TL;DR

Heaven Hill's second Grain to Glass rye is a six-year, barrel-proof (105.2) Kentucky straight rye built on a higher-rye mashbill and a single corn varietal grown on one Kentucky farm, and it runs about $100. I gave it 8.5 overall and 6.4 on value. It took a close second in my four-rye blind, a hair behind a $275 Wild Turkey and the best value of that flight, and it won Best American Rye at the 2025 World Whiskies Awards. It is easy to find and it rewards drinking on its own. If you are more of a rye drinker than I am, you may rate it even higher.

Quality Score - 8.5

Excellent - Really quite exceptional.

Value Score - 6.4

Good Value - Priced right, with a little left in your pocket.

Nose - 8.0

Mint and anise, with an underlying sweetness of caramel.

Palate - 8.6

Old barrel dust, a touch of vanilla, oak, and orange pulp, with grass and hay underneath and the barest hint of mint. Big complexity, though the ethanol pushes through and keeps it from feeling fully settled.

Finish - 8.2

The sweetness carries through, with a nice lingering spice and orange zest.

Neck Pour

November 23, 2025

A classic rye through and through, and at the time I meant that as a compliment.

I bought this on the drive home for Thanksgiving, in the middle of a bigger bourbon hunt than I should admit to. New job, some money to burn, and it shows up in a few of my other reviews from that stretch. I was happy with the haul. We did a little tasting with the family that night, and this went in the lineup next to a JD Heritage, a Woodford Double Oak, the Elijah Craig Toasted Rye, and a couple of others I have since lost track of. I opened the Grain to Glass and thought: classic rye, start to finish. I was trying to explore ryes then, so I did not mind that one bit. I liked it well enough. It did not blow me away. There was a drying thing on the palate, almost dusty hay. It was interesting, but it was a loud, happy Thanksgiving night, and it never grabbed me the way the JD Heritage did on my first pour of that one. I have cooled on toasted finishes since, and on that bottle a little too, though it holds up better than most because Jack put the spirit in toasted barrels from the start instead of finishing it late. All of which is to say the Grain to Glass reads like the better pour to me now, and the score follows.

Blind Pour

July 26, 2026

Blind, it was the most classic rye on the table, and I still liked it a lot.

See my full post: Fourth Rye Blind

I put it in a four-rye blind against the Elijah Craig Toasted, a Woodinville 8 Year, and the Wild Turkey Master's Keep Triumph. Sample one turned out to be this bottle. I got cherry, some anise, a little grass, caramel underneath, and a sweetness that hung around on the finish. I liked it enough that I nearly called it the Wild Turkey. I landed on 8.4 and guessed right that it was the Heaven Hill, because it tasted the most like a rye of the four. It finished second by three tenths, a hair behind a Triumph that costs almost three times as much, and it was easily the best value of the night.

Open Pour

July 28, 2026

On its own, months later, it is more than I remembered.

Coming back to this by itself, well after that first neck pour, it is better than I had it filed in my head. I honestly cannot tell you why. Maybe my palate has moved after all the whiskey I have gone through since. Maybe the bottle opened up. Maybe both. That uncertainty is the whole reason I taste in stages, and this is a clean example of it. The nose is caramel sweetness with some mint and anise over the top. The palate reads old barrel dust, a touch of vanilla, oak, citrus that comes off more like orange pulp, grass and hay, and maybe the barest bit of mint. The anise I got blind is not as loud when it is on its own. There is real complexity here. It is also a little unbalanced, with the ethanol pushing through harder than I would like. It is still not the grassy rye it started as. It makes me want to go grab the rest of the Grain to Glass lineup and see what else they are doing.

The one hitch is the price. At $100 it is getting into the range where I get picky, and I would probably chase a little more for the money before I rebought this one. That is on me and my shelf, not a knock on the pour. It is a fair price for what it is, it won Best American Rye at the 2025 World Whiskies Awards, and if you are more of a rye drinker than I am, you may land even higher on it than my 8.5.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com. Not sponsored, not gifted, bought myself at retail. Please drink responsibly.

