Angel's Envy Port Barrel Finish

@jerryclyde, one more time your taste and mine are very similar. You have bought one more bottle of Angel's Envy than I am ever likely to buy.

For me rye grain (or wheat grain for that matter) usually doesn't work well with any wine influence. Wine can easily ruin a perfectly good bourbon. Angel's Envy is an excellent example of a bourbon-plus-wine that I just don't like. I find the Port influence on Angel's Envy to be very drab and not at all tasty, or even interesting. Angel's Envy bourbon probably would not rate even 80 points for me.

Lots of people like Angel's Envy a lot though. I won't compete with them for the bottles.

Bourbon with Port that works for me are the two Abraham Bowman Port Finished Bourbons, 8 and 12 years old. Most of the time, though, I think that adding wine to bourbon is a step backwards.

@jerryclyde, spot on review, your pallet is serving you well. Again you bought one more bottle than I did. It would make a decent high rye bourbon if they left out the port barrel. Quite a few love it, I hated it.

@Victor is correct again, don't add wine to bourbon. In my opinion, don't add anything to bourbon. Honey, Maple, Apple, Yuk!

One regret I have in hindsight: because I dislike Angel's Envy Bourbon, I passed up an opportunity my sister pointed out to me to meet Lincoln Henderson in Baltimore, about a year before he died. I didn't want to be in the position of either having to tell the man I didn't like his bourbon, or to pretend that I did, when I did not.

As it turned out my sister had Linc Henderson all to herself at a liquor store to chat with, for about 45 minutes. He went into great detail discussing the effects of the barrels on the whiskey, etc., with her. If I had it to do again, I would definitely have made the drive to Baltimore. Some opportunities are not at all obvious at the time at which they present themselves.

Victor, what a nice story. Opportunities, indeed, are quite fickle. I think you very fortunate as your wife and sister share your whisk(e)y passion. My wife likes to nose my drams, but sticks to her pinot noir.

@jerryclyde, @Nock's wife is a wine girl too, but when he gave her a taste of Amrut Intermediate Sherry matured, she immediately asked him if there weren't some way he could get out of giving me the bottle of it he had purchased for me. I don't hold it against her. It is an understandable reaction.

My sister is a great spirits boon to me/us. Her whisk(e)y collection is about the size of ours, and she buys a lot of stuff I wouldn't buy, so she effectively doubles the number of products we get to try. She says that that 15K she has spent on liquor in the last 5 years is "all my fault". That is a very nice compliment.