Read my profile of Bourbons Bistro, as published in the current issue of Food & Dining Magazine.

In the past I've usually waited until the following quarterly issue of Food & Dining Magazine to publish the text of my most recent contribution, but these days our articles appear at the web site during the weeks following the magazine's release.

As such, here's the link to my profile of Bourbons Bistro, originally published in the Fall 2019 issue.

Profile — The Bourbons Bistro Legacy: Putting the Urban in Bourbon, by Roger Baylor (Food & Dining Magazine)

“Irish Hill is the Louisville neighborhood you find when you’re lost.”

It’s an old-time Louisville saying about a relatively small, richly historic patch of ground shoehorned between Baxter Avenue, Lexington Road and Beargrass Creek, and Eastern and Cave Hill Cemeteries.

On Irish Hill’s northeast side is Breslin Park, formerly the site of Louisville’s fortress-like City Workhouse, where minor offenders were incarcerated while they paid their debt to society through menial labor. Across Payne Street is a collection of imposing old brick warehouses known since the 1980s as Distillery Commons, used nowadays as offices, businesses and creative spaces.

Once this was National Distillers and Chemical Company’s Kentucky Distillery Warehouse & Bottling Plant. The mighty National Distillers owned some of the country’s most venerable bourbon brands, like Old Grand Dad, Old Crow, and Old Taylor, and by the 1940s it controlled 70% of the American market for bourbon and rye.

At its peak National Distillers had a work force of 1,400, most of whom lived within walking distance. Numerous families depended on these jobs, but consumer trends were unkind to the whiskey market and the plant closed in 1975.

“Headliners (a music venue) used to be the lunch hall for National Distillers, which was just down the street from us. I call it the UPS of the time; it was the economic engine for our neighborhood and others nearby, like Phoenix Hill and Clifton, even Butchertown.”

Meet Jason Brauner, who grew up in Irish Hill and was in knee pants when National Distillers was shuttered. Brauner’s great aunt and great uncle both worked there. So did business partner John Morrison’s father and grandmother.

Brauner and Morrison opened Bourbons Bistro in 2005. Call it cosmic, karmic or just a well-turned business plan, but their Frankfort Avenue refuge became an instant classic, primarily because Brauner and Morrison scanned the cluttered landscape of gimmicky bar and restaurant concepts, settling on a unifying principle so incredibly obvious as to be invisible: Bourbon.

LIVE TO EAT: Food & Dining (Vol. 65; Fall 2019) is on the street, so check out my profile of Bourbons Bistro.

I’ve been contributing quarterly beer columns to Food & Dining for most of the mag’s existence. The past few years publisher John Carlos White has guided me into longer-form pieces like the profile of Bourbons Bistro in the new issue, and as of July, I’ve had the title of digital editor, charged with creating short news items at the website.

Even better, Marty Rosen is now on board.

I’ve been writing for Food & Dining off and on since the first issue.

With this issue, I rejoin the magazine as editor.

From the beginning, publisher John Carlos White envisioned a magazine that would cover Louisville Metro’s vibrant culinary scene with outstanding literary and visual storytelling. F&D continues to do exactly that, and continues to thrive in an era that has not been easy for journalism.

In short, we have a fine team. Check out the latest and let me know what you think. Hard copies should be available in their usual locations (Pints&union will have a stack), and don't forget they're free.

Entire Issue

Comings & Goings

Bourbons Bistro

Pizza Lupo

The Manhattan Project

Stupid Food Trends

Renaissance on Whiskey Row

Easy Entertaining - Tailgating

Cooking With Ron - Apples

A tale of two binders: Bourbons Bistro and Rich O's Public House.

During the course of chatting with owners and crew at Bourbons Bistro for a forthcoming profile at Food & Dining Magazine, I asked to see the legendary bourbon binder. It dates back to the establishment's founding in 2005 and is filled with tasting notes compiled at the time (and perhaps since) by Michael Veach.

Of course this reminded me of the then-Rich O's Public House binders from the long-lost period of 1997-1998. 

Jason Brauner mentioned that few customers ask to view the binder these days, and speaking for myself, twenty years ago at the Public House publications like this proved impossible to keep updated, so I quit trying.

Perhaps the modern world has made these relics obsolete. If so, something has been lost.