As a pitmaster and restaurateur, Carey Bringle continues to excel with his three operations: Gulch stalwart Peg Leg Porker, Bringle’s Smoking Oasis in the Nations and Pig Star at the airport. That would be enough achievement for most mortals, but Bringle is seeking to build a multigenerational business empire.
That’s a big reason behind why he decided to diversify into the spirits industry with Peg Leg Porker Spirits. His three flagship bourbons aged from 4 to 12 years each won Gold or Double Gold awards at the recent San Francisco World Spirits Competition, adding to the long list of accolades that Bringle’s whiskeys have received through the years.
His latest release may not win as many awards, mainly because there won’t be enough bottles to sacrifice to various judging panels. Bringle has recently bottled the second edition of his Pitmaster Reserve Series, and the very limited quantity is on its way to select distributors as well as the shelves of his tasting room at 2700 Eugenia Ave. in Berry Hill.
Why is this such a big deal? Well, the first release of Pitmaster Reserve in 2020 was the 15-year-old Peg Leg Porker Tennessee Straight Bourbon Whiskey, and the 2,500 bottles Bringle had to sell were gone almost immediately, even with a premium retail price. Another metric of the success of a limited release is, unfortunately, how it is received in the secondary market.
The first Pitmaster Reserve appeared in the gray market at prices higher than $1,000 per bottle, and is still listed in some corners of the internet for close to $750 a pop. So yeah, people really like that bottle.
Now get ready for round two: a 15-year-old Canadian rye whiskey that has spent time in two different barrels to allow the double-oak to permeate the spirit even more aggressively. The second edition of Pitmaster Reserve features a bronze pig bottle topper and a luxurious presentation box. It will retail at around $400 per bottle, and he has a few hundred more bottles to release than the first Pitmaster Reserve. It’ll still be scarce.
I haven’t sampled it out of the second barrel yet (see the aforementioned $400 a bottle price) but I did taste the liquid five years ago when it was getting ready to enter its second home. I remember it being a pretty remarkable rye, an exemplar of the Canadian style that is traditionally softer and more rounded than spicy American rye.
If you do decide to run over to Eugenia and pick up a bottle, I’d be happy to offer my professional opinion of how it aged over the past half of a decade. Y’know, as a public service …
