LARCENY
Barrel No. 6515628, dubbed “K&L Spirit Larcenists,” picked by K&L (2020)MASH BILL – 68% corn, 20% wheat, 12% barley
PROOF – 92
AGE – NAS (barreled April 2013, bottled early/mid 2020)
DISTILLERY – Old Fitzgerald Distillery (i.e. Heaven Hill)
PRICE – $30
WORTH BUYING? – Absolutely
Uncorked and tasted in The Year of No Buying (The what? 🔗 here.)
I wouldn’t say Larceny gets a bad rap. Rather, it gets virtually no rap. The periodic Barrel Proof release gets attention on the social meds. But the standard release, or even single barrel store picks like this one, seem to go about unnoticed.
Larceny sits quietly on the shelf in the shadow of Weller. (Metaphorically, of course. Weller can seldom be found on the shelf, so, there is no shadow to be cast.) And I get it. Weller is a more overtly sweet wheated whiskey, and most tastes tend toward the overtly sweet. But Weller is also a pretty simple and uncomplicated whiskey, like Larceny. Larceny does have sweet notes. But there is a drier, dustier, breadier tendency to it that puts it some notches subtler than the sweeter spectacle of its cousin from Buffalo Trace.
I’ve compared single barrel store picks of Larceny and Weller Special Reserve here on the blog once before. I liked them both. At the $30 price point, they’re both no-brainer buys. But of course Weller single barrel store picks have now moved far away from that price point. So, for their purpose as simple sippers and easy mixers, it’s a clear consumer choice: Larceny.
I picked up the current post’s particular Larceny SiB back in 2020, during the dark times. (You know the times I mean.) It’s been gathering dust in my bunker ever since. And that’s no particular comment on Larceny. But perhaps it does speak to the nature of this bourbon. It’s easygoing. Not flashy. It’s not a special occasion pour. It’s a workhorse. And as such, it’s strong. In the four years since I purchased this bottle, I’ve not opened it simply because I’ve opened other things.
This begs the question, why publish notes on it? It’s a single barrel from 2020, after all. Nobody can get it at this point. So there is no obvious consumer-oriented reason to add another webpage to the www on this bottle’s behalf.
My impulse to share notes on it has more to do with my sense that Larceny doesn’t get the respect it deserves as a solid, bottom-shelf tasting experience. Also, I’ll admit to a belief that the bourbon community would do well to free itself from the habitual obsession with Weller. The minuses of that phenomenon have out-weighed the pluses, I believe—Weller and its Van Winkle gentry being the single greatest targets, and fosterers, of price-hiking FOMO.
So here we are, a week and a half after uncorking and three pours into the bottle. These brief notes were taken using both a simple brandy glass and traditional Glencairn.
COLOR – beautifully honeyed gold and orange
NOSE – smooth and creamy with just a dash of dusty grit to it, sweet buttery corn, fresh thick-sliced fluffy wheat bread, vanilla, caramel, lemon oil zested across it, mild oak, fresh whole cream
TASTE – buttery, with corn on the cob, fresh wheat bread, fresh cream, the vanilla and caramel swirled into a smooth multi-grain porridge
FINISH – lingering oak and oak tannin, black pepper, soft-crusted wheat bread, a bit of the butter, cream, and caramel
OVERALL – a lovely and simple wheated bourbon
Yes indeed, this lacks the sweet spectacle that sells Weller. But what Larceny offers is something closer to the grains, without going grainy, and softer overall. It’s a much more relaxed bourbon.
Breadiness in whiskey can sometimes be drying, sometimes irritating, or just boring. It’s none of those here. Rather, this single barrel wheater comes across more like a good hunk of bread at dinner. Everything in the dough—the grain, yeast, flour, salt, cream—is in balance. There’s something very satisfying about simple, good, well-made bread. I’m getting that same kind of satisfaction here.
This quality might be exactly why Larceny is so seldom a main event bourbon. It’s an opener. An excellent supporting player and not the star. I’m enjoying it perfectly well on its own. And I’ll gladly put it toward any number of cocktails, especially those with other more assertive ingredients. It will support a strong vermouth, maple syrup, or citrus juice without either disappearing or vying for the drinker’s attention.
And that color! Absolutely beautiful, and a good indicator of what’s to come on the nose and taste.
So all in all, Larceny single barrel store picks aren’t anything I’ll ever trip over myself to get ahold of. But if ever my shelf is low on good mixers that I could also sip without much ado, and a new Larceny store pick popped up near me, I’d go for it. Great value for the price, and a legitimately quality whiskey.
Cheers!
The Right Spirit 