Mike Outcalt is a good friend and whiskey evangelist. He is the host and creator of the Po It Up Podcast. Today we talk about the current local and global culture around whiskey and how to find some of the rare bottles out there.
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Show Transcript (AI Driven There will be Errors)
Colter Wilson: On today’s show, we’re going to do something a bit different and we’re going to talk about all things whiskey specifically. We’re going to talk a lot about commercial whiskey with the creator of a podcast called poet up. His name is Mike Alcott, and he’s tasted a lot of whiskeys from around the world, and we’re going to do a deep dive today on homebrewing DIY.
Welcome back to homebrewing DIY, the podcast that takes on the do it yourself aspect of home brewing gadgets, contraptions and parts. This podcast covers it all. On today’s show, we’re going to talk about the wonderful world of whiskey with the creator and producer of the poet up podcast, Mike Alcott. But first, I’d like to thank all of our patrons.
It’s with your support that we can keep this show coming to you week after week. So head over to patrion.com forward slash homebrewing DIY. Right now, if you give at the $1 level, you will get access to our ad free RSS feed, which is normally set aside for the $5 level. Also send you a set of homebrewing DIY stickers.
That’s for the first 20 people at the $1 level. I’d also like to thank our newest patron, Greg. He gave at the supporter level, which I can’t thank you enough, Greg. That one always means a ton to me since it’s at such a high level. So once again, if you’d like to support the show head over to. Patrion.com forward slash homebrewing DIY.
Another way you can support the show is to rate us and review us. If you head over to Apple podcasts or pod chaser.com even on Stitcher as well, you can write a review about the show and that helps others find the show because your reviews really do matter. Also, I do appreciate the feedback. I’ve actually made direct changes to this show based on feedback from our supporters.
Another way that you can support the show is to head over to our website, homebrewing diy.beer and click on our sponsor links. If you want to buy brewing software from brew father, or if you want to shop at Cherokee brew supply, if you click on those links, it lets them know that we sent you and then they will also support the show.
In turn, Cherokee Bruce supply has some great deals for you. If you have any orders over a hundred dollars if you use the promo code, homebrewing, DIY, all one word, you’ll get 10% off. And if you have any orders over $58 you’re going to get free shipping. So head over to Cherokee brew, supply.com another announcement I have to make at the website is that if you head over to the support page on our website, you’ll have all the different ways you can support the show, but we also have released our new t-shirt store, so it’s powered by T public, but if you go over and click on that link and buy any of those shirts, you’re going to support the show as well.
I’d also like to set out a reminder that on Thursday the 30th of April at 7:00 PM mountain time, we are doing our homebrewers discussion. We’re going to have Ryan pack Meyer, he’s been on a couple of our episodes. He’s going to do a Q and a in our discord server to access that server. Just head over to home brewing DIY dot ear and click on join the discussion once you.
Get into the discord server. If you go under the announcement section, you’ll see the instructions on how to participate. I’m really excited about this one. Ryan’s a great brewer and a great friend, and to be honest, you’re going to get a lot of different questions answered when it comes to brewing big beers or brewing in barrels.
So very excited about this homebrewers Q and a. If you are planning on participating on May 2nd, 2020 that is actually this Saturday. It is the world’s largest virtual big brew from the home brewers association. Head over to homebrewers association.org to find out more information, but on Saturday, May 2nd will be the virtual
big
Colter Wilson: brew.
I have a bit of a story to tell when it comes to my brewing. I’m finally getting rid of my fermentation chamber. I have it on the side of my house. I need to actually figure out how I’m going to dispose of it. That’s a whole nother project, but right now, I currently have a brand new chest freezer. Evan Sherlock, who’s done a couple of shows.
He does our Homebrew hack show with us in the month of December. He actually had an extra chest freezer that was given to him. His wife actually said he’s not allowed to have another refrigerator, so boom, it’s sitting on my back porch and getting ready to be converted into a new fermentation chamber.
I’m very excited about it. One problem I had is that as I was swapping out all the electronics, I somehow. Broke my ferment track controller. So it’s actually a good opportunity for me to start from scratch. So I am in the process of building a new one. I’m going to switch to the ESP 82 66 from the Arduino version, and I’m going to rewire the whole thing.
And I even have one of the people that is in my discord server, pretty sweet guy. He’s going to. Three D print me a brand new enclosure for it. So pretty excited about the new ferment track project. Well, enough about me. Let’s jump into today’s show where we’re going to talk to Mike Alcott about all of his adventures with drinking whiskey and how he found a cool new podcast called PO it up.
I’d like to welcome Mike Alcott from the poet up podcast. He has an amazing podcast that talks all about whiskey. So I’d like to welcome Mike.
