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Incredible flavors, even better stories. One Pour,
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10 Minutes. Aussie bourbon lovers sharing bourbon with Australia.
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We're super excited. We're with Whitney Rye at The Parlour Room in
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Bardstown and host of the Mashbill podcast and of
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course owner of The Parlour Room. Here we are. Yes. So good. Thanks for coming
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and letting us in. Listen, I didn't do anything. I came to work. You all
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came here from a very, very long way away.
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Yeah, exactly. So thank you all for coming here. We're excited to
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be here. Yeah. Cheers. That's awesome. I'm super excited. Yeah.
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Should we start it off? Yeah. What have we got in our glasses? What have
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you poured for us, Whitney? So this is a 15-year sourced Willett that I
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picked with Drew Colesveen and Pablo Moy, along with a few of our closest
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friends who paid me a lot of money to be there. And we decided
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to do this one, but this is barrel number 4242. I only have
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a few bottles left of this, so I wanted to share it with you all.
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So I'm going to talk less, drink more, and let you guys kind
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of tell me what you think. Yeah. Wow. We'll ask a little questions.
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It's got a lovely,
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lovely nose. My goodness. I know I can barely smell right now.
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My voice is almost gone. Just like the weekend took
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it out of me and my body is like coming back punching me.
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So I've been a little congested recently, so I just went
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straight in, but it still tastes good. Yeah. Yeah. Amazing. It's delicious.
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The, actually, I'm getting some lovely fruit, like some stone fruit characters
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on the, both on the nose and on the palate. And then, yeah.
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Yeah. That kind of great Willett body is so pretty. Right.
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This is very Willett. This feels to me like
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whenever we went through, so we, we had 6 lined up in front of us.
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And we got to try. And when I sat down initially and
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talked to Drew, I was like, hey, I got this new license. Like, I really
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want you to be my first barrel pick. And he was like, sure, let's do
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it. But then he was like, well, I want to come and see what you're
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doing. Like, I've heard about it. I've seen you around, like, whatever. Because we knew
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each other, obviously. I texted him to be like, hey, can we have coffee?
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And so he was like, I'm not going to wear any swag. Don't tell anybody
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I'm there. I'm going to come and take a classic. And I was like,
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do you want to do the Willett one? And he was like, no, just whatever
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you got. So he came in and did a like $40 ticket class,
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right? It was Buffalo Trace. It talked about the mash bill.
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So like E.H. Taylor Small Batch, Eagle Rare, like that sort of thing. Very base
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intro level to Buffalo Trace. And he came and he sat right over there.
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And at the end, like he, you know, he was just like
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drinking and going through the motions just like everybody. At the end, everybody left and
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he was like, I'm obsessed with this place. He was like, I love what you're
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building. I love that you're not doing tasting notes. I love that you're not doing
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mash bills. And I was like, yeah, this is called mash bill 1,
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2 wheat. And I was like, but I don't actually talk,
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I don't tell people the mash bill. I just tell them like, hey, this one's
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mash bill number 1, this one's mash bill number 2. This is why they
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have those mash bills. This is why they do it. And he was like,
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can I call Pablo? And I was like, of course. And I was like,
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well, Ethan, your barrel manager's right next door. Can I have them come over?
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They were gonna come by. And he was like, absolutely, bring 'em all over.
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So about 2 hours later, I have about 30 bottles
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lined up on the table because everybody just started bringing stuff.
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And Drew's like, here's what we're going to do. We're going to plan this 2-night
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event at Parlor. You're picking a 15-year with me. You're going to pick a 15-year
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with Pablo. And then they wanted to talk about each other's brands and
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really kind of break down any barriers between that. So this is the
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barrel pick that we did for that event. And yeah,
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and so my thing is with this one, I picked this immediately.
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Like there were 6 in front of us. I slid this one forward, kept trying
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them, went back to this and I looked at Drew. He's sitting right next to
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me and I was like, number 3. And he was like, number 3. And everybody
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else is still kind of tasting and we were whispering and I was just like,
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yeah, it's number 3. And then everybody was like, well, I really like number 4.
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I really like number 2.
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And I was like, I was like,
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well, let's revisit 2, 3, and 4.
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And they were like, oh yeah, yeah, number 3 was really good. And so we
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go through and finally it dwindles down and it was half and half.
