, I thought. So we added a dribble of OGD, again about 1/8 oz. Ah, now we’re getting somewhere. The best attributes of youth and age. Rich, slightly sweet, and very complex all wrapped up in mature Pappy.

That distinct wheater sweetness shows up first on the palate. The Forty Creek caramel and honey make a short appearance and then OGD closes the show. The final flavor is very rich and complex. The Pappy’s provide a spectacularly ornate stage on which the other actors perform. The finish starts sweet and then flips rather abruptly to dry.

Mike

[cowdery]

I love this! I envision a book of cocktail recipes in which the only ingredients used are different whiskeys. You can't get more esoteric than that. I even have a title:

The Art of Gillmanization.

[bourbonv]

Gary should write just such a book with his vast inventory of experimental vattings. He could then ask for favorite recipes from others. I would buy it.
Mike Veach

[gillmang]

You guys are too kind. Really. But thanks for these comments. To MikeK: I commend you and Art for your intrepidness in vatting whiskeys (it still takes some courage to do it and admit it) and creating this particular one. It sounds great in theory and I have your word as to the practical result. 'nuff said! Just now on my balcony overlooking downtown Toronto I was sipping a neat vatting (or really a blend) that is one of my best (I know I keep saying this). Only devotion to whiskey and its traditions can conduce to drinking a neat dram when it is 85 F. outside but in my defense, it is windy today and a cool breeze is blowing in from the lake. In fact the drink was very good and while ice wouldn't have hurt it too much it was better neat! I can't recount the ingredients. While I make some drinks still the way MikeK did, this one is a combination of many different bourbons (plus Jack Daniels) and ryes. It also has some Canadian whisky in it and some flavouring (maple syrup and some rock and rye). The result is a whiskey drink that is "all-whiskey" but lightly sweet and with a hint of the citrus from the rock and rye. There is a light nose of rye on it which comes I think from the Booker's, Beam Black and Lot 40 in there. The JDs add a nuttiness and the many bourbons lend the main undertone. The way I make these is by taking 3 or 4 bottles of these mixtures and making a cocktail by adding a bit of this one and that one until I get it near-perfect. This is when it comes out clean, rich, soft, and complex. I like when the whiskeys meld to a nutty complexity that you can't unravel but which only derives from the high number of fine whiskeys in there and the particular (essentially singular) combination. But certainly you can do it with all-straight whiskeys (no flavourings, no Canadian) and a book of recipes would be very interesting to put together. An introduction would set out the principles: balancing dry with sweeter and younger (as MikeK and Art did); balancing rye bourbon against wheat-recipe; congeneric against "clean"; and so on. Chapters could be devoted to variations where high proof spirits are used to lighten and display the straight whiskeys, and where some flavouring is used but falling short of a cocktail (the boundary will be unclear inevitably, though).

Excellent notion. Who will write it?

Gary

[Mike]

Only devotion to whiskey and its traditions can conduce to drinking a neat dram when it is 85 F. outside

Gary

Gary, as far as I can tell, drinking whiskey at 95 F won't do you no harm either, neither. I did it yesterday as I was cooking ribs. It is getting the glass to my lips when it is 20 below that would give me a problem!

Beginning to look like we gone have to put on a 'Vatters' exhibition, with Gary Gillman as MC!

[gillmang]

Thanks again. Certainly people can experiment if minded and report their results here. To me vatting and blending are ways to expand the taste spectrum of the bottles in one's bar. And it is an old industry practice too going back to the early 1800's as I've often said. Currently we see it done commercially mostly in the American whiskey (blend) category. Here it is not to best advantage since the straight whiskeys used generally do not exceed about 20% of the total. Some may hit 30%, I think Calvert Extra does; it is also true that in practice for some blends the straight whiskey component(s) exceed 30% (i.e., even though the label may say the bottle contains 20% or 30% straight whiskey). This may be so, I've heard, for Barton's American whiskey blends. The preparation of a bourbon batch by distillers (to make up a bottling for a bourbon brand) is a kind of vatting since barrels of differing flavors and sometimes different ages are combined. WT Rare Breed is perhaps the best example with its blending of 3 bourbons of different ages. RB uses all in-house produced whiskeys of course. There is no reason logically though to limit vatting or blending in this way.

Historically, especially before Prohibition, middlemen bought whiskey from different sources and vatted it to their own recipes. Some still do. At home one is not bound by any particular way of doing it. Historically too blends came in every gradation from 5% of the total being straight whiskey to e.g., 50%, 90% and 100% (a blend of straight whiskeys). One way to do blending is to buy a blend and simply add more straight whiskey(s) to it. E.g., say you have a bourbon you are not fond of, or one you are fond of: buy Calvert Extra and add some of that bourbon to it. You can't really go wrong doing this since the straight whiskey simply reduces the amount of grain neutral spirit or green whiskey in the blend. Some people like the contribution to the taste of the non-straight whiskeys in the blend.

When someone does this over a certain period they probably will work out their own approach. E.g., I like all my blends to have some Jack Daniels in them: I find it fills them out and adds a nutty edge I like. And I always use some rye whiskey or rye-recipe bourbon strong on rye (e.g. Beam Black or one of the HH bourbons). And if possible I like to add some older bourbon to give an undertone of age (but not too much for my taste). Sometimes I like a little citrus or sweet in there too. There are many ways to approach it.

Gary