Mike Outcalt: Thanks culture. Thanks for having me on the show.
Colter Wilson: Yeah, so. Let’s just dive into the pota podcast and start there. I’d like to talk a bit about just pre roll of this.
When we were having a chat before we got started, you were giving me a breakdown of how your podcast was found, and I think that’s a good place to start. How, how’d you get into podcasting about whiskey?
Mike Outcalt: Sure. Perfect place to start. And my girlfriend. You know, started taking a look at my whiskey collection.
She said, you know a lot about this. It sounds like you’re speaking in tongues when you start chatting shop about whiskey. So y’all should start a podcast and you love sitting around drinking, talking about whiskey with your friend, Devin. You should bring him on. She said, you two should be the hosts. I’ll be the producer.
And I said, that is a fantastic idea. All we gotta do is get Devin onboard. So we went over to his house. We had this master plan just to get them drunk enough to agree to do a podcast with us. And we did like a 15 course whiskey pairing. We did Blanton’s gold from Japan, and then we had a lot of Freud Cardeas cask strength, and we compared to Buffalo traces the normal in the store pick and.
Every time we’d pour more whiskey, we’d say poet up when it started laughing, and we’d get drunker and drunker until the end of the night. We’re just like poet up powered up, and Devin was totally into doing the podcast. So that’s what we agreed to. Name it right there and right then. So barriers to entry for a podcast were minimal.
We got two microphones, a switch, and some free recording software, and we went to it.
Colter Wilson: And you’re on episode nine or 10 now, right?
Mike Outcalt: We have grand plans for 10 as soon as the quarantine is over during Covitz. Since we’ve been stuck at home, our producer Rose, my girlfriend has been jumping in and doing some bonus episodes with me.
So that’s been pretty fun too. And under 10 episode 10 is going to be, are under $10 bottles, so. We’ve been blessed with an abundance of just phenomenally good whiskey. I mean, all the hard to get stuff, the rare stuff, the allocated bottles, we’re going to just beat her pallets up on this one. The under 10 category.
Colter Wilson: Yeah, so let, let’s talk a bit about tasting whiskey, or actually let’s just talk a general about whiskey culture right now. When I was a bartender for a long time, I would say. I was a bartender all through the two thousands from the late nineties through the two thousands you know, vodka was the big drink.
Martinis were the thing. Jen was the thing. And only in the last, I would say, five years to seven years, whiskey has really taken off to become a, it’s really become a thing that is like the spirit of choice for at least America. What would you say is driving that.
Mike Outcalt: That’s a great question. Um, maybe just a revitalization in, um, great whiskeys.
You know, there’s some fantastic offerings that have gone unchanged for a long time coming out of Kentucky. I think social media plays a big part in that too. There’s a lot of massive, massive whiskey groups on Facebook and Instagram. People that are, are sharing these bottles and their tasting experiences.
I think. People are going back to some of the traditional whiskey roots and I, I love bourbon, scotch, Irish ride, Japanese whiskey. There’s just a ton to explore there. And then there’s a lot of hunting going on too for these allocated bottles. I know you used to say back in the day, you could get Blanton’s anywhere, but it’s a real struggle to go pick up a bottle of Blanton’s anywhere.
You got to know somebody, you got to find it. The secondary price is getting crazy for it too, because everybody’s out to get those bottles.
Colter Wilson: Yeah. And it seems like there’s such demand and whiskey takes so long to age that there’s really a shortage. Just be based on the process to make whiskey. Right.
Mike Outcalt: Yeah.
Yeah, absolutely. And a lot of the name brands have the economies of scale that make bourbons and rise that are 12 years old and keep their prices down. There’s just a ton of craft breweries or craft distilleries that are popping up where they can’t do the same thing. They’re going to be aged less. The cost is going to be higher, and if you look at somewhere that’s running out of whiskeys, because the demand is so great, look at Japan.
Japan’s been making phenomenal whiskeys at Nika and how some Tori, the Suntory brands are Yamazaki, hukou Shu and Hibiki. Those three, all the age statements have been discontinued. And it’s a small country that’s making an exceptional product that got really popular, especially with the Olympics and now cancel the Olympics.
But people were, they were looking at keeping all of their whiskey in house in Japan, and it’s all just been bought up and the prices have skyrocketed in the States because they simply just can’t produce enough for the demand.
Colter Wilson: Yeah. It’s funny you say that. I was in salt Lake city for the 2002 games and I was blown away.
It’s some of the access to spirits and wines that we didn’t have when I was in normal. Production, I guess, or normal business levels. Right. And so like for example, R, and it was a state run liquor store, but our state run liquor stores had access to liquors and wines, and specifically on the wine side that we wouldn’t have never had access to if we hadn’t had the Olympics.