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3 people wanted number 4, 3 people wanted number 3. Luckily I
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had a majority stake. You get to push the—
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But the second Drew was like, number 3 was my favorite, everybody was like,
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all right, we're good. We made the right call. But my, when I
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pick a barrel, what I look for is chocolate.
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I was going to say I get a burnt finish, like a burnt chocolate finish
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on the end of it, which is really nice. And I feel like chocolate just
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balances out every other thing, right? So you said stone fruit, like if you had
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stone fruit, if you have banana, like Old Forester and Barton have these notes of
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banana, all of those go really well with chocolate. So do
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any type of floral, any type of herbal goes really,
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like mint and chocolate go really well together. I just feel like chocolate has this
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ability to really combine and balance out a
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pour. So the second that I tasted this and I got that chocolate,
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I was like, this is it. This is my favorite.
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And so here we are. However long later.
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Well, you're a Bardstown local, so your favorite
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is going to be a good recommendation because you get to try all of them.
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100%. So I have a really great relationship with a lot of the distilleries.
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I've always loved Willett. I have not always been able to afford Willett,
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But I do this other podcast that we've just kind of
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done live on social media called Bourbon Bracket. I'm sure
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you all get this question all the time. What's your favorite pour? And I'm like,
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in what category? Yeah. That's a good response.
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And also on what day? Like what do you feel like? Right.
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'Cause sometimes I just want a martini. I don't even wanna drink bourbon. So I'm
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like, it depends on your mood. It depends on everything. Like if someone asks me
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what's the best pour you've ever had, I can answer that pretty quickly. If they
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ask you, you know, oh, out of these 4, what's your favorite? Great, I can
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answer that. So Crystal from Evergreen and
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Nikki from Liam Ashe, all of us did a barrel pick and we were
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talking and I was like, we should just do this live on Instagram. And so
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we did. And we pick a category. We're basically building like a bracket of bourbon,
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like a fantasy football draft, right? So the first week we did our favorite
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single barrel, but there were limitations. Can't be more than a year old.
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Can't be more than $150 because we want it to be approachable for people to
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go out and find. And it can't be a barrel pick. That was a big
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one that got us. Oh, because a lot of single barrels would be barrel picks.
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Exactly. Because they're technically, obviously a barrel pick is going to be one single barrel,
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but it's not like designed to be a single barrel, right? That's not what somebody
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can go pick up at the store. Well, it wouldn't be as readily available.
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Right. Exactly. Like this one. Not readily
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available at all. But we were surprised because then we would record
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it and we would all bring our favorite But we were surprised by the limitations
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of that. It was just like, dang. So mine was Blanton's Gold. Yeah. Okay.
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And I was like, this is probably the thing that made me really love story
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of bourbon, right? And then Crystal brought in,
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Crystal and Nikki both brought in a Heaven Hill product. I forget which ones.
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I think Elijah Craig 15 and a Henry McKenna 10-year. What they brought in.
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They're all great picks. Right. But then we did it blind 2 weeks
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later and I picked Henry McKenna. And so it
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was just, it's so cool to think about it that way and to break it
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down of like, when you ask, what is your favorite single
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barrel? I can answer that a little bit easier now,
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but you have to really think that question through because
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that's a really hard question for someone who has as much bourbon as we do.
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Right? Right. Yeah. And I mean,
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our appreciation of bourbon, we're comparatively
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new to it, having not been able to grow up in Bardstown. What's it been
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like growing up around here and then like having it always as part of what
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you do? It's amazing. I mean, I always tell people what you
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don't— people come into Bardstown and what they don't realize is that I'm friends
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with pretty much every master distiller. But beyond that, like, that's the cool thing,
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obviously. But beyond that, I'm
friends with most of the brand teams. You know,
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these are people that I've worked with in the past or that I see consistently,
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and they're just out and about. You know, the amount of times I've ran into
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Ross Cornellison, or Drew Koolzveen, or even Connor
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O'Driscoll. Like, they'll just be at Mr. Tubb's or at Neat, and like, we'll just—
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I'll just be like, hey guys, how are you? You know, whatever. So growing up
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in Bardstown, if you don't already love bourbon,
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like, I feel bad for you because there's nothing else here.
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I mean, it is why we come here. That's why it's the bourbon capital of
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the world, right? We have 11 distilleries within a 15-mile radius of here.