I have a hunch about myself that I have carried for a while. The ryes I like best are the ones that do not taste much like rye. I could not tell you when that started. It has just been sitting in the back of my head, unproven. Tonight it gets tested.

Because here is the other thing: I am not really a rye guy. These four are every rye on my shelf right now, so this is less a curated bracket and more everything I own poured into four glasses. When I drank a lot of rye it was for cocktails, Manhattans mostly, and for that I still reach for Rittenhouse, Old Forester Rye, or Bulleit. I rarely buy rye to sip anymore, which is how you end up with a tasting this eclectic.

The four: Elijah Craig Toasted Rye, a Heaven Hill Grain to Glass rye, a Woodinville 8 year, and the Wild Turkey Master's Keep Triumph. On paper they scatter in every direction. Elijah Craig has no age statement and sits lowest at 94 proof and about $55. The Grain to Glass is six years, barrel proof at 105.2, around $100. The Woodinville is eight years, 100 proof, about $130. The Triumph is ten years, 104 proof, and it is the oldest age-stated rye Wild Turkey has ever put out. It also carries a $275 sticker, and I paid $350 for mine. More on that later.

Two of the four are Heaven Hill, and they are nothing alike. One is the Toasted Rye, the other is the Grain to Glass, and they split completely by the finish. I like the Grain to Glass story. The grain-first idea is Heaven Hill taking more control of what goes in the bottle, a higher rye mashbill and Chinquapin oak instead of the usual barrel. Good story.

I also come in with memories. I expect the Woodinville to be the oaky one. I expect the Wild Turkey to not taste like a rye at all. The Grain to Glass I remember as one thing, super grassy. The real question tonight is whether any of that holds once the labels come off, and whether that hunch about not-quite-rye ryes proves out.

Four ryes, blind — by the numbers

• Elijah Craig Toasted Rye — Heaven Hill, KY Straight Rye, NAS, 94 proof (47%), 51/35/14 rye/corn/malt, $55. WWA 2026 Best Rye.
• Heaven Hill Grain to Glass Rye — Heaven Hill, KY Straight Rye, 6 yr, 105.2 proof (52.6%), 63/24/13 rye/corn/malt, $100. WWA 2025 Best Rye.
• Woodinville Straight 100% Rye — Woodinville, Straight Rye (WA), 8 yr, 100 proof (50%), 100% rye, $130. Bold & Tannic.
• Wild Turkey Master's Keep Triumph — Wild Turkey, KY Straight Rye, 10 yr, 104 proof (52%), ~51/37/12 rye/corn/malt, $275. Oldest WT Rye.

The Setup

Four coded samples in front of me, one through four. I know the four bottles on the table. I do not know which pour is in which glass. Fair warning, I just got back from my friend Jake's, where we did a lot of tasting, so I am hoping I am still calibrated from the night before. I taste them out of order and keep circling back, on purpose, so no single pour gets judged only against the one before it.

Sample One

Lots of cherry on the nose, some anise, a little grass, caramel underneath. The palate follows the nose but softer, not as intense as the nose promised. Really pleasant. There is a nice sweetness that lingers on the finish, a little licorice, that anise coming back through. I like this one a lot. Honestly I was tempted to call it the Wild Turkey, it is that enjoyable and that well put together. The anise note is what steered me off, so I am landing on a rye in the more classic sense. If it turns out to be the Heaven Hill, I am surprised, because grassy is not the word for this.

Sample Two

The nose is toasted. Brown marshmallow and vanilla. It is sweet, with a nice enough palate and finish, but mild for a rye. On the second pass it turns grassier than I first thought, and a little less balanced than I want. This one reads like the lowest proof on the table.

Sample Three

Dark cherry bomb on the nose, with something medicinal sitting behind it, almost varnish. Then the oak arrives. Fierce, unmistakable oak, like chewing on a railroad tie, a creosote quality I cannot get past. Oily and thick in the mouth. There is a chocolate cherry buried in here if you can fight through the wood, but I can't. This is not one for me, and I am almost certain it is the Woodinville.

