Boozehound Unfiltered: Balcones Baby Blue

A trip to Texas all but demands that you get ahold of some Texas whiskey of some kind and this trip was no exception. I had heard about Balcones Baby Blue- and indeed, Balcones in general a few years back and I've been keeping an eye out up here to see if any of their stuff shows up- but going to Texas I knew that I could find some. When we added a stop in Waco to our itinerary (to see the Magnolia Silos and make a quick stop at Harp Design) it seemed like the fates couldn't have aligned any better. We found a local liquor store and I got ahold of my bottle of Balcones Baby Blue as well as a bottle of Mezcal that turned out to be tastier than expected- but that's another blog post. (Actual visits to distilleries, I think are going to have to wait for the kiddos to be a wee bit older.)

Founded in 2008, Balcones started in downtown Waco in an old welding shop under a bridge and grew from there, starting their own distilling in 2009. I seem to be on a good streak with whiskies that put a premium on locally grown, quality ingredients- which might be just the industry overall raising their standards or it could be just a case-by-case basis of finding good whiskies- either way means more delicious whiskey for me! Balcones gets their blue corn from New Mexico and malts their barley right in Texas and the quality is obvious in their delicious whiskey.

(I'm actually moving through this bottle at a fairly brisk clip-- I need to shift to scotch for awhile, so I can really savor this one-- because, as you'll see from the tasting notes below-- it was a great find in Texas and a great souvenir to bring back.)

Color: Dark honey, almost a rich amber shade.

 Nose: It's light and hard to unpack at first. Something sweet that initially thought was brown sugar and bananas, but I was wrong. Honey is the dominant note, but there's a nutty undertone that's hard to ignore. I hate to give in to the power of suggestion, but if I'm going to guess, I'd say that was the blue corn. So you end up with a sort of rich, honey flavored tortilla chip- which isn't nearly as bad as it sounds.

 Body: Viscosity is well balanced. Not too weak and water, but not too heavy and thick either. Very smooth. The spice dances across your tongue in a perfectly delicate way.

 Finish: It's so smooth. It's ridiculously smooth... It's like butter or silk or something equally nice. Subtle and smooth again, the warming is slight and pleasant. It's not harsh going down at all.

 Overall: Look, I like whiskey- so I'm really considering getting rid of starred reviews at this point, because I rarely meet whiskies I don't like. This one is worth the trip to Texas just to buy more of it. It's smooth, delicious and everything you could hope for in a really good sip of whiskey. My Grade: **** out of ****

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

I Didn't Watch The State of The Union

I didn't watch the State of the Union last night for the first time in what seems like a very long time indeed. I didn't watch it out of some form of virtue-signalling protest. I didn't watch it because it started at about eight o'clock at that is prime time for bedtime for the kids. And anyone with kids will tell you: you don't mess with bedtime. Also, I just didn't care. I know in some areas of the flaming dumpster fire that is our political discourse these days that's a hanging offense. "You didn't care? How dare you not care! Aren't you against [insert controversy of the week here]?" or my favorite, "Well, you have the privilege of not caring about this stuff." No, it's not about my privilege. (That's an entirely different conversation.) I just genuinely did not care, because it did not matter. Both ends of the political spectrum live in parallel universes, I decided. They're going to listen to the same speech
Read more

Psephology Rocks: Holiday Grab Bag Edition

Well, there's lots to talk about post-Election Day, not only in America, but there's a few bits and bobs from around the world worth touching on as well.  We'll start local and work upwards: Local:  Well, I went three for three in my City Council Endorsements- Botchway, Salih took the At-Large Seats and Susan Mims took the District B Seat.  The District B race between incumbent Susan Mims and student Ryan Hall was less of a contest than I think people were anticipating, as Mims won handily 59% to 41%. I had nothing in particular against Hall, per say- but I feel like if Raj Patel who was another student who ran a few cycles back (I want to say 2010?) had serious money and a serious platform behind him and didn't win, then Hall was going to be a long shot. He checked all the right progressive boxes for Iowa City, but he was running against an incumbent who might not be uber-Progressive, but not say, Terry Dickens either. I think Hall would have had a better shot aga
Read more

Tintin, Ranked

Image
What can you say about Tintin? He's been around for decades- was one of the most popular comics of the 20th Century. He's spawned a television cartoon ( which I remember watching on Nickelodeon ) and more recently a movie ( two more of which are apparently coming, though it's been awhile since the movie dropped .) He hasn't been free from controversy- Tintin In The Congo is hard to find these days for a reason, the least of which is (what I'm guessing) the somewhat 'problematic' portrayal of Africans in the Belgian Congo when the reality of that chapter of colonial history was dark indeed. For sure, if there's an aspect of these books that makes me cringe somewhat, it's his portrayal of Africans. Herge's portrayal of Latinx individuals and cultures tends to be a bit better, though his portrayal of indigenous folks and Asians is somewhat mixed. He's excellent in The Blue Lotus , somewhat less so with his portrayal indigenous people in Ti
Read more