Review: Stolen Whiskey 11 Years Old
Review: Stolen Whiskey 11 Years Old
Stolen, best known for its smoked rum line, expands into whiskey with this first offering, an 11 year old bourbon sourced from MGP and given a unique finish. After Stolen gets ahold of the whiskey it is rebarreled in a cask with “double smoked barrel staves” which are made by “turning the staves at key points during a toast over an oak fire.”
So, what’s that do to a whiskey?
The nose of Stolen Whiskey is bourbon-sweet but, as one would expect, slightly smoky — exhibiting a barbecue-like smokiness with vanilla-soaked overtones of cherry wood, some eucalyptus, and hints of cardamom. The smoke lingers the longest on the nose, though — and it grows in power as it collects in the glass.
On the palate, a rush of sweet vanilla and caramel reminds you you’re drinking bourbon, but it’s washed away by notes of bacon and smoldering mesquite fire, smoky but sweet, and heavily meaty. The finish is drying and exceptionally lasting, increasingly dusty and growing rather harsh as it lingers on the tongue, that initial burst of sweetness long gone.
A little barrel char in a whiskey can work wonders for it, balancing out the more sugary notes and adding nuance, but here the effect is amplified to an extreme, taken too far and throwing the whiskey a bit out of whack. The more I drink it, the more all I taste are the remnants of a desert scrub brush fire. And I have to think that was probably not the intention.
92 proof.
B- / $40 / thisisstolen.com [BUY IT NOW FROM CASKERS]
Stolen Whiskey 11 Years Old
$40
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