Sample Four

Light, bright, kind of complex. Strangely, I struggle to pin specific notes to it, though by sample four that might just be me. Honey, some dark fruit, caramel. It smells the least like a rye of anything on the table. If I did not know better I would not call it a rye at all, it drinks closer to a bourbon. Then the palate, and the layers come together in a way I have not had before. It is just really well made. Maybe the lighter proof helps it read this balanced.

The Debate

The two standouts are one and four, and I keep going back and forth between them. One reads like a rye. Four does not, and that might be exactly why I like it. Four has balance and complexity while staying light and playful, without tasting young. One is right there, leaning more classic. What separates them is preference, not quality. Both are very well made, and on a different night I could flip the order.

The Rankings

I still have to score them. Sample four takes it, on preference. It is sweeter, and it feels like the most complete pour of the night. It does not quite reach a nine. I am not reaching for it constantly, and it stays a touch light on flavor even when that flavor is perfectly balanced. Four gets an 8.7. One is right behind at 8.4. Two is fine and forgettable at 6.0. Three, the oak monster, gets a 2.7.

The Guesses

Before the reveal, my calls. Sample one I think is the Heaven Hill, purely because it tastes the most like a rye. Two I think is the Elijah Craig Toasted, with that toasted sweetness and the low proof. Three has to be the Woodinville, because nothing else here is that oaky. Four I think is the Wild Turkey, because it tastes nothing like a rye, and that is what I remember about the Triumph.

The Reveal

Sample one is the Heaven Hill Grain to Glass. Sample two is the Elijah Craig Toasted Rye. Sample three is the Woodinville. Sample four is the Wild Turkey Master's Keep Triumph.

Four for four. Not much of a challenge with bottles this different, but I have been fooled before, so I will take it.

The Verdicts

The Wild Turkey wins. Now the price, because it is the whole conversation with this bottle. It runs $275 at the shelf, and I paid $350 for mine. It won the blind by three tenths of a point over a rye that costs a third as much, so on paper there is no version of this where the money makes sense. But this was never a rational purchase. I bought the Triumph for my wedding day and drank it with the people I love most in the world, and no scorecard captures that. For a rye it is genuinely good, and I will open it again every anniversary. The rest of the year I have a cheaper answer. It is the same math I keep running into, most recently with a Blanton's that won its blind and still lives on the shelf.

I also have to give Wild Turkey credit for the thing that fooled me. Making a straight rye that drinks like a bourbon is frankly impressive, unlike anything I have run into in whiskey. That craft alone earns it a taste if you get the chance.

That cheaper answer is the Grain to Glass. It came within a hair of winning, it runs about a hundred dollars, and you can actually find it. One caveat: there are different batches of this out there, and this is the only one I have had, so far. On this batch, the grain-first approach shows, and I like both the idea and the pour. If you want most of what the Triumph gives without the wedding-bottle price, start here.

The Elijah Craig Toasted was named the best rye in America at this year's World Whiskies Awards, and in my glasses it landed in the middle. Pleasant, easy, a little forgettable. I have also drifted away from toasted finishes lately, they do not do for me what they once did. No knock on the bottle. It just did not move me tonight.

The Woodinville is the one that stings, because I wanted to love it. I saw it in stock driving through Spokane and spent a solid thirty minutes wandering the store trying to track the bottle down. I actually left with my other purchases, checked online to confirm it was still in stock, and walked back in to hunt again. I wanted this one badly. And it is too much for me. So tannic and oaky it reads like creosote, all railroad tie and no room for anything else to breathe. I do not think it is a bad whiskey, and I do not think it is trying to be a normal rye. Someone picked these barrels to push hard and keep aging, and if huge, bold oak is your thing, you may love exactly what I could not stand.

So there it is, no longer a hunch. The rye I loved most barely drank like a rye, and the most aggressively rye one finished last. That preference I have carried around for years is confirmed, at least for my palate. Do with that what you will.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com Not sponsored, not gifted, bought myself at retail.

