Jack Daniel's Gentleman Jack
40% ABV - Tennessee, USA
Nose: Aromas of grain, bread, honey, and vanilla. Lighter doses of oak and florals, with a touch of acetone (it really gets your nose), and light smoke. It’s only expressing about half of that "Double Mellowed" here!
Taste: Sweet, smoked Manuka honey, with light charcoal, citrus (orange?), and vanilla cream. This is a light and very accommodating flavour profile.
Finish: Citrus, green fruits, honey, roasted nuts, and oak – or something to give it a bitter kick.
The act of writing down - challenging yourself to write down - the flavours that you detect in the nose, taste, and finish of a whiskey is formative journey. You develop a different opinion, and, once you have practiced this enough, the nuances between start to emerge. Is it citrus or is it more of an orange citrus? Is it like that whiskey from yesterday or are we detecting something completely different?
I’ve had the Jack Daniel’s Gentleman Jack on a number of occasions and in a variety of different forms: neat, with ice, or the base of a cocktail. As it stands by itself, it is a really easy drinking whiskey - but I have liked it less and less over time. Thinking back, some of the times I enjoyed it most were in conjunction with very memorable moments! It’s really interesting how that association happens... I don’t think that I have that problem when I’m doing a "proper note taking" session, because I generally arrange to have the same setup - quiet, indoors location, usually in the evening, most often alone with my thoughts, and another whiskey to contrast with.
The value of this whiskey cannot be ignored, especially if you live in the USA or can avoid the import fees and higher taxation. The answer to "will I purchase again?" is in contention, however. I imagine that I’ll opt to try some other whiskies from the same price category before picking up another bottle of the Gentleman. I recently added a Jack Daniel’s Single Barrel to the shelves - about double the price category - and I look forward to tasting that! There is also a 700mL Travel Retail Exclusive, the Jack Daniel’s No. 27 Gold, that hopefully one day I’ll get to taste; the information on the official page states that it takes the Old No. 7, gives it the "twice mellowed" treatment – the same as the Gentleman Jack, but then spends some additional time finishing in maple barrels. Yum!
Tasting Notes (Official): Nose: Vanilla, caramel character. Clean, soft nose. Taste: Flavour forward in the mouth. Warm, short finish. Absence of oak, power of second mellowing.
Tasted 27 July 2019. (Posted 29 July 2019.)
