Aged oak | Leather | Baking spices | Allspice | Rye spice | Toffee | Dark cherries | Caramel | Aromatic

Spice up front | Aged oak | Cigar box | Tobacco | Leather | Caramel | Chewy | Well integrated with ample potency | Delicious

Spice spills over from palate | As spice dissipates, sweetness opens up drawing out concentrated brown sugar | Molasses cookie | Caramel | Long and delicious

The first edition of a new limited edition series, the Heaven Hill Heritage Collection will join the Parker’s Heritage Collection as an annual limited release, with the Heaven Hill Heritage Collection released in the spring and Parker’s Heritage Collection released in the fall. According to the press release, the Heritage Collection will “feature some of the distillery’s oldest inventory of aging whiskey” and each release will “feature one of the six traditional American Whiskey mashbills produced by Heaven Hill.” The press release alludes to the idea that the new Heritage Collection will feature more traditional whiskeys in contrast to their Parker’s Heritage Collection, which is described as its “more experimental counterpart.”

Credit to Heaven Hill, as the exact breakdown of bourbon ages is provided, with 17 year bourbon as the youngest in the blend, which also includes 19 and 20 year bourbons. The barrels used for the blend were pulled from four of the distillery’s six rickhouse locations: Deatsville, Glencoe, Schenley, and Heaven Hill main campus.

Bottled with a similar look and feel as their Heaven Hill 27 Year Bourbon which was released in the fall of 2018, Heaven Hill Heritage Collection 17 Year maintains all the good attributes of the 27 year, and sheds all of the bad ones. While 17 Year highlights flavors synonymous with higher aged bourbon - aged oak and leather - it brings an array of sweet flavors into the mix and integrates them extremely effectively. It also drinks lower than its 118.2 proof point, trading heat for richness of flavor. With a focus on oak mingled with traditional sweeter flavors, Heaven Hill Heritage Collection 17 Year Old Barrel Proof Bourbon is exactly what a quintessential high aged Kentucky bourbon should taste like.