TL;DR

Blanton's Straight From The Barrel is the uncut, full-proof version of Blanton's, a no age statement Kentucky straight bourbon off Buffalo Trace's high-rye mash bill. My bottle is barrel 378 from Warehouse H, dumped in early 2023 at 127.6 proof. It was my PhD graduation gift, and I owe that to my brother, who talked our parents into going in fifty fifty with him on it. Huge thanks, it means a lot. It scored a 9.3 and won its blind against a Found North Snow Day and an Elijah Craig private pick, barely. This is simple Kentucky bourbon, maxed out. Honey, vanilla, caramel, and a rush of cinnamon, all clean and none of it funky. The nose is the weak point, which is backwards for a Buffalo Trace bottle. It is one of my all time favorites and still a hard bottle to call a value. At $165 it is a special occasion pour, not a regular buy, and secondary pricing is not worth it.

Quality Score — 9.3

Incredible - An all time favorite.

Value Score — 5.8

Fair - You get exactly what you pay for. No bargain, no regret.

Nose — 7.5

Heavy ethanol, not surprising at this proof. Confectioner's sugar and vanilla underneath. Light, and the weakest part.

Palate — 9.2

Honey, fruity caramel apple, and a touch of grape. The least grape of any Buffalo Trace I have had.

Finish — 9.5

A rush of cinnamon. Extra long, clean, well rounded.

Neck Pour

July 2025

>I cracked this to celebrate a new job, and it flattened me.

This bottle was a gift from my family for finishing my PhD. Barrel 378, Warehouse H, 127.6 proof. A great gift. I saved it, and when a new job came through I finally pulled the cork.

It blew me away out of the gate. A crazy long finish, honey and vanilla and caramel with cinnamon, all of it pushed to the max. Everything you picture when you think classic Kentucky bourbon, turned all the way up.

The thing I remember most is the heat. It was hot. I was genuinely surprised how hot this bourbon was, and looking back that is partly on me. I was not drinking as much whiskey then, and I had not put anything close to 127.6 proof in front of myself before. It was new and it was fun. It has mellowed since, or I have. Probably both.

Mostly I remember the couch, a new job, and a pour that fit the moment. This one will always take me back.

Blind Pour

July 12, 2026

>Labels off, it won. Barely, and against a Canadian whisky I would have sworn was the Kentucky one.

The full night lives in Blind in the 9+ Club. Three pours I had quietly filed as 9+ bottles, poured blind. Blanton's was sample two, up against a Found North Snow Day and an Elijah Craig Barrel Proof private pick.

It won. By a tenth of a point, but it won. What got me is what I called it. I had the Blanton's and the Snow Day backwards. Something in the Blanton's read Canadian to me, and the Canadian read like the Kentucky legend. That says more about how good Found North's blenders are than anything else.

The part I want to address: someone on Reddit read my comments during the blind and guessed the Blanton's sample would land third, going off how little I had to say about it. I get why. Buffalo Trace, and Blanton's especially, is simple. It does not give me long tangled notes or wild analogies. There is not much to pull apart. What it does, it does about as well as anyone, and that is hard to write up, because I am not going to inflate the notes to make it sound more layered than it is. It is not layered. It is clean, classic bourbon done at the top of the game.

The best comparison I have is a cooking show. One cook comes out and tries ten things at once, stretches too thin, and loses the judges. The other nails the fundamentals, plates something simple and perfect, and wins. Blanton's is the second cook. It reads plain on paper and it still took the night.

Open Pour

July 26, 2026

>Simple bourbon turned up to eleven, and other than the nose I never would have guessed the proof.

Months in, this is one of the cleanest bourbons I own. Extremely clean, the whole way through. If you are looking for funk, you will not find it here.

The nose is the weak part, which is backwards for me and Buffalo Trace. Usually I love the nose off their bottles and then get let down by the rest. Here it is flipped. There is a lot of ethanol on the nose, no way around it at 127.6 proof, and under it some sweet confectioner's sugar and vanilla. It is light, and it is the least of the three parts.

