Sunday, July 7, 2019

Summer Road Trip - Lexington

Huge breakfast at Mammy’s Kitchen. I had Kentucky Hot Brown with eggs. So delicious and couldn’t come close to finishing. But the highlight was walking into the bathroom to see a young woman laughing and crying. I went into immediate mother mode. It was like - oh sweetheart what can I do to help and she just pointed. The object in the second picture had scared her when she walked into the bathroom. We both got a good laugh. 




Visited  the house that inspired the song “My Old Kentucky home” and a civil war log cabin community in Bardstown before visiting Maker’s Mark. I am pretty sure the lights are not period pieces (smile). 






Maker Mark - a beautiful distillery and great tasting. The most remarkable note is that the wood fermenting tanks are over 100 years old. Mark dipped his personal bottle. By the way, the distillers wife Margie Samuels was the brains behind the brawn. She designed the label, shape of the bottle and  the red wax dipped bottle neck. Her husband didn’t want the wax but she won and it is iconic. 

















Maker’s Mark had a Chihuly exhibit and he left the distillery with a gift of his work. 


On a whim because we had some time, we stopped at Limestone Branch Distillery. A very small craft distillery producing two barrels a day. Had a fun tasting out of the barrel and then a flight of 7 bourbons that are not distributed. 


Next stop Lexington. Driving in past all the horse farms was so beautiful. Checked into a historic hotel - the Campbell House. Very pretty sprawling hotel. 

Last stop of the day, James E Pepper. Col. Pepper (not a military colonel- but an honorary Governor bestowed title) operated the finest stable in Kentucky. His thoroughbreds competed in the Kentucky Derby. He was a proud whiskey distiller and during his visits to New York, often at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel, Colonel Pepper was known to socialize with other American captains of industry, including John D. Rockefeller, Theodore Roosevelt, C.V. Vanderbilt, Charles A. Pillsbury, and Charles L.Tiffany. It was at the Waldorf that Colonel Pepper is credited with introducing the world to the “Old Fashioned” cocktail, which was said to have been invented in his honor by a bartender using James E Pepper Kentucky Bourbon. We bought some to test out the recipe. Check out the height of the low wine still and then the small high wine still. I couldn’t get the whole still in the picture. 










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