This just goes to prove – you can teach an Old Grand-Dad new tricks.
Tucked away on the bottom shelf of most markets, you’ve probably seen a bottle of Old Grand-Dad Bonded before, likely wedged between Old Tub, Old Crow, and/or Old Overholt. At around $20 a pop with a weird orange label, it’s super easy to write off Old Grand-Dad Bonded as nothing special. But this old bourbon actually has quite the legacy to live up to – and oh does it.
Meredith Basil Hayden Sr. was quite the distiller back in the mid to late 1700s. He was most known back then for his high rye bourbons, but today is most associated with the Basil Hayden brand. By 1885, well after Basil Hayden has passed, his grandson Raymond B. Hayden set up a distillery in Nelson County, Kentucky and got to work. Raymond Hayden was well set for bourbon success with a grandfather known as, “The Father of High Rye Bourbon,” and a mother who was part of the J.W. Dant bourbon family. Yet, when it came time to name his first bourbon, Raymond went with the family pet name for his grandfather – Old Grand-Dad.
These days, there are three different grand-dads floating around: The original, Old Grand-Dad 114, and Old Grand-Dad Bonded. The bonded version refers to bottled-in-bond, which is a classification that requires a bourbon to be aged at least four years, produced from one distillery in one season, and bottled at exactly 100 proof. There are plenty of bonded bourbons around including Jim Beam Bonded, Evan Williams Bottled-in-Bond, Old Tub, Rittenhouse Rye, and New Riff. But Old Grand-Dad is seriously one of our favorites.
This bourbon has a spicy aroma of baking spices and cinnamon with a little dash of oak. It’s an ultra smooth bourbon that mingles even more baking spice taste in with a peppery, cinnamon-y, chocolate-y flavor. There’s a sweetness to Old Grand-Dad Bonded, like vanilla and a bit of honey but the ending flavor is all about cloves, cinnamon, and mild peppercorn. For just around $20, this is an incredible value and a bourbon that we’d honestly pay a lot more for.
It’s unclear why Old Grand-Dad seems to be so underplayed by its owner, Jim Beam. While the Basil Hayden collection seems to be getting the lion’s share of the marketing budget, Old Grand-Dad is virtually ignored by Jim Beam. Maybe that’s to keep the ever-growing bourbon supply and demand issue in check or maybe Jim Beam just likes keeping it a secret. Either way, Old Grand-Dad Bonded is a bourbon that hits way above its price range and no doubt, would have made Basil Hayden Sr. proud.
STATS: Old Grand-Dad Bonded Bourbon
- Price for us: $21 for 750 mL
- Proof: 100
- Aged: 4 Years, at least
- Distillery: Jim Beam, owned by Beam Suntory
- Recommendation: Neat
