Unique

How a real Jim Beam is made

It is a long journey to get from the individual ingredients that make a real JIM BEAM to the final product with its incomparable velvety smooth taste. For one thing, it takes four years alone for the distillate to mature and become the stuff of JIM BEAM legend. Another factor is that we have kept strictly to an age-old, tried-and-tested production process for centuries. We are happy to show you the steps that are needed to turn corn, rye, barley malt, and water into the world’s No. 1 bourbon whiskey. But some of the secrets that accompany a JIM BEAM bourbon from the mash to fermentation, distillation, storage, and bottling will remain with our distillers and nobody else.

MASHING – a drop of tradition

One of the most important criteria that a bourbon whiskey has to meet is that the mash contains at least 51% corn. Together with rye, the corn is ground on the grindstone of a hammer mill. The fine flour is mixed with iron-free spring water, creating a mash that is cooked. We heat the mash for a somewhat longer time at an especially low temperature. The result is the characteristic, rich aroma and soft, mild taste that only a real JIM BEAM can offer. Hops are added to the cooled mash to turn the cereal starches into sugars. Then the actual “birth” of a new JIM BEAM takes place – we add “set back” to the mixture, or a portion of the mash from the previous distillation, to give it its special character. And so in every JIM BEAM, there is a part of the first-ever JIM BEAM – a real piece of tradition. This has now been taking place for more than 215 years.

FERMENTING – the inner value

The actual fermentation process begins when yeast is added to the mash, at which point sugar is slowly turned into alcohol. It takes three to five days for the mixture to fully ferment, creating what is known as “distiller’s beer.” At JIM BEAM, we use special yeast cultures that are already much older than 70 years. They originate from the same culture that JIM BEAM himself used after Prohibition. The yeast used was such an important part of the original JIM BEAM recipe that he always took a glassful back home with him for safekeeping. This is a custom that Fred Noe, part of the seventh generation in the family of distillers, maintains to this day – he, too, has a sample culture of the yeast at home in a private refrigerator. It’s the special features in the process such as this that make the quality of what’s inside a real JIM BEAM.

DESTILLING – less is more

We also stick to the traditional methods of the old family recipe when it comes to distilling. The fermented mash is first distilled in a beer still that is heated with steam. The mixture evaporates during the first distillation, and the vapors are collected and cooled, resulting in the first distillate, which is known as “low wine.” This is then distilled again to obtain “high wine” or “white dog,” which is then poured into the barrels. Even during the distillation process, JIM BEAM takes care to ensure a special result: unlike many other whiskeys, JIM BEAM is distilled at a low temperature, giving it a little more time to form. Perhaps another reason for the natural, mature aroma of JIM BEAM is that distillation at a low temperature helps to create a Kentucky bourbon with a more intense flavor – a real JIM BEAM.

AGING – a mature taste

The barrels that are filled with “white dog” are new, charred barrels made from American white oak, a wood whose special properties, especially its porosity, are perfectly suited for maturing whiskey. The charring process involves drawing the barrels across an open fire to caramelize the natural sugars in the oak. The large temperature fluctuations in Kentucky cause the wood to expand and contract throughout the year, meaning that the whiskey inside can penetrate the wood and pick up its color and aroma. As a result, JIM BEAM acquires the particular aroma of the barrels over a four-year maturing process and, at the same time, develops its extraordinarily mild taste of caramel and its incomparable golden amber color. During the four years to come – double the time the law requires a bourbon whiskey to be stored – JIM BEAM achieves its unusually smooth, pure flavor, often described as “the taste of maturity.”