It’s like, uh, these brands use the Olympics as kind of a marketing statement specifically to make sure that they’re there. They’re marketing to that crowd. It’s kind of funny that you say that cause that that is something that I’ve seen it firsthand.
Mike Outcalt: Sure. And I got into whiskey a little bit too late. I was in Japan like seven years ago and I wish I would’ve known more about it when I did because I didn’t buy any whiskey that got them.
Could have made a killing on some of the, some of the allocated bottles and the age statements that it could’ve picked up seven years ago.
Colter Wilson: Well, let’s talk a bit about the different whiskeys from different areas. I think that, you know, obviously there’s two ways to spell whiskey. There’s whiskey without an E in it.
And, uh, and I know that whiskey with an in, it means that it comes from Scotland. But the idea is that when we look at the different whiskey producing. Regions of the world, you know, there’s American whiskey. What other kinds of whiskey are there and where are they from globally?
Mike Outcalt: Sure. It’s funny you mentioned the spelling between the K E Y and the K Y.
The general rule of thumb I use is if there’s an E in the country name, there’s an E in the whiskey, so United States of America and Ireland, you can have the K, E, Y if it’s K, Y. Look at Scotland in Japan, so no E in those country names. And then you have the whiskey and the whiskey. Uh, my understanding is the key is a Gaelic pronunciation and spelling of it.
So the Irish immigrants brought that over to the United States, but there’s always going to be exceptions, I think right now you’re drinking a bottle of Rittenhouse, correct? I
Colter Wilson: am.
Mike Outcalt: That is a bottle and bond rye made in Kentucky by one of my favorite distillers, heaven Hill. But they spell it S, K, Y. No, E in that.
So, same thing with like maker’s Mark is a bourbon and they call it whiskey in early times. Bib is a K Y instead of a key. There’s always going to be exceptions to that rule. Um, I tell a lot of people, don’t worry too much about how you spell your whiskey. I
Colter Wilson: agree. So my, my next question is when we talk about the different regions that are producing whiskey, where are, where is whiskey being produced mainly in the world?
Mike Outcalt: Sure there’s, there’s kind of four big regions, in my opinion, and that’s going to be bourbon, which Kentucky is going to be the bourbon capital of the world. Bourbon is a federally regulated term in the United States though, so you can make bourbon anywhere in the United States as long as it’s bottled at at least 80 proof.
You age your whiskey for at least two years in an American Oak barrel. In the mash bill, what it’s made up of is 51% corn. So a lot of bourbon coming out of Kentucky, a lot of rye coming out of Kentucky. And then the other three big players, Scotland, that’s where they make scotch. Ireland for Irish whiskey, and then Japan for Japanese whiskey.
And those four areas make a phenomenal product. But we’re also seeing a huge, huge boom in craft distilling right now. I mean, look at Colorado. We have laws to 91 Stranahan’s mile high spirits. There is, uh, you know, um, uh, peach street. And there’s, it seems like every week there’s a new craft distiller popping up, and a lot of times these people have the funding to start these distilleries and they can do something unique.
I already mentioned they don’t have the economies of scale as the big distillers do, so they’re have to do something unique to gain a competitive advantage. On poet up, we sat down with, um, a distiller out of Pennsylvania and they were called Liberty. Uh, uh, excuse me. Um. Uh, Liberty pole, and we sat down, they do a peated rye and a peated bourbon, which is super, super interesting.
Pete’s usually something you see in the LA region of Scotland, and they brought that over and made this fusion blend with their rise and their bourbons. It’s an awesome product. It’s so unique that it’s a really fun drinking experience.
Colter Wilson: Yeah. And, and craft is stilling really has taken off. You’re, you’re talking about Colorado.
I, I do live in Colorado now, but I also came from salt Lake city. That’s where high West started was in park city. Actually. Their first distillery was in West Valley city, which is down in salt Lake before they moved to park city. They also, we had. Beehive distillery. I have a very close friend that owns the salt flats distillery down in Sandy, so shout out to them.
But the idea is that craft is stealing. I think it, at least in the United States, is, is I would say probably where craft brewing was in the late nineties. It’s something that is really starting to take off and that micro distillery process is hitting where it’s becoming a local product, but it hasn’t really blown up at the scale of craft beer yet.
Mike Outcalt: What would you,
Colter Wilson: when you, when you talk about that craft process, what would you say is the big differentiator you would see between a craft distillery and maybe a macro distillery and what are the difference in production that they might have.
Mike Outcalt: Sure. And when we sat down with Liberty pole, I mean, they, they talk a lot about that.
