Jim Beam Distillery, Clermont, Kentucky

      There are plenty of bourbon distilleries to tour in Kentucky.  We chose the Jim Beam distillery located in Clermont, Kentucky.  They do the tour nicely, first taking visitors through a mini-distillery where one sees the process of making a small batch of spirits up close.  That's followed by a walk through part of the large main factory.  There's a tasting at the end of the tour.
     To sum up bourbon:  It's an American whiskey made mainly of corn.  In order for a whiskey to qualify as bourbon, it has to be made from at least 51% corn.  The other grains are rye and malted barley.  These grains are combined with water and fermented with yeast.  Kentucky's water is naturally filtered through limestone, is high in calcium, and contains no iron.  That's what makes the best bourbon.  The distillation process has three stages.  The first distillation produces a liquid called beer, the second produces low wine, and the third produces high wine.  High wine goes into new, charred oak barrels and ages for varying lengths of time.  The charring gives bourbon it's color, and the oak adds flavor.

Tasting what goes into the barrel.

Tasting what comes out of the barrel.

You can order a personalized bottle of bourbon at the end of the mini-distillery tour.

Each one of these enormous vats holds 46,000 gallons of fermenting liquid.

This is our guide Patrick Guelda.  The fluid gushing out of the pipe on the left is low wine.

The high wine ages in new, charred oak barrels for varying lengths of time.  At Jim Beam that's at least four years.  During that time the bourbon penetrates the wood and some of the liquid evaporates.  Most of the lost volume, up to 1/3 of the contents, is water, and that is called the angel's cut.  As the water evaporates, the alcohol content of the barrels increases.  The percentage of alcohol in the finished product is adjusted by adding water at bottling.   The bourbon that penetrates the barrel is called the devil's cut.  In the old days, employees took the barrels home, put water in them, and soaked the booze out - just a perk of the job.  Now the company does the same thing marketing the reconstituted 90 proof spirit as Jim Beam Devil's Cut.   

This might be a cautionary view.  Drink responsibly or end up in a cemetery like the one in front of this barrel house.  Barrel houses are painted black to absorb heat in the winter.  In the summer, only the top floors get hot.  Before bottling, batches are mixed from low, middle , and high floors.  All together there are 800,000 barrels aging in Jim Beam barrel houses.   

This is the bottling area in the main plant.  Bottles are washed out with bourbon, not water.

This is the sample storage area.  They keep the samples of every batch produced for about two years.  If there are any complaints about a batch, the sample is retrieved for analysis.  At the end of two years it is assumed that the batch has been sold and consumed without any issues.  Samples cannot be sold.  At that point, our guide explained, employees help out by taking bottles home.

                   

Patrick is conducting our tasting.  The law limits how much you can consume at a tasting - 2 ounces.  We received a plastic card containing a chip.  We inserted our card into a dispenser to receive a sample.  We had four 1/2 ounce samples.  We had the option of tasting an experimental whiskey and rating it.  Here's what we had and what we thought of it:
Baker's - A small batch, ultra-premium bourbon - I liked it, but no more than regular White Label.
Devil's Cut - I thought it was okay, but a bit lacking, like using a tea bag twice.
Kentucky Fire - This is cinnamon flavored.  It reminded me of Red Hots candy.
Bourbon Experiment 435 - Not for me.  It had an unpleasant aftertaste.