Eagle Rare 17 Year Old Bourbon 2012

Eagle Rare 17 Year Old Bourbon 2012
Part of Buffalo Trace’s Antique Collection, the Eagle Rare 17-Year-Old is a more rarefied and limited edition expression of the Eagle Rare 10-Year-Old Single Barrel. Same mash bill, but with more time in the barrel. Just as with George T. Stagg and other members of the collection, a small quantity of the Eagle Rare 17-Year-Old is bottled every year and released in the autumn.
The bourbon has a burnished coppery amber look in the glass. The nose starts the bourbon off in a sweet, but very un-bourbon way. Bourbon sweetness is usually drawn from the barrel or the corn, and has certain expected characteristics, but this stuff is delightfully floral and fruity, like a dark pie filling. The woodiness is there (how could it not be after almost two decades in new oak), but is quite understated.
The flavor is of tartly sweet dark and red fruit, with a dash of cookie and pie spices, like cinnamon. There is a little bit of oakiness and caramel in there, but as with the nose, the woody aspects of this bourbon are strictly secondary. It’s not a big, hoary, oaky whiskey, or even a syrupy vanilla and caramel bourbon. Instead, it’s something of an odd duck and a very mellow one at that. The finish is modest, and warm, and leaves a lingering caramel aftertaste, this being the only place where the wood stands at the forefront.