Old Elk Straight Bourbon Single Barrel Selection

Mike Rosen

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Bourbon

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November 3, 2022

Creating Old Elk’s flagship bourbon was the first job that Greg Metze was tasked with when he came on board as master distiller. In an interview with Weekly Whiskey, Jay West and John Henderson interviewed Greg Metze and Old Elk’s CEO of Luis Gonzales. This is what Greg had to say about the creation of Old Elk’s high malted barley mash bill. “The only request that the folks at Old Elk asked of me was to create a bourbon that was “smooth and easy”. Greg said from his experience that to get smooth and easy characteristics he had to get the malted barley content “way up” in the bourbon mash bill. “In the back of my mind I knew that all the other mash bills that I created had a certain amount of rye in it to produce a spice characteristic, and I wanted that to be part of the profile”. Greg went on to say, “To get that rye character to pass into the distillate, takes a minimum of 15% of rye in the mash bill. At that point it just became reverse math taking the corn content down to the minimum of 51%, factored in the 15% rye to get that little spice characteristic, which left me room for 34% malted barley. Probably 5 or 6 times higher than any other bourbon on the shelf”. Greg also talked about the cost of malted barley being the highest cost cereal grain in this mash bill with the lowest starch content, producing the lowest yield of alcohol. He added, “This is an expensive mash bill to create as your base flagship product, but it brings a special product to market that is different than everybody else”. With all that said, let’s check this out.

Barrel picked by: Jay West for r/bourbon.

Taken: Neat in a Glencairn glass, rested about 15 minutes.

Distillery: Contract distilled at MGP for Old Elk.

Proof: 111.6

Age: 7 years.

Mash bill: 51% corn/34% malted barley/15% rye.

Price: $75.

Appearance: Light golden amber

Nose

Sweet caramel, vanilla bean, brown sugar, dill, peach, orange, pecans, allspice and oak. There is a lot of vanilla on this nose mixed with werther’s caramel, sweet stone fruit, pecans and dill. All this sweetness balances out with a fair amount of allspice and oak. There is a buttery vibe to it that I’m sure the high malt content is responsible for. Swirling and more time brings out more vanilla, fruit, brown sugar and dill. There is a delicious and beautifully balanced nose with no heat.

Palate

Nice medium viscous mouthfeel. The nose transfers on the palate with caramel, vanilla, brown sugar, peaches, dill, and even more pecan nuttiness. Allspice enters in mid sip covering the palate but more subtly than I expected allowing the other notes to stay in the mix. Very good balance but overall more subdued than I was expecting given the strength of the nose.

Finish

Allspice, stone fruit, caramel, pecans and dill linger while subtle oak tannins enter in. Allspice and oak linger for a finish that I can best describe as a very subtle medium with some dryness at the end.

Conclusion

The nose is fantastic, the palate is tasty and enjoyable with a very nice silky mouthfeel. Unfortunately, the finish is the weak link. No doubt, Greg Metze accomplished what he started out to do by making this bourbon a “smooth and easy” delicious every day sipper. It is definitely that. The proof lifts up the profile enough so that I wouldn’t describe it as muted, but there is no “wow” factor here (like the Old Elk wheated r/bourbon SiB). Maybe a higher ABV would help? On one hand, this bottle has grown on me and there are aspects about it I really enjoy. On the other, I wish it had just a bit more punch on the palate and a much stronger finish.

Rating: 6.2/10