Any time there's a new addition to the Beam lineup, I get a little excited—not necessarily because of what's in the bottle, but because it serves as a reminder of where my bourbon journey started.

Finding Eagle Rare at or near MSRP used to be a no-brainer for me. At one point, I may or may not have had a closet full of the stuff. It was my tried-and-true daily drinker when I first moved to Washington, D.C.