Basil Hayden Toast: New Bourbon Made of Brown Rice

Bourbon mashbills are usually dominated by corn—at minimum amount, 51 percent—with rye or wheat as the standard backing grains, and a minor malted barley as very well. At times all 4 grain kinds might aspect, or the mashbill might include malted rye or a specialty malt in addition to malted barley. But the latest bourbon from Basil Hayden incorporates a pretty strange grain alternative: brown rice. The new expression is called Basil Hayden Toast. It functions a toasted barrel complete, something that’s develop into additional common among the bourbon distillers in the latest yrs.

 

 

All bourbon is aged in new charred oak barrels, which presents the whiskey its characteristic wood-ahead flavors like vanilla and caramel. Utilizing a toasted barrel for secondary maturation yields sweeter flavors, as toasting delivers out far more sugars from the oak.

The core Basil Hayden bourbon is manufactured with a significant-rye mashbill—63 percent corn, 27 % rye, and 10 p.c malted barley—but the new release substitutes brown rice for rye in an undisclosed volume. The liquid is in the beginning aged in degree four char barrels, with a portion completed in the toasted barrels, then blended back in with the main brown rice bourbon. The proportions of the mix are also undisclosed but avid lovers may well observe an extra sweetness and milder spice character in Basil Hayden Toast.

This isn’t the initial foray into brown rice bourbon for the James B. Beam Distilling Firm, whose Clermont, Kentucky, distillery helps make Basil Hayden. In 2014, Jim Beam unveiled an 11-yr-outdated brown rice bourbon as element of its Signature Craft line. According to eighth-technology distiller Freddie Noe, who designed Basil Hayden Toast, the distillery ongoing generating the brown rice mashbill immediately after that confined edition—and he may well be working with extra of the liquid in an future release. (Our money’s on the upcoming batch of Tiny Book, Noe’s once-a-year blend that showcases exceptional liquids from the Beam warehouses.) Noe’s intention with Basil Hayden Toast was to carry on the legacy of bourbon discovery begun by his grandfather, learn distiller Booker Noe.

Basil Hayden Toast is a new, everlasting expression for the lineup, and debuts with an current glance: Absent is the crinkly foil cap, changed by a spiffy wooden topper and gold-embossed neck label. The monogrammed “belt” that remembers barrel hoops has also gotten a makeover, with a wider copper band than ahead of. And the whiskey’s actual name has been tweaked—from Basil Hayden’s, with an apostrophe-s, to just Basil Hayden. The new name and aesthetic will be rolling out throughout the lineup in the coming months.

Concurrent with the launch of Basil Hayden Toast, the brand name is jogging a contest with layout studio Fort Standard. One winner will be selected to level up their household amusement match with a custom made oak home bar. Intrigued followers must abide by @basilhaydens on Instagram for data on how to enter.

Meanwhile, if you are wanting to decide on up a bottle of Basil Hayden Toast, it is hitting cabinets now, priced at $50. One factor hasn’t changed: Like all whiskies in the Basil Hayden variety, regarded as the ideal “starter bourbon” amongst Beam’s Small Batch Collection, it’s bottled at a gentle 40 p.c ABV.

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