Milestone Whiskies Series #5: Maker’s Mark Private Selection – VA ABC Single Barrel, “Winter Spice” (2024)

This ongoing series of posts builds on my 9 June post, “Brief Reflections on Exploring Whiskies: The Road So Far,” and is meant to highlight whiskies that have profoundly shaped my understanding of the diverse world/s of whiskies and spirits more broadly.

While a Virginia ABC single barrel of 1792 Bottled in Bond was the first bottle of bourbon that I liked because it was the first on which I could move past the charred/burnt wood flavor that was so dominate for me early on in my bourbon exploration, this is the bottle that was a revelation to me about how multifaceted a bourbon can be in terms of its aroma and flavor profiles. Winter Spice’s aromas and flavors move well beyond the notes that are most associated with “a bourbon” like toasted/burnt brown sugar, caramel, vanilla, baking spices, tobacco leaf, oak, and leather.

Bottled at 111.5 proof (55.75% ABV), Winter Spice was finished for 9 weeks with 1 Baked American Pure, 1 Seared French Cuvée, 3 Maker’s Mark 46 (seared) French Oak, 3 Roasted French Mendiant, & 2 Toasted French Spice oak staves.

Winter Spice is defined by this collation of finishing staves, which bring aromas and flavors including butterscotch, creamy dark and milk chocolate, red fruits (fresh and dried), robust baking spices, honey, molasses, vanilla, orange peel, toasted oak, black pepper, mint, and coffee crème brûlée.

This is the bottle that remains the standard by which I measure all subsequent bourbons in terms of how multifaceted their aroma and flavor profiles are. Since it’s a single barrel pick, it’s unlikely to be recreated exactly and, when it was available last autumn and early this year, I made sure to snag some reserves. Winter Spice also will forever bear the title of being the first full-sized bottle of bourbon that I first killed off because I enjoy it so much (and also because I shared multiple samples of it because of that).