Um. Number one, I said, this gentleman has the patience of a Saint because it takes a long time to make good whiskey, and we’re looking at a minimum of two to four years. If you want to make a good quality product. Buffalo trace just had a $3 billion expansion to their distillery. So if you look at what Buffalo trace and Sazerac is doing, they have massive, massive amounts of land and the economies of scale that produce at a really high level.
Someone like Liberty pole is running their operation out of a basement. And they have, you know, a certain amount of barrels, they just up their stash to a larger barrels to produce more alcohol. But you still have that time that it takes to create a good quality product. And, and again, it’s, it comes down to who’s been around for a long time.
But these craft distilleries are doing some really interesting things. It’s funny, you mentioned high West, I’ve got a couple of bottles here from them. I have their blue rye, the blend of a 10 year at least old bourbons and rise. So they blend them together and call it the blue, right? They’ve got a jackalope on the bottle.
They’re awesome, awesome whiskey. And then I have the American Prairie bourbon. That’s a port cask finished, so that at least two years in an Oak barrel, and then they. Agent in an additional year in five months in a Brandy cast. So you get a lot of dessert flavors, chocolate, sweet, sugary. It’s, um, they’re doing some really cool stuff, which gives them kind of that, um, a good head to head advantage against some of the big distillers that are making a quality product will keeping the price down.
Colter Wilson: Yeah. And the big distillers will have a head start, right? So if you have a distiller that’s a hundred years old, obviously they’re going to have. Bourbon or whiskey with age on it. Whereas if you’re starting, let’s say you’re a year old distillery, you’re, you’re kind of, you’re, you’re in that place where you’re still trying to produce something that you can sell, but you may not even be producing whiskey yet.
Right.
Mike Outcalt: Sure, and these craft distillers too are usually have something else they’re selling. It could be a vodka, it could be a gin kind of instantly distilled liquid that you can sell as alcohol if there’s no aging process involved with that. Um, Liberty pole is doing a bourbon cream, for example, and that’s kind of their Pash spirit while they’re aging their whiskey.
Um. It takes time, and again, you’ve got to have a lot of patients to do that. Uh, I think I’m too impatient to make my own whiskey. I’d be checking on it too much.
Colter Wilson: Yeah. We’ve done a couple shows here on the podcast where we’ve talked about. Distilling at home, and there’s a lot of shortcuts that home distillers can do.
Like, like I’ve actually seen videos of people doing things like Sonic aging of whiskey where they take woodblocks, add it to the whiskey, hit it with a a sound wave, and it will actually age your whiskey in as little as a couple of days or hours versus having to wait years. Not that it, I. I’ve never tried that kind of whiskey.
And I’m not going to say that it’s anything superior cause I’m just inexperienced and I’ve seen some crazy internet videos and that means absolutely nothing. But on the other hand of that, you know, I do see a lot of distillers doing things like. Rum, vodka, those types of spirits to get started and then moving into whiskey five or six years down the road as they’ve built a business.
What do you think is something, when you try a newer whiskey or a newer distillery, when w what, what kind of characters are you looking for as opposed to something that’s larger like w and what I mean by that is. Do you actually see a difference in flavor or are they trying to mimic what the big guys are doing?
Mike Outcalt: Yeah, that’s a great question. I’m happy to answer that, but it’s really funny. You mentioned using kind of Sonic waves to pound a woodblock to age the whiskey. Metallica, the band actually has their own whiskey out right now called blackened. And the stick is when they’re aging the whiskey, they’re blasting Metallica tunes into it to try to like vibrate the whiskey into the Oak barrel, which I think is hilarious.
I can’t imagine drinking a glass where I’m like, yeah, this one was aged to master of puppets for the last three years. And, uh. Uh, I’d be interested to try that out too. But we are seeing a lot of, kind of like famous musicians making whiskey too. You got a Bob Dylan did heaven’s door, and then again black and by Metallica.
And I think there’s a few other ones out there. Um, when it comes to craft distilleries, I think sometimes they’re trying to mimic the, the, the tastes of, of like the big guys, like a Buffalo trace or a heaven Hill, you know, some of those famous brands. Um. A Rittenhouse rye as a great example. I like that one a lot.
It’s kind of that perfect rye, um, Buffalo trace, Elijah Craig, some of those other brands are really great bourbons. And when I’m looking at a bourbon, I, anytime I smell it tastes, I get kind of a lot of vanilla, sugar, caramel Oak. You want it to taste like that. Sometimes the older ones can have like this kind of dusty corn, which could be really sweet, like a cream corn flavor in there.
