New Riff was founded in 2014 and already has a massive following. All of its flagship bottlings – rye and bourbon – are bottled-in-bond and also bottled without chill filtration. This is a “high rye” Kentucky Straight bourbon with a mash bill of…
Blanton’s is a storied bourbon named after former distillery president Colonel Albert B. Blanton. The brand was created by legendary master distiller Elmer T. Lee in 1984 when he selected so-called “honey barrels” from Warehouse H and created (purportedly) the first single-barrel bourbon label. Obviously the idea of bottling bourbon from a single barrel was not a new concept at the time, but marketing a brand around the idea was…
My favorite retailer and all-around whiskey personality, David Driscoll, recently offered a package deal at Mission Liquor in Pasadena, California, to showcase New Riff’s flagship bottled-in-bond range … He suggested we do a comparative tasting to see how New Riff stacks up against the Biggest of Boys in the whiskey game: Buffalo Trace.
New Riff was founded in 2014 and already has a massive following. All of its flagship bottlings – rye and bourbon – are bottled-in-bond and also bottled without chill filtration. This rye is 100% rye (95% rye, 5% malted rye for enzymes), which is unusual although not unique. It’s aged for…
Sazerac is one of the industry workhorses, fueling many a bar’s rye-based cocktail menu. Normally that would be a mark against it, but Sazerac (distilled by Buffalo Trace) still manages to be one of the best quality-to-price options on the bloated rye whiskey shelf. Amazingly, it can still be found for…
Contradiction is a blend of the sourced bourbons, similar to those that go into Old Scout blended with the wheated bourbon made at Smooth Ambler’s distilling facility in West Virginia, which is what goes into Big Level. The sourced components are both straight bourbons: a high-rye (21%) MGP bourbon and a low-rye (8%) Tennessee-distilled bourbon (not a Tennessee whiskey!) from…
The rye is distilled from a mash bill of 65% rye, 15% corn, and 20% malted barley. This markedly high quantity of barley is intended to provide a softer, mellower rye than others available on the market. I do like that the mash bill information is on the bottle label. The rye is bottled at 50% ABV (100 proof) and is priced similarly to their…
Old Elk Blended Straight Bourbon is a blend of sourced straight bourbons, with the youngest aged 5 years. As for the mash bill, Old Elk is once again an outlier: A whopping 34% malted barley, 51% corn, and 15% rye. I’ve never seen that much barley used in a bourbon before. They say it makes the whiskey extra smooth. The bourbon is bottled at an acceptable…
Roknar is one of the products of Far North Spirits, a “Field to Glass” distillery in Hallock, Minnesota, near the Canadian border. This is a single-estate rye made from non-GMO “AC Hazlet” rye grown on the family farm, mashed with 10% heirloom corn and 10% malted barley, and hammer-milled, fermented, and double-distilled in small batches on-site. The whiskey is matured in…
So, I thought I was relatively safe to purchase this McKenzie Straight Rye after being impressed by their bottled-in-bond wheated bourbon. It’s a real distillery (not sourced), so you’re not at the whims of the local secondhand market for barrels that could suddenly go downhill, and the price is comparable. Lesson learned: rules of thumb are not infallible. I just…