Ewan Williams Bourbon is produced by Heaven Hill on their Bernheim distillery at Louisville, Kentucky. It’s most sold product of Heaven Hill and secondly most sold bourbon whiskey after Jim Beam. On the world it’s 7th most sold whisk(e)y. Story tells that Welsh Ewan Williams was the first who start whiskey production in Kentucky at 1783.
The Basic version “Black Label” was used to be 7 years matured but after very high demand they drop out the age indicate at year 2000. Nowadays it is estimated to be 4-5 years old. In addition of “black label” Evan Williams have also “green label”, “white label” and several age classified bottles. Also another very well known bourbon, Elijah Craig is produced by Heaven Hill. Mash bill of Evan Williams have 75% corn, 13% rye and 12% malted barley. 70cl bottle bought for discounted price of 11.99€ (Maxima).
Evan Williams have very pleasant nose, in addition of sweet corn there is maple syrup, orange peel, caramel and hint of oak and banana. Taste is however lighter than could expect. Caramel, maple and honey brings sweetness on the beginning, but it change slowly to quite a bitter oakness. Especially it’s on the aftertaste, which otherwise is full of caramel and maple syrup. However even there is lots of sweet nuances on the whiskey itself is not anything too sweet as a whole. Burn is quite strong, which is not only due to 3% higher alcohol level but might tell that the whiskey is not matured more than the required 4 years. By adding some water there comes milk chocolate and sweet honey which grow to fill the mouth, burn goes milder but the bitter oak nuance still remain. Despite the pleasant nose Ewan Williams is not too pleasant to drink neat, but with adding a bit water or ice cube it changes much better and is a good choice on it’s own price category. The best of it are the sweet caramel, honeycomb and maple syrup nuances, but it definitely needs couple of years more on oak barrel to start to shine. Anyway as a mixer Evan Williams shines already now and it mix very well with different refreshing drinks.
81/100