Um. These craft distillers, I think sometimes are largely trying to mimic that, but they’re also trying to have their own unique calling card. And I think Liberty pole is a great example of that. They’re doing, um, they’re adding peated bourbon. They’re adding peat to their bourbons and scotch. So you get kind of the smoky flavor on the back end with some of those traditional flavors, and they’re peated rye was a very young rise, so.
If it didn’t have as robust a flavors as a written house, or like a Parker’s heritage ride that I have here on my desk, they’re making up for it by adding something completely different with this peat and taking a different direction there. Um, if we look at something local, like, uh, 80 laws out of Colorado, they’re using all locally sourced ingredients.
They’re using, uh, San Luis Valley, Ry, uh, Colorado water. They’re doing everything they can to keep things local. And to really play to the state of Colorado and the locals that are here, and they’re adding more and more age. So the first release of bourbon was, you know, two years, and then they’re three years and now they’re four years and they’ve got a bottled in bond and they keep going.
They’ve got an iron maiden barrel. I’m just waiting for them to release that one so I can get, you know, six, six, six, the number of the beast to get a bottle of 80 laws with that on it and see how it is.
Colter Wilson: So metal of you.
Mike Outcalt: I’m going to run, run to the Hills for that one. All right.
Colter Wilson: Oh man. So punny. Well, let, let’s, let’s talk a bit about your show and the kind of topics that you guys cover. Cause I think that. You know I have, this is a home brewing podcast. Normally this is very much outside of my normal kind of subject matter, even though, yeah, we do talk about spirits, but we usually talk about making them yourself at home or making beer or alcohol in general at home.
I’d like to talk a bit about what it is that you do on your show that. Really helps you guys stand out. I know, I know you guys taste a lot of whiskey, but you guys talk about why you should, what you should be looking for and, and the different types of whiskey you’re trying, right?
Mike Outcalt: Sure. Yeah, absolutely.
And that’s, that’s the main point of this is we. Have a lot of local liquor stores that are really supportive of the podcast and they’ve helped us get some of these mega allocated bottles. Super hard stuff to get. I got a couple of bottles out of the Buffalo trace antique collection, like a William livery Weller and a George T stag, and that’s an old Fitzgerald’s from heaven.
Hell um, part of the stick is where. We’re talking to everything whiskey, and we’re just trying out all these different super allocated ones, you know, is it worth the price? What kind of flavors do you get? We love to talk about the smell. So you do a nose, then you do the palette. Talk about the mouth feel and the taste that you get, and then what’s the finish like?
Is it, you know, is it long lingering? Do you get some, a dynamic drinking experience when you have this? When we first started, we had a bottle of Blanton’s and rock Hill farms and we sat down and were like. All right, let’s drink these. Um, what the hell are we doing? And, uh, it gets better with age. So it was definitely an awkward first episode.
We tried to script it intro and it took us like an hour and a half, and I was just going crazy and I was like, let’s just drink whiskey and talk about it. So we do the nose palate. Mouthfeel. You know where we got the bottle, what the whiskey hunt looks like, because a lot of these whiskeys that we’re drinking on the show, you can’t just walk into a store and get, there’s a crazy allocated market for whiskey right now.
Bourbon in particular has really taken off, and some of the scotches I have or discontinued, or they’re hard to get Japaneses running out of supply. So we were very fortunate to have some amazing Japanese bottles to an award winning bottles too. You know, if something wins an award. I want to see if it stands up to that ward.
And we can be a little bit picky about that. But oftentimes, if I’m getting one of these really great bottles, it can offer something totally unique and a really great drinking experience. So we love to talk about those things on the show. Devin has perfect comedic timing, my cohost on the show, so he’s, he’s a riot to listen to.
And then our producer Rose Hague is, you know, she’s listening for. Um, things that we should be saying. She keeps us in line. If we end up drinking a little bit too much whiskey on the show. And if we’re doing a heavy tasting, like we did on our, our welder lineup, we had six bottles of Weller and we just went bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, one after another to drink these Wellers.
By the end of it, we needed a, we needed to be kept in line a little bit, so she’s, she’s keeping the ship going and providing some interesting content ideas. Oftentimes she’s got a really good palette too, so she can add to some of the things that we’re tasting sniffing. You know what the finish looks like.
She loves sitting around drinking the whiskey with us too, when we’re producing the show.
Colter Wilson: That’s awesome. And you, let’s talk about you. You get a lot of these allocated whiskeys or these hard to fine spirits that you can’t really just walk into a store and get, but you also were coming up with a show that’s your tent show and you’re doing all $10 bottles, right?
When do you find that there are certain types of whiskeys or certain types of spirits that hold up to these. Hard to find. I can, could you name maybe something that is easier to find that you think holds up to the big boys?
