Tasting notes

nose

Caramel candy and toasted cereal with biscuit, marzipan, damp earth and dusty oak

palate

Thick and oily; caramel and honey lead, then creamed corn, almond, nutmeg and oak through the middle

finish

Medium to long; honey and oak hold, sharpened by black pepper and fading on a herbal mint note

Mash bill

68% corn, 20% rye, 12% malted barley. That is a different recipe from the 70% corn, 22% malted rye and 8% malted barley in most Milam & Greene bourbons, with more barley and a little less rye. The spirit was distilled in Bardstown, Kentucky, in May 2019.

Why it's craft

Live Oak shows what Texas aging does to an older Kentucky bourbon: after more than four years in Kentucky, the four barrels spent their last years in Blanco rickhouses through summers over 100 degrees and sharp winter swings. They were first picked for single-barrel bottlings and kept together because they matched so closely, giving 608 bottles at full cask strength. Milam & Greene, founded in Blanco in 2019, sends part of the proceeds to the Blanco County Conservation Initiative.