Whiskey Wednesday: The Party Source

The Party Source sounds like one of those stores that sells balloons and paper plates featuring the Disney Princesses, but it is actually a fabulous Kentucky whiskey store. Kentucky liquor stores, which tend to feature huge Bourbon selections, generally don't sell on-line for legal reasons, but the Party Source has ventured into new territory by offering its specialty, single barrel bottlings on-line. These are single barrel bottlings of American whiskey and Scotch made specially for the Party Source. They include American whiskies from Buffalo Trace, Heaven Hill, Four Roses and the Willett Bourbons bottled by KBD. They also offer single barrel Scotch from a number of different distilleries including Bruichladdich and BenRiach.

Among the most exciting offerings are specially made versions of the Buffalo Trace Experimental Collection, and at a reasonable price. For the last few years, the innovators at Trace have been doing all sorts of strange things to whiskey and bottling it in 350 ml bottles as the Experimental Collection. These bottles are exceedingly hard to find outside of Kentucky and environs. In fact, the only one I've seen on a California shelf was priced at $200, while they go for $50 to $60 in Kentucky. The Party Source is offering two specialty bottlings of the Experimental Collection, a wheated whiskey aged in rye barrels and a rye whiskey aged in dessert wine barrels. They are $60 per 375 ml bottle.

I picked one of the ryes up as well as a young Willett, which I will review in due time. Meanwhile, check out the Party Source.