Mike Outcalt: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. We did a budget pickup episode, I think it was two or three, so Hey, if you only got a few bucks to spend on whiskey, you’re not looking to do an extensive hunt.
You don’t want to network and spend a ton of money with a shop or build those relationships. What can you find that’s a good bargain? My favorite is just Evan Williams bottled in bond. Thumbs on a white label. I can get it for 14 bucks at total wine. And I say it’s the Champa budget picks and it punches way outside of its weight class.
One night I got a little inebriated and I kept saying, that’s my friend. So now if I see him, he’s conditioned to say it punches way, way outside of its weight class. And I’m like, Hey Evan, what do you think about Evan Williams bottled in bond? He goes, it’s the tramp punches way outside of his weight class.
And uh, Evan Williams bottle and bond is awesome. Regular Buffalo traces. Great. If you want something with a little less spice, something that’s a lot smoother, I think, uh, Jamison is awesome. You can’t go wrong with that. Jamison and ginger is a fantastic cocktail. Super easy to make, can’t screw it up. And then there’s a lot of whiskeys that are kind of like bottom shelf whiskeys that make great mixers, and there’s a lot of them that hold up on their own too.
Um, Rose and I played a game the other day on our podcast where we did mystery pores. And she nailed hers. I gave her the a log of Uhland 11 that’s the Nick Offerman edition. Ron Swanson for all your parks and rec fans out there. And she gave me something that totally caught me off guard. I drank and I said, it’s so smooth.
It’s got awesome cinnamon, great flavors, nice finish, good Oak spice. I’m like, is this Buffalo Tracy? She’s a dope. I said, is this Elijah Craig? She said, Nope. It says this red spot Irish cause it’s Marsala cask finish. So that maintains a lot of the bourbon. Uh, flavors, even though it’s a 15 year Irish whiskey.
She said, Nope. And she goes, it’s the bottom of the bottom. And I was completely stumped at wild Turkey, one Oh one. And I go, Oh man, I have been completely bamboozled. And it was great. I really liked it. So after I tried that, I, you know, I threw my. Preconceptions aside a wild Turkey and said, all right, maybe I need to revisit this line here.
But, um, high West is doing some really cool stuff, and I really like the whiskeys they have. That’s what both of us are drinking right now. And as far as some craft whiskeys go there, there’s a bunch in Colorado. They’re doing some cool things. Two 91 is offering an interesting lineup. Um. 80 laws is doing some great stuff, and I like, uh, my high spirits, their, uh, their bourbon fireside is like 22 bucks.
You can find it everywhere. It doesn’t have a whole lot of dynamic or crazy flavors, but it tastes a lot like just a traditional bourbon, which I like a lot. And then a mythology is the one out of Denver too. That’s pretty good. Actually, the master distiller from mythology came from high West in Utah.
Colter Wilson: And when we talk about the different types of flavors you’re looking for, what is it?
What are the characters in whiskey that you’re not going to find in things in other spirits? Right? So there’s, and I know that like for example, bourbon tastes very different than a scotch kind of whiskey, and an Irish whiskey is going to be very different. And so what, what would you say, at least from an American whiskey standpoint, what is the flavor profile you’re trying to hit.
Mike Outcalt: Yeah, and before I answer that, let me, I’m looking at my whiskey rack here. I just want to give a couple shout outs to some other find-able brands I think are really great. Elijah Craig bourbon is awesome. The father bourbon 1792 is a weeded bourbon from Buffalo trace. Isabelle. Vinny is one of my favorite scotches.
They are doing such great stuff. Phenomenal, phenomenal whiskeys. Um, the Jim beam lineups, great to really like it. Itch Taylor, Eagle, rare. I mean, I could just go on and on and on for Irish data. Check out red breast. It’s awesome. Made it middle to distillery. Love that stuff. When it comes to different flavors, I feel like oftentimes on the nose of the whiskey, you can identify kind of the region.
It comes from bourbon again, is going to have that caramel. That Oak, the vanilla, the spice, um, scotch. Highland scotch is going to be really honeyed. And then the ILA scotch is going to be usually pretty heavily peated. And then Japanese whiskey has the craziest noses out of all of them. Um, Nika has two different whiskeys from two different distilleries, the Mia Gilo distillery, and the UHC distillery.
Those ones are unlike any other whiskeys that I’ve had, and they have crazy, crazy flavors. The UHG is banana and tobacco. Which is such a weird thing to smell on a whiskey, and then to have it be kind of chewy and translate to the mouthfeel, the Mia geekier was green, Apple, coconut tobacco, which if you think about whiskey, those are three flavors that I feel like just don’t belong, but it works really well.
