The Original
Written: Aug 27 '08 (Updated Aug 27 '08)
|
Product Rating:
|
|
|
Pros: The original sour mash bourbon whiskey ... need I say more?
Cons: Brings down upon itself the disdain of $40-a-bottle dilettantes.
The Bottom Line: If you want a decent straight Kentucky bourbon (the original, actually) at a good price, you can't beat Old Crow.
|
|
|
| tlknapp's Full Review: Old Crow Bourbon |
Pay no attention to the naysayers, ladies and gentlemen: Old Crow is (pardon me here, Coca-Cola) the real thing.
To be more specific, Old Crow is the first, original sour mash bourbon whiskey, named for the inventor of the sour mash technique, Dr. James Crow. If you drink bourbon -- any bourbon -- Old Crow is the headwater of the stream you're drinking from.
To drink Old Crow is to drink history.
It was the preferred spirit of Ulysses S. Grant (when told that Grant drank heavily, President Abraham Lincoln inquired as to his brand, "so I can send a case to each of my other generals").
Henry Clay, the man who said that he "would rather be right than be President," drank Old Crow as he sat through lengthy sessions in the US Senate.
Old Crow was Hunter S. Thompson's whiskey of choice early in his career.
I'm not much on the vocabulary of beverage reviews. I'm not going to feed you a line about the aromas, overtones, "nose," etc. of this stuff. Hey ... it tastes like whiskey, okay? Good whiskey. If there are any aromas or overtones, they are of corn and ethyl alcohol. Old Crow is "straight" (meaning it's aged for at least two years) "Kentucky" (consult a map if you don't understand that part) "bourbon" (at least 51% corn, natural with only water added to the mash, aged in new charred oak barrels) whiskey.
My subjective taste meter tells me that it's as least as good as Jim Beam (Old Crow is made by the Beam company now, by the way), but less expensive. It's better than Kentucky Tavern, and worth the slightly higher price. If I had to choose a free bottle of Old Crow or a free bottle of Maker's Mark, I'd probably go with Maker's Mark ... but if I'm buying, well, Maker's Mark isn't that much better. And since I usually drink my bourbon mixed with cola, it's not like there's a bunch of swirling, spitting and pontificating to be done. It tastes good. It goes down, it doesn't come back up, and there's no especially atrocious aftertaste. It works.
Alcohol content being an objective criterion, and Old Crow being 80 proof (40% alcohol), the bottom line is that it can take you from sober to sozzled ASAP if that's your goal. Ready for liftoff, bubba.
Recommended:
Yes
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
tlknapp
|
|
Member: Thomas Knapp
Location: Saint Louis, MO USA
Reviews written: 82
Trusted by: 11 members
About Me:
Libertarian activist, writer, publisher of Rational Review and Kn@ppster.
|
|
|
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.