The Story

Our first encounter with Barrell Bourbon was back in 2020. One of our usual liquor store haunts had just received a single barrel pick of their straight bourbon whiskey, which they prominently displayed atop a barrel near the register. The price was $99.99 for the bottle. Now, at this point we were no stranger to Barrell Bourbon in general; we’d seen a lot about them on Instagram and of course had heard good things. The issue for us was whether we wanted to drop $100 on something we had personally never tried. In retrospect I’m sure the store owner would’ve been glad to give us a sample, but we didn’t think to ask. So here we were, wondering if we should drop a bill on a whiskey brand we had never tried before.

But for us, the specs were good…105.54 proof, 14 years aged. That seemed like a winner already. It’s tough to find a bottle that has a 14 year age statement on it for anything close to $100. So, we decided to be bold and drop the cash on it that day.

And boy were we glad that we did.

Barrell Bourbon knows how to blend extraordinarily well. That’s pretty much their claim to fame. They don’t distill whiskey themselves, but rather source barrels that they believe are remarkable in their own right, then blend and bottle them. Of course they also do single barrel picks as we just mentioned, but with their larger releases, they’re blending and releasing them in batches. So when we say they have their experience, we mean it.

Which brings us to Barrell Bourbon New Year 2022. Clocking in at 115.34 proof, this cask strength bottling, limited edition blend features a selection of 5,6,7,9 and 14 year old straight bourbon whiskeys distilled in Tennessee, Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio, Wyoming, New York and Texas. So without further ado, let’s get into it.

Nose

On the nose we got some toasty oak notes, vanilla, some apricot and a distinct graham cracker note as well. It definitely comes through as sweet and with a good amount of age and depth.

Palate

The palate is sweet initially with some plum, raisin and nice oak notes that transition rather quickly to a nice pepper spice. Once you ride the wave of spice you’re left with some nice cinnamon and clove baking spice notes with just a touch of chocolate. 

Finish

The taste finishes with really nice sweet notes of molasses, brown sugar and a hint of licorice accompanied by that black pepper spice undertone and supported by that lingering baking spice.

Verdict

The retail price on this bottle is $89.99 and we think that’s right in the range that we think is acceptable. Typically we pay anywhere from $85-$100 for Barrell Bourbon expressions so this sits right in the middle there and we’re happy with the value we derived from New Year 2022. For this bottle, we’d stay close to that $90 figure for an acceptable price range, not going over $95.

Overall, this is a good one – we’re giving Barrel Bourbon’s New Year 2022 bottle an 8.5. It presents a lot of really enjoyable sweet notes upfront while showcasing some really complex notes on the finish that we very much enjoyed. Cheers friends! 

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