It’s a perfectly refined product. When it comes to bourbon again, and I kind of mentioned those quintessential bourbon aspects and smells that you’re looking for along with tastes, but you’ll also get a lot of like a toasted sugar if you think about kind of like aged sweetness, that musty corn that I talked about.
Here’s a really a pretentious bourbon term, stone fruit. So a lot of like Islam or anything. Yeah. Anything that would have a pit.
Colter Wilson: Yeah. And the funny thing is, is that with all of the crazy hops and beer, everything comes across as stone fruit right now. That’s the hot word as well.
Mike Outcalt: Yeah. Stone fruit. It’s such a, it’s such a weird thing.
I’ve never like got back from a run and I’m like, I’m so hungry. I could just really use a big old help in a stone fruit.
Colter Wilson: You know, a peach or a pear that’s usually not a pear, I’m sorry, a peach or an apricot. That’s usually what I think of is stone fruit.
Mike Outcalt: But yeah, I’ve run into like cherry watermelon, orange peel.
Citrus is a big one. Lemon peel. Those can be flavors that you’re going to find in whiskey. And when I do whiskey tastings, I will like isolate myself in a room and I’ll close my eyes and just think about the whiskey for like 30 minutes and I’ll just sit around and drink it. And then try to write everything down.
So I’ve been doing some reviews on Reddit and then I try to identify some of those really cool and unique flavors when we’re were on the show too.
Colter Wilson: If I were to want to really get into whiskey, let’s say I wanted to really study the product and learn more about the flavors and how to properly taste it.
What are some good resources out there other than your podcast to learn more.
Mike Outcalt: Yeah. I think, um, I think go out and try things right. Really step outside your comfort zone too. If you’ve only ever drank bourbon or rye, try some scotch. Try some Japanese. There’s a lot of world whiskey coming out too. There’s some famous whiskeys from France.
There’s some famous whiskeys from India. There’s a company out of Taiwan called, um, um. Uh, I’m, I’m drawing a blank on them right now, but, uh, there, there’s some phenomenal, phenomenal whiskeys out there. So I think if you really wanted to jump back into it, try some things outside your comfort zone, that’s a great way to do it.
Otherwise, there’s a ton of bourbon resources out there. Uh, world whisky reviews to read. It is a great place as well. If you can follow our slash bourbon or R slash scotch is going to be some awesome reviews that you can see on there. People are. Coming up with some really unique flavors and they’re reviewing hard to get bottles, they’re reviewing easy to get bottles.
There’s kind of a good mix of everything. If you just simply use Google and Google some of the whiskey that you’re interested in, I guarantee you come up with reviews and resources to learn more about them, um, from the actual distillers and then from the community as well.
Colter Wilson: I know that you’ve traveled to taste a lot of whiskeys.
I know that. And just our conversations, I know you’ve gone to like the national Wiki whiskey conference and things like that. When you travel to try all these different types of spirits, what are those kinds of trips like?
Mike Outcalt: Yeah. I went to whiskey Fest two years in a row, so 2017 was in San Fran and then 2018 was in New York city, and.
Great reminder to drink responsibly. A whiskey Fest has 86 distillers and 475 whiskeys, and you can’t possibly drink all of them except in New York city. I tried my damnedest to get out as much as I could with an 8:00 AM flight the next day, which is just an absolute recipe for disaster.
Colter Wilson: Why would you do that to yourself?
Mike Outcalt: It was the cheapest way and the dumbest decision I’ve made today. You know, I just, I had borderline alcohol poisoning, so I was just drinking so much whiskey. Um, long story about how I threw up on the highway in New York and, uh, left a big fat tip for my Uber driver. Um, the, the trip is awesome though. If you really want to get into whiskey, that’s a great way to do it.
I think back in 2017 I had an idea of what I liked for whiskey, but man, that opened my eyes to so many different flavors and companies. Um, there’s just too much to do and too much to see. But you can go try everything for kind of a set price. And I think that’s a really great way to do it. And with VIP tickets to whiskey Fest, everybody’s bringing out the top of the top, you know, compete for whiskey of the year.
And. All the big hitters are there. There’s also a lot of small companies that you probably haven’t heard of that are making phenomenal products, so that’s a great way to just try new things. And you can also meet a lot of people there too that are also interested in whiskey. I think we’ve, you know, Devin and I camped out for some whiskey last year and some allocated lines and went to events.
It was a great way to just chat whiskey and chat shop with people that were looking to do the same thing and that we’re passionate about the spirits.
Colter Wilson: I want to dive into the Japanese styles. And the reason I wanna dive into them is that I’m in agreement with you that the Japanese stuff out there right now is so unique to anything else that is in the whiskey world.
