I can generally get a hold of Larceny Barrel Proof every couple of years; it is a highly allocated and sought after Heaven Hill whiskey, that, like Elijah Craig Barrel Proof, is released generally in four batches (A, B, C, and D) per year. Thankfully, Hokus Pokus and other local stores have been able to do private barrels of Elijah Craig Barrel Proof, but I had yet to see a Larceny Barrel Proof pick locally or even on the internet, until Hokus Pokus got one in this week. I got to sample it and buy a bottle at Whiskey Wendesday last week even though the bottles were not yet on the shelves.

The barrel Hokus Pokus picked is 6 years old, at a hefty 126.9 proof. This was aged in Heaven Hill’s Deatsville rickhouses on the site of the former T.W. Samuels distillery, on the fourth floor of Rickhouse CC, which is a mid floor on these six story rickhouses. For those that don’t know. Larceny is Heaven Hill’s wheated bourbon that replaces Old Fitzgerald which has now become an extremely limited release bourbon. I am not a fan of Larceny’s standard 92 proof release, but the barrel proof releases are very good.

The color on this is a nice deep amber, and is darker than I would expect after being aged only six years. Thin film but thick legs on the swirl. On the nose are the wonderful bread notes I find on wheated bourbon, along with vanilla, caramelized sugar, and some nice oak. On the palate, this bourbon just explodes with flavor – cinnamon rolls in caramelized sugar frosting, cherries, cloves, raisins, and oak. The mouthfeel is also really nice – thick but not too syrupy, and it really exemplifies why whiskey straight out of the barrel is so good. There is a little bit of the Beam family peanut yeast funk on the back that I detected on Whiskey Wednesday and on my first dram from a fresh bottle at home. On the finish, cherries and candied peanuts fade into cloves and cherry altoids, with some oak as the finish recedes.

I had my wife Catherine sample it; she loves wheated bourbon and her palate is not sensitive to the yeast funk; she said this was absolutely nothing but good and that she could drink a lot of this, despite the high proof. Swirling this whiskey in my copita really lessens the peanut yeast funk, and I suspect a little air in the bottle will do that as well. Swirling my second dram a bunch really changed the flavor for the better. Talking with the folks at Whiskey Wednesday when we were sampling this, I think Beam Family Yeast funk may be my own personal soapy cilantro for my palate. But, many folks note that the initial pour of a bottle of bourbon is often not the best indication of the true flavor profile of a bourbon. Knowing this, I will often draft a review, save it, and finalize it a day or two later after sampling the bourbon again. Tasting it 24 hours later and giving it a good swirl in a Glencairn, the yeast funk is now barely detectable. So, before passing final judgment either way on this bottle, give it some air.

When you think about cask strength wheated bourbons other than William LaRue Weller, the Platonic form of Bourbon (IMHO), what you have is Maker’s Mark Cask Strength, including limited edition releases of the same, from Jim Beam, Weller Full Proof from Sazerac, and Larceny Barrel Proof. Those three bourbons are pretty much the universe of cask strength wheated bourbon other than craft distilleries. While Luxco’s Rebel Yell does cask strength store picks, they do not have a widely released cask strength bourbon. What is really interesting is that Old Fitzgerald (and Larceny by implication), Weller, and Rebel Yell all trace their origins to Stitzel Weller, and Pappy Van Winkle and Bill Samuels, Sr. were good friends and there is some speculation that Maker’s Mark is the old Fitz recipe but with Beam yeast. Most wheated bourbons can trace some part of their history to the Van Winkles. But, given that the brands have been divided up, the flavor profiles can vary greatly from distiller to distiller.

I definitely prefer this Larceny Barrel proof to Maker’s cask strength and Weller Full Proof; it just has a lot more character. But, I would also have to say that I sampled Heaven Hill’s Grain to Glass Wheated Bourbon at a Whiskey Wednesday at Hokus and was glad I didn’t pay the nose bleed price for that bottle which was likewise six years old and high proof. As to flavor and mouthfeel, it pales in comparison to this Hokus Pokus barrel pick of Larceny, and I have no idea why that is the case. High proof six year old wheated bourbon from the same distiller should be similar. At least I would think so. Now, that it not to say that Larceny Barrel Proof displaces the Van Winkle 15 or William LaRue Weller in my wheated bourbon rankings. But it definitely wins in the cask strength under ten years old wheated bourbon category.

At $75, this is priced right, meaning that it is the same price as the quarterly releases of Larceny Barrel Proof, and those releases contain bourbons between six and eight years with this one being six years. Really good on Hokus Pokus for sourcing something so reasonably priced but ridiculously hard to get in time for the holidays. Any bourbon drinker would be happy to get this in their stocking this Christmas.