Evan Williams Bottled In Bond

Evan Williams is a bourbon brand produced at the Heaven Hill distillery. Bottled In Bond designates a minimum of four years of aging, distillate all produced within one calendar year, and bottling at 50% ABV. The reviewed bottle has been open for one week, and is 90% full. This review will be in non-sequential format

Strength: nose, palate, and finish all have robust flavours of crisp sweet oak and tangy rye baking spice, far stronger than Evan Williams Black Label, or most barrels of Evan Williams Single Barrel. Nice robust flavours. Score 23/25 pts

Quality: the intense cinnamon/cassia, vanilla, black pepper and ginger are very pointed, prickly, even, and quite pleasant. For the general presumption of only four years of aging for BIB status, this has a ton of oak sweetness in it, which yields a stark contrast to the strong spiciness from both oak-wood and rye grain. You can really taste here that perhaps the majority of the spiciness is actually from the oak. I really like that this Evan Williams Bottled in Bond is much more aggressive in flavour than are either the Evan Williams Black Label or the Evan Williams Single Barrel releases. Score 22/25 pts

Variety: the range of flavours available is very adequate, but offers nothing exceptional. Score: 21/25 pts

Harmony: these flavours provided offer more of a stark contrast, or counterpoint, than they do a harmony, with one another. That said, the contrast offered is quite enjoyable, and the overall result is of a striking frisky bourbon that works. Score: 21/25 pts

Comment: this bottle required a minimum of 2 days after it was opened before the flavours really started to blossom. My great hope in buying this bottle was to find an Evan Williams expression with more "oomph" than the lower ABV Black Label, or the Single Barrel. This bottle absolutely has more intensity of flavour than do those other two expressions. This Bottled In Bond expression is more of a brute and shows less refinement than do most of the Single Barrels,...but I really like this feature of it because I am often in the mood for intensity. Evan Williams Bottled In Bond is not a commonly available bottle, even in the US, but where it is available it offers a rather robust bourbon in a very economical package. Where I live Evan Williams BIB currently costs $ 13.07, including the tax. This is a very decent bourbon for almost no money

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