If I wanted to go out today and try something from Japan, is there something I could get that’s actually easy to get?
Mike Outcalt: Um. Probably, and unfortunately anything from Suntory is going to be tough to get, and the stuff that they have available would probably be like the house Suntory, Toki Teo, excuse me, T. O, K.
I. Which, um, it’s a,
Colter Wilson: it’s a
Mike Outcalt: phenomenal bottle. I think it’s, I think it’s pretty good, but it doesn’t get close to some of the age statement things that they’re offering from like the Yamazaki 12, the hookah, hookah shoot 12 and the Hibiki 12, you could still find the Yamazaki and the Hakushu twelves, but they’re running about $149 for a bottle, so you’d pay a premium for those.
Um, Nika. Is an awesome, awesome company. Everything they make is great. Um, I can usually find their Mikiko and their UHG for $80 at total wine, and then in their allocated section, usually on the weekends, if you’re out there, bourbon hunting or whiskey hunting, um, they keep some bottles of the Nica from the barrel, which was the 2018 whiskey of the year.
It’s simply a blend of a hundred constituent barrels from the UHG and the Migo distilleries. They keep that up at the front. It’s usually $64 for a seven 50 bottle, and it’s phenomenally good. It offers so much robust flavors. It’s a unique drinking experience every time. Nica is great. Um, the other one I really like right now is called Caio in Caio means waves in Japan.
And it’s funny enough, they don’t call it a Japanese whiskey quote, unquote, because they ship the whiskey by boat down to Osaka for three months. So it’s actually aged for the final three months of its lifetime off shore, though it can’t legally be called a Japanese whiskey, but that one’s popping up.
Their barrel proof is the cask strength. Caio is awesome. I see that one at total wine all the time.
Colter Wilson: And what’s different about the process that you get from Japanese whiskeys that’s very different than like a bourbon or a scotch or an Irish whiskey.
Mike Outcalt: Sure. Um. One of the whiskeys you can get from Suntory, I may have spoke too soon, is called the Hibiki harmony.
That’s kind of their core product in the United States right now, and it tastes a lot like a Highland scotch. And the reason behind that is when Suntory was learning how to make whiskey, he went door to door in Scotland. Centuria was a chemist, traveled to Scotland, knocked on distilleries until somebody took him in, took a bunch of meticulous notes, took them back to Japan.
They started refining their own whiskeys. Japanese whiskey can be very similar at times to scotch, and particularly Highland scotch, but they also use a Japanese peat too. So sometimes there’s some smokiness on the backend and some tobacco flavors, I think, you know, like other fine Japanese products that they take.
Something that’s been around and make it their own and make refinements to it. And if they’ve come out with some exceptional things, um, how they get the crazy flavors in their whiskey that I, I, I’m not sure, but I hope they keep doing it and experimenting with some of those really unique things.
Colter Wilson: Yeah. If I were to want to find your show, what, what, what podcasts platforms are you guys on.
Mike Outcalt: We are on Spotify, iTunes and I heart radio. It’s just on poet up.
Colter Wilson: Okay, and do you guys have Facebook? All that stuff?
Mike Outcalt: Oh yeah. Facebook and Instagram. I like to whip out my Nikon and take really nice photos of whiskey bottles and make sure the content is great. Put some slow-mo videos up. My birthday celebration this month, um, that is at poet up official P.
O. I T. U. P official.
Colter Wilson: Okay. And I first of all want to, Mike, thank you so much for coming on the show. This was a, a great conversation in learning about how to taste whiskey and all of the things in the world of distilling that’s going on right now, specifically around whiskey. And you know, if you’re looking for a new show to check out, please check out the poet up podcast.
And like you said, it’s on Apple. Stitcher and, uh, and I heart radio and as well as,
Mike Outcalt: as well as Spotify, iTunes. And I heard radio. You got it.
Colter Wilson: Yep. I’ll put a link to his, to his iTunes link and his Spotify link. So if you wanna check it out, you can. And, uh, yeah. Mike, thank you for being on the show. I’m really excited to share what you’ve been doing with my audience.
Mike Outcalt: Hey culture. I definitely appreciate it. It’s always a pleasure to talk about what we do and share a good DRAM of whiskey with you.
Colter Wilson: I’d like to thank Mike for taking the time to be on this week’s show. It was great to have a good conversation with him about all of the different types of whiskey in the world and some of the things that’s involved with having to pursue them. If you’d like more information about Mike and his podcast, head to our show notes@homebrewingdiy.beer, or just look at the bottom of your podcast app and you should see him there.
Well,
Colter Wilson: that’s it for this week and we’ll see you next week on homebrewing. DIY.
