Parker's Heritage Collection 2014 Wheat Whiskey

Nose: burnt sugars, a little cough syrup, fresh baked bread. Even though this is a wheat whisky, I find the fresh bread to be really interesting.

Taste: spicy and warm, with lots of interesting spices.  Some peppers, but not a normal ground black pepper.  Maybe more of a Chinese type ground white pepper.  Some slight anise and cardamom. I don't notice any cloves and cinnamon notes are way to the back.  While very similar to most whisky profiles, it feels like an inverse look at all the spice flavors with everything shown like a photographic negative.  Extremely recognizable, but still foreign.  Interestingly, I feel like this (along with last year's release) really benefits from breathing a little bit.  The nose gets a nicer, softer feel to it. The heat becomes more fierce, more intense.  The sweets become more luscious and candy like, forming a nice thick rope of toffee and caramel, still rolled in that interesting spice drop mixture. To me this seems to change more than a lot of others.  Most often, I'll pour a glass of something and sip on it over more than an hour.  After a half hour of air time, I don't notice a lot of change in most drinks.  This is about the time the window seems to open for the PHC for me.

Back to my normal rattling on, the finish is the nice long finish you would expect at this price point.  Gently balanced with a pleasant oakiness that lasts for as long as you are willing to pay attention to it.

Overall, I was very surprised by this.  I don't like Bernheim Wheat.  Kinda hate it, to be honest.  I've kept trying it at tastings over the last 6-8 years, but it has never been interesting to me.  I always think, 'that would be a great mixer.'  This extra age has immensely helped.  As always, a nice bit of work by the Heaven Hill gang.  My initial thought on this one was that it was clearly a high quality product with a lot of interesting flavors.. I just wasn't sure if I liked it.  After about a third of the bottle down, I'm in love with the stuff.  There is far less left now.  Great flavors, great balance, delivered with just enough subtlety and fire.