No wonder that March 2020 barrel tasted smoother than any two-year bourbon I’d had before. Having them onsite, too, instead of in storage in Bardstown, allows his staff to keep a closer eye on them while they mature. A standard barrel holds about 60 gallons, Beam explained, and these smaller barrels work well for testing new recipes and techniques because they age faster than the standard size. However, this pintsize rickhouse is used for 15-gallon barrels and recipe experiments. Lux Row Distillers in Bardstown, which is part of Luxco, stores the bulk of the distillery's barrels.
Whisky thief distillery full#
This, of course, is not Limestone Branch's full aging operation. It only took a few steps to get from the distillery to that shipping container rickhouse. "I never get tired of that," Beam told me, as we felt heat rise and took in the warm smell of yeast.
In one glance, I could see the grain go through the grinder and in the next, I could watch the mash bubbling in the tanks.
His brother Paul Beam is a co-founder.įrom there, Beam and I left the gift shop and stepped into the distillery itself, which is roughly the size of a high school gymnasium. Steve Beam is the president and master distillery at Limestone Branch Distillery. "When we brought it back, we wanted to give it some of its glory from the heyday." "It had kind of been forgotten about," he continued. “If I talk to people too long, most of them will say 'oh I remember my grandfather drinking Yellowstone,' and 'I remember that on their counter,'" Beam explained. The deal brought a piece of the Beam's family history to its own distillery and allowed the brothers to put their mark on that legacy, too. The Beams kept its look but reformulated the bourbon to add a more craft appeal to the legacy spirit. Then bourbon as a whole took a nosedive in popularity in the 1980s and 1990s, and Luxco acquired the Yellowstone label in 1992, but they didn’t do much with it until the Beam brothers came on the scene 20 years later and partnered with the company in 2015. Beam's grandfather, Guy Beam, was among the distillers who worked with the spirit in the mid-20th century, and it become one of the most popular bourbons in the 1960s. Limestone Branch's iconic Yellowstone Select dates back to 1872, and the label even lived on through Prohibition for medicinal purposes. Jeff Faughender, Matt Stone and Kirby Adams, Louisville Courier Journal Beam can oversee the whole operation from beginning to barreling from his upstairs office. The grain is ground in the same warehouse where the mash is fermented and distilled. A 'very, very popular' family legacyīeam's team makes about seven barrels of bourbon a day, and the entire process happens under one roof. Limestone Branch and its iconic label, Yellowstone Select, are an interesting mash-up of craft distilling and bourbon heritage. The cozy distillery, located about 65 miles to the southeast of downtown Louisville, is more remote than some of its peers on the Kentucky Bourbon Trail Craft Tour. The entire time I was on the property it felt less like taking a tour and more like I was being hosted as family. Throughout my visit, Beam never hesitated to let me feel, touch, taste and smell the things that made his product and his business so special. As I took that final swallow of that unfinished bourbon during my visit July, I could tell they had succeeded. When Beam and his brother founded Limestone Branch in 2010, they wanted to create a space that made bourbon enthusiasts and newcomers alike feel right at home. Limestone Branch Distillery in Lebanon, Kentucky offers intimate bourbon experience and has arguably the smallest rickhouse in the industry. Limestone Branch Distillery in Lebanon, KY, offers intimate bourbon experience: Photos It would take a little more aging to see what this recipe could really do, and Beam and his team were eager to let you in on the whole process as if you were part of their family. Sampling that bourbon out of the barrel was almost like trying cookie dough before it went into the oven. This small distillery in Lebanon, Kentucky, is a master of making bourbon but also of fostering intimacy. This was much too smooth and rich for a two-year-old bourbon. As I sipped it, I thought surely the date on the barrel ― Ma― wasn’t right. He handed me a sample with black sediment floating from the barrel's char lingering at the bottom. With a "pop," Steve Beam opened the barrel's hole and used a whiskey thief to draw out the bourbon inside. The shipping container-turned-rickhouse didn't look anything like the larger warehouses scattered across Kentucky's bourbon country, but that was very much part of the charm at Limestone Branch.
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