Going Bananas for Jack Daniel's! - The Week in Wine Podcast, Special Edition

Hello, listener. Welcome. We're currently sat in Don Kavanagh, editor of Wine Searcher's front lounge. Don't tell everybody. They'll all want to join us. There's a... Let me try and paint the scene. There's a litre bottle of Jack Daniels Tennessee whisky. I haven't had any yet. The rain is falling. Don is resplendent on the couch in a green and white Hawaiian shirt. I'd like to thank Ernest Hemingway here on my right for setting the scene so vividly. Um, I'm not entirely sure why on earth he's decided to start with that strange voice, that disturbing voice, the kind of voice that you'd have nightmares about as a child. Here we go. So, hello everybody. I'd like to welcome our listener to this very special podcast. This is a one-off special. And what we are doing today is we're trying to work out why on earth a Tennessee Tennessee whiskey smells like bananas. OK, there's a long held belief in whiskey circles that Jack Daniels, the most famous Tennessee whiskey of them all, is somehow made with bananas. People say, oh, they use bananas in it. Yeah. And that's why it smells of bananas. The first thing to do is we thought we'd test this theory, non festus teary. Eerie. Um. And the first thing to do is work out whether or not it does smell of bananas. So we have a small amount of it here. You know? Yep. Okay, it's a relatively small amount. Relatively for a pint. It's not in a pint glass, exactly. Exactly. It is, in fact, in one of the Glencairn glasses, those wonderful little Scottish ones. A branded one, too, by the way. Both branded from the Edradour Distillery. Just outside Pitlochry in Perthshire, which is, of course, famously the smallest distillery in Scotland. What it produces in a year, Glenfiddich produces in a week. And it still is so small that if it was any, it's the smallest legal still in the UK. Is that true? It is. If it was any smaller, the authorities say, they could have hidden it away in the hills. Wow. And as anybody who's ever tried to find the Edradour distillery, I can tell you, They have hidden it away in the hills. Anyway, that's just the glassware. Well, that's what... Just on the subject of the glassware, for people at Edradour, if this makes its way to you, if you are missing two official tour glasses, I can tell you they're currently in Auckland. They said we could have them. Oh, okay. They said we could have them. At least I'm sure that's what they said. I wasn't listening too closely after Dram 3. Anyway, back to the subject at hand. Anyway, back to the subject at hand. So we have a Glencairn glass. I almost called it a Cairngorm glass. That is replete with Jack Daniels. Yes. Now swirling it around a bit, just break up the oils on top and have a sniff. Honestly, I thought, okay, potentially yes. And did some reading up on this. Thought, yeah, there's... Reputed to have banana esters, isoamyl acetate, which is the flavour compound or the aroma compound for bananas, pears. I was like, OK, yeah, maybe a bit. You're absolutely right. It does, doesn't it? Once you know what's there... But not just bananas. It's like banana cake. You know when you have those really old bananas that you used to make banana cake with? This is exactly it. It smells like that. It's the smell of ripe, overripe, or the most completely non-banana flavour of all time, which is banana candies. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, those beautiful little lollies, sweets, candies, whatever you want to call them. Guilty pleasure of mine. Oh, absolutely. Love it. Oh, they're fantastic. Fantastic. But yes, it's there. It's right there. Oh yeah, this is absolutely like banana cake. It is. It's magnificent. And do you know where it comes from? The interesting thing about this, because what else I'm getting on the nose, I'm getting a very fresh cut timber smell in there as well. So it's like chewing on a banana candy while walking into a sawmill. And it's a magnificent, it's a magnificent combination. Is there a better aroma combination yet? Well, I don't know that there is, to be honest with you. I mean, this is genuinely, it smells beautiful. I mean, this is Jack Daniel's all-time number seven brand. You know, the Black Label one you see everywhere. Yep. It's been a long time since I've had Jack Daniel's. I bet it is. I'll tell you why, because you're too snobby. You're like those people who say, oh, I like bourbon but yeah, not that Jim Beam because it's rubbish. Let me tell you, you don't get to become the biggest selling bourbon in the world by being rubbish. Similarly with Jack Daniels, you don't become one of the three biggest selling whiskies on earth by being rubbish. It's magnificent stuff. Yeah, it is. Fantastic. It's rare that I have it neat though. Well, I mean, going back to my youth it was JD and Coke. Well, indeed, yes. And so, you know, who can taste anything under that? I mean, you know, if you're that desperate for sugar, I'm sure I've got some in the cupboard I could go and get you. And perhaps a dessert spoon. You could just simply sit there and eat sucrose from a spoon. It'll be pretty much the same as having Jack Daniel's and Coke. Yeah. But it's quite a clean flavour, really, isn't it? It is. The banana, I hasten to add, doesn't really come through on the palate. There's a hint of it there. No, the palate is remarkably clean, and the palate leaves you that sort of caramelly, that nice caramel kind of finish. The slighting of sugar. Burnt caramel. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah. It's got a little bit of note to it. Almost butterscotchy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Which, for our younger listener, butterscotch is what people used to call salted caramel before it became trendy. Anyway, okay, so right. Yeah, you said that the banana ester, and I always thought it would come from like the barrel age and the alcohol, and you said that it's actually a function of the yeast. It's the yeast. It's in the yeast. They use a specific yeast at Jack Daniel's, at Brown-Forman, whatever, at the Jack Daniel's distillery, that they've always used this. They've always used this yeast. And it has always had this iso... Isoamyl acetate? Isoamyl acetate. Is that right? Is that a drug? It is. No, you've got it right. It's always had that in it. So there's always been that big, full... Yeah. Touch of sweetness to it, but it's only from the yeast. Wow. It's quite astonishing when you consider. It is. There's not a huge amount