Last fall my buddy Tom Spenser and I attended a store pick tasting of 1792, and we sampled three different barrels and picked one for bottling. The bottles are finally at Hokus Pokus! The delay was apparently at the distributor level, which has been severely adversely affected by the opening of a Total Wine in Lafayette which has upended things for most retailers in Louisiana west of the Mississippi.

Color is a beautiful amber with seriously long thick legs on the swirl. The nose is very 1792 but on its best day; caramelized sugar, vanilla, some nice oak notes, and some floral notes. It is bottled in bond so it is 100 proof. On, the palate though, this bourbon really shines-creme brulee with blackberries and raspberries, Caribbean vanilla, slight rye spice, which culminates into cinnamon, clove, dark berry candies, and oak on the finish, which is very long and lingering.

This is probably one of the best picks of 1792 I have ever tasted. But, then again, I helped pick the barrel so I picked something pleasing to my palate. I really like this one because it has none of the raisin notes that some 1792 Full Proof picks have, the rye notes are very muted in that you get spice without grassy notes, and the flavors on the palate and the finish are really good with no negatives whatsoever. The distributor owes Hokus more cases of this, so they may sell out temporarily in the short term.