The grounds are almost ready, the flowers are being planted, the ponies are arriving, the odds are settling in, the big day is only 11 days away, but do you have your hat yet?  The 140th Kentucky Derby is set to begin on May 3-4 and the excitement is building in Louisville Kentucky.

 

We took a behind the scenes look at the grounds and got to see some of the work that goes on year round to prepare the horses to be ready for race season.

The Kentucky will have more than 150,000 people attend and it only seats a little more than 50,000.  That means 100,000 people have no seat and most will be in the infield where you can’t even see the track.  This year they have installed a 9 story TV so that even those people can see the race.  The Derby only lasts about 2 minutes, so 1 horse out of the 30,000 Thoroughbreds born during 2011 will sit in the winners circle and then probably retire!

 

 

The Derby is a very short event but the excitement created by the tradition is contagious.  I almost bought a fancy hat!

 

Saturday we are out tasting some really fine bourbon (we will get to that!)  and decided we better have something for lunch before we hit the next Distiller.  There isn’t much out here except nature, green grass and a couple of distilleries but we find a tiny town with a church and a market/hardware/bait shop/gas pump (which didn’t work) and a sign that says “Sandwiches”.  Great they have a deli inside.  We step into the store and it is very dark, I think are they really conserving energy or just don’t like to display their wares?!. There is one lady at the register and she barely whispers hello.  Paul and I venture towards the back looking for the deli counter.  Paul finds it.  It is a shelf next to a glass frig, with a white board of the list of sandwiches.  It ain’t fancy but they have several offerings of meat and cheese so Paul proceeds up to the lady and asks “can we get a sandwich”.  Yep,

He follows her back and she asks “what kind”  Paul asks for roast beef, nope.  How about Olive loaf? nope.  What do you have?  Turkey, Ham, Bologna!  Ok then.  Paul orders Turkey and cheese.  I’m thinking maybe just cheese.  A nice Swiss, Gueyere and maybe a smoked cheddar!  I see those in the case.  So I say I’ll have cheese.  She starts making the sandwich for Paul and cuts off some turkey, opens the loaf of store brand white bread and takes out 4 slices!  Whoa!  Do you have wheat?  nope!  She asks Paul, do you want Miracle Whip?  Can I have Mayo? nope!  She then takes out a chunk of american cheese and slices 2, 1/4 inch thick slices.  She turns to me, Do you want Miracle Whip?  nope!  how about just mustard!  She slaps on one slice of american cheese a squirt of mustard and tops it with the other slice of bread, wraps our sandwiches in a napkin and hands them to us!  I was hungry!  so I ate a doughy cheese sandwich!  I hope I don’t have to do that again!  The funniest thing was the look on Pauls face watching me, watch the lady building this sandwich, knowing I am hating every step!

 

 

Back to the Bourbon!  Bardstown, Kentucky, the Bourbon Capitol of the World and it is just beautiful.  It seems like everyones front yard is about 2 acres and all lawn!  There are more barrels of bourbon in this county than people – this is going to be fun.   Bourbon tasting is a lot like wine tasting in California,  the distillers charge you for a tour, take you around for about an hour, knowing you only want to get to the tasting and then they offer you 2-4 sips of some pretty good stuff if you like bourbon.  I don’t really care for the taste but it is fun to have just a small sip.

Our first distiller was Makers Mark on the Bourbon Trail where we got our first glimpse of how this stuff goes from a grain to a pretty expensive beverage!

This distillery had beautiful grounds and the tour took you right in where they are making bourbon.

Everyone on the tour was a bit creeped out by the fact that we could stick our hands into the mash and taste if you wanted.  No washing of hands before or after here cause they are not worried about germs when they are going to cook it during the distilling process.

 

We went to three other Distilleries and tasted all of them.  Heaven Hill makes Evan Williams an other brands.  They are the second largest Bourbon seller to Jim Beam which is number 1.  I learned something while touring – Paul’s favorite,  Knob Creek is made by Jim Beam!  We got to see Knob Creek go from –

For the cost of a bottle of Bourbon you could choose your bottle, wash it, watch it being filled with the sweet, brown liquid, sealed and then hand dipped and labeled.  We just had the free (for the cost of a tour) 2 tastes.  I tried one of the new Knob Creeks with maple flavoring – I might be able to drink that!

My favorite distillery was Willett Distiller.  It’s a small family operation with about 40 employees making about 80 barrels a day.  The bourbon was strong so not my style but the distillery was really cool.  We watched the corn being delivered and run through the auger into the distillery.

 

 

We learned a lot about Bourbon and of course enjoy the tasting.  Picture of the Day!  Look closely at the front porch!