Bring Back Wiser's Legacy
Before they head out to pasture, old whisky makers are known to tuck a few gems away for their successors to discover. So, rather than joining other pensioners at the early bird special, 85-year-old Canadian whisky legend John Philip Wiser would more likely be found at his Prescott Ontario distillery until he died on April 30, 1911. Not long before that sad day, we can imagine a senior J.P. putting quill to paper to record a whisky recipe to be his Legacy.
Following his death, Wiser’s distillery struggled, until his successors finally sold it to Corby Distillery in Corbyville. When Corby closed and demolished Wiser’s distillery, that final whisky vanished, leaving Wiser’s legacy unrealized. As fate would have it, the Wiser name lived on through whiskies now made at the Hiram Walker Distillery in Windsor Ontario.
In the fall of 2010, a hundred years after Wiser’s death, a new whisky hit shelves. Bottled in what has become Wiser’s trademark, heavy, square premium bottle, it bore a bright blue label and the name Wiser’s Legacy. As this new release snaked along the bottling line, Hiram Walker star master blender David Doyle passed the blending torch to a young Dr Don Livermore. Three years earlier, Doyle had celebrated the 150th anniversary of J.P. Wiser’s distillery by releasing Red Letter, a whisky based on another original Wiser recipe. Red Letter had been a best seller for Wiser, and Doyle’s expression too, was much sought after. Now it was Legacy’s turn. J. P.’s folkloric recipe finally went into production, though with a modern twist.
“The recipe was based off work I was doing for my PhD,” remembers Livermore. “It was the first time we had brought in new barrels to our distillery. We were so impressed on the flavour and aroma of new wood in Canadian whisky, we used it as one of the components for Legacy.” To develop Legacy’s deep and rich spice, both unmalted and malted rye were distilled in the same copper pot still that makes Lot No. 40 today. Legacy was matured in toasted oak then proofed down to a sturdy 45% alcohol.
The 2010 Legacy was a rich whisky with very clear rye bread notes punctuated by cloves, cinnamon and other baking spices. Dark sweet fruits carved through the spice with razor-sharp citrus zest. Fresh lumber balanced the blend while herbal dill accented complex hot spices in the finish. It was a masterpiece, and when it was gone, it was sorely missed.
That is until Dr Livermore did what doctor’s do best and wrote a prescription, well a recipe, actually. Now you can create your own version of Legacy using available whiskies. Livermore suggests blending one part Lot No. 40 with two parts J.P. Wiser’s 15 Year Old. “It’s currently the closest permanent released brands that we have to the JPW Legacy recipe. It’s not the exact recipe, but fairly close,” explains Livermore. Putting the recipe to the test, you quickly discover he is right. Although it is the same big luscious Legacy of yore, and the palate is very much in the same wheelhouse, the nose of the homemade version feels a bit restrained in its hard rye and savoury dill notes.
With so many new, super-deluxe whiskies available, it surprises Livermore to learn that Legacy is still climbing the charts of whisky collectors, and his reaction to the news is humble. “I suppose the higher rye profile is trending and in line with consumer palates today and scarcity – people always want what they can't have, especially as whisky collecting is becoming more popular,” says Livermore. But let’s be honest, many of these whisky lovers had turned their noses up at Canadian whisky until very recently. And Legacy embodies everything they had missed out on.
Bryan Vanderkruk, a co-founder of the Toronto Whisky Society, prefers to sip his whisky rather than collect it. So with his own stocks of Legacy extinct, blending a home version was very appealing. “The idea arose from Dr Don mentioning it in his distillery blending classes and in masterclasses. When people asked about where they could get more Legacy, he would tell them how to get something akin to it,” says Vanderkruk. “I heard about it a few times and finally decided to give it a try, after first texting Dr Don for some additional tips.”
But, instead of going down the path toward a conventional 45% Legacy, Vanderkruk went whole hog on a cask strength version. “I asked Dr Don if he had recommendations for anything more accurate. He mentioned that the true blend would be Lot 40 and Red Letter rather than the core age-stated J.P. Wiser's releases, and while I'm not one of the fortunate few to still have Red Letter on their shelf, I did have a cask strength barrel sample of it from a few years back, along with some Lot 40 Cask Strength. The idea for a cask strength version of Legacy really arose from having the right ingredients readily available.”
With Vanderkruk’s palate sprinting faster than a blood doping Olympian, he thought, "Let's get people demanding not just Legacy, back on shelves, but a cask strength version. And then follow through by creating hype behind that idea. So this is me, throwing down the gauntlet, saying it's a great whisky idea: #ReleaseLegacyCaskStrength.” This year also marks another hashtag moment, it’s J.P. Wiser’s 175th birthday. To celebrate, we can guess what John Philip Wiser would wish for as the last birthday cake candle was reduced to smoke: If not a cask strength version then pretty please, with sugar on top, bring back Wiser’s Legacy.