of yeast goes into the production of wort for distillation. Basically beer, isn't it? Yeah, it is. Effectively, what whiskey is before it becomes whiskey is beer. Yeah. So effectively, what whiskey is, if a beer is very, very good in this life. It will go on to become whiskey in the next life. Yeah. You know, it's basically what beer wants to be when it grows up. Yeah. That's amazing. I always thought it was the caramelization, that sort of caramely sort of notes that you get from classic barrels. But isn't it astonishing, though, that it survives new oak? Yes. It survives charcoal filtration. It survives the heat treatment of distillation. Yeah. And it still comes out. Well, the distillation would augment it if it's there already. Well, this is true, but for it to get there in the first place, it's quite interesting. And I wonder if the barrel as well, the longer time it spends in the barrel, kind of complements it. I think it does, really, because you're talking about new oak, new white American oak, so it's vanilla automatically. If you charred a little bit, you're going to get those butterscotchy notes. Yep. Yeah, and it does compliment that. It gives it, I don't think it necessarily raises it that much. I just think it gives it a platform to sit on. Yeah, I think the combination of the two also is like, you know, vanilla and bananas. Yeah, who doesn't love that? Yeah, right. I mean, let's be honest, who doesn't love that? It's like mashed banana with custard or something, you know, or banana cake with vanilla icing on it. It's glorious. It's also that... Yeast is also often used in Germany for making wheat beers. Right. So, you know, you get... I'm not talking about the sort of the more obvious craft brewing wheat beers, which just end up tasting like bubblegum. Yeah. But the ones that have a definite kind of banana whiff to them. Yeah. So it is that ester and that production that you get. So you get it in the likes of Paulaner Weissbier, for example. Yeah. That's a classic one for it. 100%. A beautiful Munich beer. One of the... One of the great beers in Munich, in fact. Yeah, yeah. That wonderful tall glass they're serving as well. It is, yeah. The only thing I don't like about it is too many people know about it now, so it's not as cool as it used to be, you know. I mean, I was into it before it got famous, which is why I'm still into Augustiner. What's Augustiner? Augustiner is the other great Munich. Well, now you can show you. Münchner Brauerei. Now you can show your Munich chops and tell me about that beer. There's, I don't know, August. Augustiner's one of the great beers of all time. The Lager's magnificent. The Weissbier's spectacular. But the Dunkler, the dark. Oh, dear Lord. Oh, many's the night I have rolled out of a beer hall in Munich. Absolutely brilliant. I loved my time in Munich. Every time I've been to Munich. I've adored it. But there's an Augustiner Halle right on the Marienplatz. Yeah. Is it the Frauenkirche? You've got to ask me that one. I don't think I've ever been to Munich. It's my sins. Wow. Really? Yeah. Oh, it's beautiful. It's fairytale Germany. Yeah. Munich. It's genuine fairytale Germany. It was, you know, the capital of Bavaria, obviously. Bavaria wasn't even part of Germany until the 20th century, effectively. Well, most of Germany wasn't part of Germany. Well, I mean, yeah, but the rest of it was. I think Bavaria was probably one of the last places. Right. To join up. And that was really only because King Ludwig was mad and was going broke. Which is what will happen to you if you start building castles on... Inaccessible mountaintops overlooking lakes in the foothills of the Alps. If you join the podcast to hear about European history, you've struck gold. You have. If you're a fan of Neuschwanstein, you have a passing interest in him. This is almost like, it's almost like that terrible song, the Pina Colada song. If you like European history and you know Neuschwanstein, Very good. Very good. We could almost make a song about this. No. But let's not. A podcast is enough. Let's not. Let's finish up this. I think that's enough. Before we finish it up ourselves. Five gold bananas in Sandringham. Ha ha ha! That's for, I'll just point out for our listeners in non- England. Thank That's a reference to Enid Blyton, a children's author who wrote a series of books about, it all started with five go. Oh yeah, the famous you five. The famous five indeed, yes. lashings of ginger beer. Yes. Potted meat sandwiches. Do you ever read them? very Oh God, I love them. Did you? Oh, absolutely. I knew more about your country by the time I was ten years old than I warrant you did. much. You're probably right. There I was, sitting in Ireland by the turf fire. By candlelight. Reading by candlelight because the ESB, the electricity supply board, were on a three-day week at the time. I know. It was the 1970s, folks. It was a dark time in Europe. Possibly not as dark as 1939, but it was pretty dark. But yes, so there you go. It does smell of bananas. Genuinely. Tastes of bananas. Yeah. Slightly. And yes, But not one single banana has touched it. Or so they say. Or so they say. I mean, this is the age of the conspiracy theory, isn't it? Well, we could probably start one. No, No, but genuinely, I was relatively sceptical, but I am 100% convinced. Well, I think we need to investigate it further, and I think possibly the only way we could possibly do that is if Jack Daniels genuinely wants to prove to us That it does not use bananas in the manufacture of its... It should fly us to Tennessee for a week where we can watch repeatedly the production process and ensure that no bananas were harmed during the production of the whisky. And this is why social media people get called grifters. Stir. Oh, dear Lord, please. I come from a long line of chancers. Grifters. There's... Tomato, tomato. Amateurs. Well, thanks for that, Don. No, thank you. Thank you for coming around and drinking my whiskey. Edifying. Boing. Edifying, and I like to think educational. It was. No, I genuinely, yeah. Yeah, I'm... And what we should do next is we should do this with other things. We should, yes. Let's give that a try. Stay tuned, listener. Don't you dare touch that dial. Good night. Good night. See you then. See you, Ollie. Thanks for listening to the Week in Wine News podcast. For more than all that we discuss, and for price and retail information on all the wines near you, including comprehensive coverage from our pro-membership option, go to wine-searcher.com.