TENNESSEE GETS TOUGH

TENNESSEE WHISKEY comes from Tennessee, Scotch comes from Scotland and tequila hails from Mexico. The rules are the rules, right? Actually, it’s far more complicated than that. The latest chapter in the Tennessee whiskey wars revolves around the finer points of making whiskey in the Volunteer State – specifically, where you take the spirit to age. The issue arose in 2O13 when the state Legislature decided to specify what exactly qualifies as Tennessee whiskey. New restrictions mostly echo the regulations for bourbon, which has to be made from a mash that’s at least 51 percent corn and aged in new charred oak barrels. The biggest difference is that Tennessee whiskey must be filtered through charcoal – although the regulations do allow some flexibility. The new rules sparked a battle between two Tennessee whiskey titans: Brown-Forman, the company behind Jack Daniel’s, and Diageo, the drinks company that owns George Dickel. Jack Daniel’s people lobbied heavily for the law, which they say helps guard against knockoff, lower-quality alcohol. Diageo, meanwhile, argued that force whiskey-makers to be dependent on the supply of new barrels and would hurt craft distillers who want to test out new recipes. Diageo launched a legislative effort this spring attempting to overturn the rules. Fast-forward to June, when the state and Diageo resolved a second squabble – this time about where aging happens. The law requires that all spirits made in Tennessee be aged in Tennessee, no more than a county away from the place they were manufactured. State attorneys in Nashville complained that the George Dickel distillery had moved barrels of whiskey outside the state, into neighboring Kentucky, for aging – which would violate the 1937 law. Diageo promptly fired back, alleging that the law was unconstitutional. They also claimed that this was the first time the state had actually enforced the law – ironically soon after Dickel protested the state’s newer rules. In early June the state dropped the complaint against the distillery after Dickel clarified that the alcohol in question went to Kentucky not for aging but rather for blending: All George Dickel products are made and aged in Tennessee. Regardless of what the whiskey was doing in Kentucky, does it really matter where exactly a barrel of liquor ages? According to Joe Barnes, founder of The Whiskey Trail, yes. Environmental conditions have a big impact on the wooden barrels, which provide the essence of aged whiskey, he says. “If you ask anyone in Tennessee, if they take their barrel down the street – much less across the state – they’re going to get a different product, just by fluctuations in temperature and humidity,” Barnes says. Now that the state has dropped the case against George Dickel, the whiskey wars look like they’ll go quiet for a while. But stay tuned: rumor has it that state legislators are expected to revisit the question of what, exactly, makes a Tennessee whiskey. That should be a barrel of laughs . . .