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And they're great distilleries. I mean, if you think about Jim
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Beam, Maker's Mark, 1792, we have Four
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Roses Bottling, we have Bartow Bourbon Company, we have Luxco. I'm forgetting
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some, but you know what I mean. So many. Like, I apologize if there's
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one that I didn't mention. I'll randomly shout it out later. But I think it's
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one of those things where there's so much access that you almost
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lose the desire to access for a
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lot of people. I was not one of those people. I was like, why would
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I go anywhere else and open up a tasting room? Why would I have my
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podcast anywhere else? Like, this is my home. Yeah, but it's
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a lot of fun for me because I love bourbon. And I just remember,
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you know, I was like 7, 6 or 7 years old and I was driving
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home from Louisville with my dad. And if you've been here,
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Louisville's about 45 minutes north of us and you have to take I-65 south and
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then you turn off of the Clermont exit. Well, right there at the corner
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of 65 and Clermont is Jim Beam Distillery.
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I was 6 or 7, didn't know. And we were driving by, it was nighttime.
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And I look over and I was like, Dad, what's that little city right there?
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Because, right, if you've been at night and you drive past Jim Beam,
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everything's lit up. There's like little— and they're in this like valley,
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so you can kind of see it all. There's like smokestacks and
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different things. And he just laughed and he was like, little city, they make
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bourbon there. And, you know, obviously I was like, what's bourbon?
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He's like, you'll find out when you're older. Yeah. And then
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another story, like, I— we were driving by and my dad always drove
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me around. But I was like, why are there those prisons in the middle of
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Bardstown that have gates around them, but nobody ever comes
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or goes? Like, in my head as like a child, I was like, these are
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haunted. That's why they roped them off. And he's like, no, that's where they have
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barrels in there. And I was like, oh my gosh, those poor barrels. Because,
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you know, the Heaven Hill ones, if you look at them, I think they still
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do. Maybe not. But they paint all of them white. Yeah. Well, then you have
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like this black, you know, the black fungus is like seeping down from
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the windows. So it's like every child's horror. Yeah, yeah, right. Has that creepy feel.
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I was like, what's happening? Like, are all those prisoners just like stuck
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in there? And so, I mean, you know, there were, there were a lot
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of parts of it that I had to figure out, but I'll never forget like
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my first time stepping foot on Maker's Mark campus, you know, and just going and
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walking through and seeing the beauty. And I mean,
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this was 2012-ish. So I don't
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think they had Chihuly yet. But, you know, they were still touring Margie's Kitchen
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at that time. And it just changed. It changed the way that I
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thought about bourbon. I was like, this is beautiful. This is stunning. And then you
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look around and you see hundreds of tourists. Yeah.
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And I was like 23 at the time bartending. And I was like,
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this is people's Disneyland. Yeah. Like this is— I grew up here.
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This is a happy place. Yeah. This is the world, the happiest place on earth.
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I won't say the whole thing because I don't want y'all to get sued.
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Happiest place in the world. I'm like, not trying to get
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y'all trademarked, but that's how I felt about Bardstown.
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And so, you know, the more people that come in and see me,
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that's how I approach it is you're here.
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This— you could be at Disneyland. Yeah. You could be in Australia.
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You could be in Ireland or in Scotland or Mexico. You could be on the
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beach somewhere. But you chose to come here. Yeah. I take that seriously, and I'm
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going to make sure that you have the best darn trip you possibly can with
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some of the best darn whiskey that you possibly can. So that's kind of,
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you know, growing up in Bardstown made me who I am through
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and through. And it's something that I absolutely love.
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I'm very, very happy. The only other place I would have liked to grow up
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is probably Australia. So, but y'all have a lot of spiders. I was like,
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snakes and spiders. Yeah, snakes and spiders. Snakes and spiders and
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sharks, oh my. Like, there's just like, yeah, y'all got a lot of
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the, the danger of the bad. I've got a lot of good stuff. So our
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first trip here was we, we brought the kids over and we left them with
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our niece at Disneyland and we came out to see— yeah, yeah, yeah,
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you were like, we could go to Disneyland, we're gonna go to Bardstown
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instead. A great time. And then we all met up in New York afterwards.
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It was like, how was that? Cheers to that. Yeah, cheers. Thanks for coming on.
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This has been amazing. And thanks for having us here. And, uh, when you come
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to Bardstown, you got to come check out the parlour. Please do. Thanks, Benny.
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Cheers.
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Thanks for listening. Make sure you connect
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