When's the last time you bought that Phil? They've been jacking up prices every year and its well over $200 now and not nearly worth it.

in the $70 - $120 range, I'd recommend:

Compass Box Hedonism
Aberlour a'bunadh
Springbank 15
Glenmorangie 18
Highland Park 18 (might be a little over that)
Highland Park 15
Kilchoman (any cask strength releases or exclusive cask bottlings)
Compass Box Peat Monster
Lagavulin 16
Ardbeg Uigeadail (probably cheaper than $70 but I like more than some of the above)

I'm not sure I'd really recommend any bourbon in that price range. You can get very good bourbon for under $45 and the stuff that is worth much more than that is either really hard to find or above $120 or both. If you luck into finding a bottle of any of the buffalo trace antique collection or the four roses limited edition small batch in that range, jump at it but you'd be extremely lucky to find any that isn't extremely marked up. You might have better luck finding a rye worth the price in the $80 - 120 range, but most of those will be special releases.

so the price point for quality bourbon is considerably lower than the 80-100 bar i set?

For bourbon I'd say yea. For $23 I just got a bottle of Evan Williams Single Batch and it is ridiculously good for the price.

You need to pay up for scotch much more than you do for bourbon. As long as you stay clear of most of the bottom shelf stuff, you're going to get a decent bourbon and there's very good bourbon in the $25-50 price range. I like most Buffalo Trace products (Buffalo Trace, Eagle Rare, WL Weller, Old Weller Antique). Old Weller Antique (probably hard to find now unfortunately) is made at the same distillery as Pappy Van Winkle using essentially the same recipe but only costs $30. Old Bardstown Estate is my regular buy these days and can be had for about $35. Blanton's which Phil recommended is approximately $45.

To pay much more than that and not be paying for just for hype, you need to find an aged bourbon or something cask strength. The problem with that is there isn't much aged bourbon around and even less good aged bourbon. Bourbon doesn't benefit as much from aging beyond 8-12 years as scotch does because by law its aged in new american oak where scotch is aged in used barrels (bourbon, sherry, port, etc). Many of the aged bourbons have been aged too long and are over oaked and the really good ones that are much better than the younger bottles in the $35-50 range are pretty hard to come by these days.

If you're looking for something more special to sip neat, I'd probably just go with one of the scotchs in the $80 -120 range that I recommended. If you would really prefer bourbon, you could look for Maker's Mark's Cask Strength which is supposed to be really good. It sells for around $40 for a 375ml bottle. Not sure you'll find it though. I haven't seen any in months. Diageo has a heavily hyped line of aged bourbon special releases called the "Orphan Barrel" project. They're near the top of that price range and get somewhat mixed reviews but they are old bourbons and some people seem to really like them. I'm skeptical that they are really worth the money though. If you can get to a Binny's, you might find an exclusive bottling that is worth paying up for but as far as general release bottlings I can't think of many special ones that are easy to find.

i really like maker's mark, i'll keep an eye out for the CS. not sure what i'm walking into with el paso grog-finding, but i assume i should be able to find something off your or phil's list.






i mean

If you are buying in El Paso, you could always look for some local Texas spirits that have limited distribution outside Texas. Balcones stuff is pretty good. Their Single Malt is probably their best product and is about $75/bottle. They also make a corn whiskey smoked with texas scrub oak ("Brimstone") and a blue corn whiskey ("Baby Blue") and Rumble which is distilled from Figs and wild honey. They just went through a mess of a founder/investors dispute with the founder, Chip Tate, being bought out. I'm not sure that their product will be as good on a go forward basis but the stuff on the shelves today was presumably made by Tate. You could certainly do worse.

Garrison Brothers is a Texas bourbon that's got some buzz. It's probably around $70-80 per bottle. I have one but haven't opened it yet. That's a lot to pay for a young bourbon but if you believe in paying up for local small batch, its supposed to be pretty good. There are some other small distillers from TX that are supposed to be good but I can't think of them off the top of my head.

My cousin always told me that Arizona was where everyone goes to disappear.

Then the cartel confirmed it.

Stock up at Specs.

http://www.specsonline.com/cgi-bin/show ... l+Pasospec

Billy it's been... i don't know... A long time since I've bought a bottle of anything. Probably 2011.

Maybe I should drink more.

Specs has the Mac 12 for what the 18 used to be. Still, in your price range and decent. Buy more than you think you'll need, because supplies are hard to come by in Marfa.

have you been there phil?

i read that the place i'm staying has a no-outside-food/alcohol policy, but i think if i'm low-key i can do whatever as long as i keep it in my backpack.

seems like i also read there was a scrumptious little grocery store co-op...the get go, or something? might get a bunch of vegan-Os for breakfast for the week and then hit up various restaurants for dinner.

got any meal time reccs?

Yeah, Marfa Burrito. The town is chill, don't worry.

Mando's is kind of gross. There are some upscale joints but I'm betting you'll have at least one burrito a day at Marfa. Brush up on your spanish for that abuela.

Do you fish? Any spare time in the warmer months I tend to be bankside bivvied up, rarely see anyone. Write, booze, meditate, and play with my little monkey.

when you say 'play with my little monkey'...

?

ohhhhhh

Pretty good selection. You shouldn't have much problem finding something good in your price range.

A couple of other options I noticed

Lagavulin Distiller's Edition
High West 21 year old rye (a little more than you suggested you wanted to spend but this is supposed to be great and its hard to find and $126 is a very good price for it.)
High West Midwinter Night's Dram (Their Rendezvous Rye which is delicious given additional finishing in port and french oak casks - hard to find and a steal at $75)

ah nice, you're staying at el cosmico! that place is pretty rad and i stayed there for a night when i visited. i don't remember anything about the outside food/alcohol thing. we brought some of our own beer but i don't think we drank it outside the trailer. also, it gets really fucking cold at night but they should have a portable heater in the trailer.

but yeah, go to marfa burrito. comida futura is pretty good though i think they run out of food sometimes later in the day. i didn't get to eat at food shark but i heard they're good. cochineal is excellent if you want something fancier. a lot of the restaurants have weird hours and days they're open, which is a little aggravating. there's a regular ass supermarket in town (pueblo market) and then a smaller whole foods type place called the get go and they sell beer and wine. there's a drive through liquor store too but i think they jack their prices up since they're the only one around. i wanted to check out big bend brewing which is in alpine about 1/2 hour away but didn't have time.

there's a couple of bars though most of them were closed the night i was there. the bar in the paisano hotel is just average. i wanted to go to padres but they weren't open (and they have shows sometimes. the men were supposed to be playing a few weeks after i was there). lost horse saloon is a great divey bar though.

i just strolled around town the day after while my friend went on a tour of the chinati foundation. also check out the wrong store. skip the prada store. the presidio courthouse and paisano hotel are pretty nice to wander around in. cobra rock boot company is cool though the boots are expensive.

thanks shiv!

which trailer did you stay in? some of them looked really spacious.

the imperial mansion. we wanted to stay in a teepee but they were all booked so we said fuck it and opted for the most expensive one.

niiice

oh yeah, another question...how's the wifi/cell tower coverage/etc out there?

they have wifi in the lobby of El Cosmico but not the trailers. There's some seating and such in there.
Cell coverage is decent depending on which carrier you have I guess. I didn't have much of a problem and I'm on t-mobile.

I kind of want to come and crash your party but i know you're on the clock for your art.

how far away are you phil?

it's pretty awesome here. getting lots done. drank way too much bourbon last night. holy shit.