High West Whiskey Dinner DC March 13, 2011

This is a review of a dinner event held on March 13, 2011 featuring 5 High West whiskeys paired with the courses of a degustation menu from Michael Mina's Bourbon Steak Restaurant in the Four Seasons Hotel in Washington, DC. Comments on each whiskey will be more brief in this review than if the whiskeys were reviewed individually. The ryes were all at 46%ABV, with the Oat Whiskey at 40%ABV

Our dinner presentation was hosted by East Coast High West representative Troy Karnes, who was entertaining, informative, and refreshingly direct in conveying the facts of High West and the company's whiskey-making. Troy was dressed in very casual US western garb including flannel pattern shirt and baseball cap, making for a very interesting contrast to the usual Four Seasons Washington, DC business attire. There were lots of jokes about what whiskey-making and whiskey-drinking is like in the Mormon-dominated state of Utah, home of High West. Troy was also remarkably candid in revealing the current sourcing for the whiskeys in High West's product line-- something that had remained a great trade secret and object for speculation for all of us present until last night. Here it is: the 2 and 6 year old rye whiskeys are made at LDI Distillery in Lawrenceburg, Indiana, while the 12,16, and 21 year old rye whiskeys are made at the Barton Distillery in Bardstown, Kentucky.

There were about 20 guests present for the whiskey dinner and there were about 12 servers delivering the dinner

First Course: an Amuse Bouche of Scallop Sashimi with tangerine, cauliflower and Osetra caviar...served with a cocktail of High West Silver Whiskey Western Oat. The High West Western Oat Whiskey is an unaged whiskey which was distilled at the High West Distillery, which opened in 2007. The cocktail was basically an oat whiskey version of the Moscow Mule: oat whiskey, ginger beer, fresh lime juice, and ice. This was the only usage of any of the whiskeys in a cocktail during the evening. I was more looking forward to tasting the 4 remaining whiskeys neat. The Oat Whiskey blended into the cocktail with the more dominant flavours of ginger and lime making the whiskey very difficult to taste separately. The cocktail was very light and very pleasant, however.

Second Course: Foie Gras Tortellini with sunchoke veloute...served with High West Double Rye. This was my first taste of the Double Rye. The Double Rye combines an LDI 2 yo 95% rye, 5% malted barley mashbill rye with a Barton 16 yo 53% rye,37% corn, 10% malted barley mashbill rye. The Double Rye is very very rye grain tasting, among the most rye-y tasting whiskeys I have encountered. It held up well to the foie gras and was quite delicious.

Third Course: Pork Belly on brioche, poached quail egg, and coffee jus...served with High West Rendezvous Rye, a vatting of an LDI 6 year old 95% rye, 5 % malted barley mashbill rye and a Barton 16 yo 80% rye, 20% malted barley mashbill rye. The Rendezvous Rye is a little softer and maybe a little sweeter than the Double Rye, and also quite delicious. A recurrent theme with the dinner is that rye flavours can stand up to any intense meat flavours with which they are paired. The Pork Belly dish was exquisite.

Fourth Course: a New York Strip steak, about 14 ounces, poached in butter, with beet and potato pierogie and "evaporated carrot"...served with High West Bourye. The Bourye vats a Four Roses bourbon with a Barton 12 yo 95%rye, 5% malted barley rye whiskey. This was my first taste of the Bourye, and I must say that this whiskey has a real standout of a finish! Lovely, mellow, sweet, like a warm fire, and very very long. I was skeptical about whether anything new could be gained from the vatting of a bourbon and a rye prior to tasting this one, but I must say this product works well. It doesn't exactly blaze much of a new trail, but it does succeed in having very nice flavours.

Fifth Course: a dessert of a Black Walnut "Baba" with toffee and maple ice cream...served with Barton-sourced High West Very Rare 21 Year Old Rye Whiskey. High West promotes the fact that this 21 yo rye is aged in used barrels to lessen the effects of the wood over that period of time. The 21 yo is quite a lovely whiskey with a superb nose. The palate is mellow, buttery, very smooth in both flavour and body. The matching of the maple ice cream, especially, with the 21 yo Rye was amazingly spot on.

Four hours later we emerged, and a good time appeared to have been had by all. The noise level had by the conclusion of the festivities grown very loud and festive. All of the High West Rye whiskey products proved to be quite delicious. The guests, most of whom had had little experience with ryes prior to this event, seemed to have absorbed a great deal of both experience and information to move forward in their future whiskey adventures. I rate the total experience at 90 and the individual rye whiskeys served all at about 92-93.

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