Two New Single Barrels From 13th Colony

What a way to kick off the first week of Bourbon Heritage Month! This week, we are highlighting producers from all over. It's hard to believe it's been over a year since our last 13th Colony single barrels. It’s always a great time to make the trip over to Southwest Georgia, especially fresh off the release of their Cask Strength Rye. We had plenty on our agenda this trip, but we won't ruin all the surprises.

This trip we focused solely on bourbons of different ages, but there’s just something special about the aging environment down there. The heat and humidity in Southwest Georgia develop mature notes you’d expect from a 10 to 12-year whiskey. During our blind tasting, I guessed the first barrel was 8 years old. It was only 6. I was off, but we were off to a strong start.

We had two different styles/locations to choose from for these single barrels. While all the barrels were 9+ years old, one set was a bit lower in proof, bringing more classic bourbon notes of vanilla, caramel, cane sugar, and softer fruits. The second set was much more dense and heavy. They were all fantastic. As we spent several minutes going back and forth on the more granular details, they told us the second set had a much lower yield than the first, so we asked if we could grab one of each. Success!

13th Colony Cask Strength Single Barrel Bourbon #4692 117.84 proof

The nose begins rich and slightly smoky, with sweet woods, cigar box, and cedar chest. Let it rest a few minutes and it begins to expand into Charleston Chew and cane sugar.

The palate leads with more of those cigar box notes, bringing in tobacco, sweet leather, syrupy maraschino cherry juice, smoked maple, and loads of caramel-coated mature oak.

The proof is deceiving because this one certainly clings to the palate. While it doesn’t give that “toasted bourbon” profile, it lingers like creamy, charred marshmallows in the best way possible, with little flecks of dark chocolate and more of that mature oak continuing on.

13th Colony Single Barrel Bourbon #1937 126.24 proof

The nose is dense and dark, with maple syrup and dark honey swirled with blackberry jam and rich vanilla, alongside wafts of cocoa powder and dry oak.

Heavy, dense, chewy. This is viscous, intense, and concentrated with barrel flavors. The fruitiness would be candied if it weren’t so dense and coating, leaning a bit more into medicinal cherry syrup before moving into raspberry and strawberry fruit leather. It meets a singed orange peel note as well as spiced grape jelly.

The finish is long and toasty, continuing with some of the jammier fruit notes from the palate while also growing short but persistent barrel spice notes. It lingers long and dry with hot chocolate powder, sweet oak, and cinnamon-touched vanilla cream pie.