Everything after the nose is where it earns the score. Great honey on the palate, fruity caramel apple, and just a touch of the grape note I get from almost everything Buffalo Trace makes. This is the least grape I have found in any of their bourbons, and I do not know what that is about. The finish is a straight rush of cinnamon, and it closes the whole thing out clean.

Other than the nose, I would not have guessed the proof. I would have said 120 at most. It drinks well under its 127.6.

Now the money. This isn't a bargain, and the 5.8 says so — fair for what it is, no more. But if I found it on a shelf at $165 I would buy it. Not every day, but every once in a while, and definitely if I ever ran out. It lives in the special occasion range. Do not chase it on secondary. Like most of what I recommend, secondary is almost never worth it, and the hype far outruns the bottle.

This one is personal. A graduation gift, a new job, a lot of good memories in the glass. I am very happy with where it landed, and very happy it won its blind. Simple bourbon, done about as well as it gets.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com Not sponsored, not gifted, bought myself at retail.

TL;DR

Found North Snow Day is a 10 year Canadian whisky that drinks like Christmas in a glass, and it earns a 9.2. It is a sourced and blended whisky, port finished, built from old rye and corn stock with some barrels past 20 years old. I put it up blind against a Blanton's Straight From The Barrel and an Elijah Craig Barrel Proof private pick, and it hung with both. At a $110 MSRP it is not cheap, so the value lands at a 4.1, but I am buying every Found North release from here on out anyway. It is mailing list only and it sells out, so the real move is getting on the list before the next one.

Quality Score - 9.2

Incredible - An all time favorite

Value Score - 4.1 Edit** 6.9

Poor Value - I'm complaining about price Priced right, with a little left in your pocket.

Nose - 9.0

Strong vanilla and brown sugar, maybe a little molasses. It smells like a Snickerdoodle in whiskey form. Black cherry and red berry sit underneath once you go looking for them.

Palate - 9.5

An explosion of cardamom, clove, cinnamon, and nutmeg, with enough caramel and brown sugar to hold it all together. Black cherry and red berry underneath. The texture is thick and creamy, one of the most viscous pours I own.

Finish - 8.5

Long, and longer than I first gave it credit for. Dried fruit and clove, a little earthy, mulling over the spices. Surprisingly little rye bite for a mash bill this heavy on rye.

Neck Pour

December 20, 2025

"The most Christmas whiskey I have ever poured, and I mean that as the highest compliment."

I cracked this on December 20th, right before Christmas, and it flattened me with how well it fit the season. Sweet, loaded with baking spice, the most sugar cookie of a whiskey I have had. More like a Snickerdoodle than a sugar cookie if I am splitting hairs. The nose is strong vanilla and brown sugar with maybe a little molasses. The palate is an explosion of cardamom, clove, cinnamon, and nutmeg, with plenty of caramel and brown sugar to balance it, and a bright thread of orange peel running through it. The texture is really viscous. The finish is a little earthy, just mulling over all those spices, lots to chew on. If I am being honest it runs a touch short, but it is really, really well balanced. Superb from the first pour.

Blind Pour

July 12, 2026

"Blind, my palate reached for this Canadian whisky when it went hunting for the Kentucky legend."

I put Snow Day up blind against a Blanton's Straight From The Barrel and an Elijah Craig Barrel Proof private pick, all three in what I quietly call my 9+ club. Labels off. Snow Day came in as sample one, the most viscous pour of the night by a good margin, and the nose I kept going back to. I scored it a 9.2 that night, a hair behind the Blanton's.

Here is the part that still gets me. When I guessed, I called this one the Blanton's and the Blanton's the Snow Day. Something in the Canadian read like the Kentucky icon to me. That is how good the blenders at Found North are. The full night is written up in Blind in the 9+ Club.

Open Pour

July 18, 2026

"A few days alone with it in a Glencairn only made the case stronger."

This is less than a week after the blind, digging in with a Glencairn. Black cherry and red berry come up underneath everything I already listed. It is really creamy, a genuinely great mouthfeel. The finish is longer than I gave it credit for on blind night. I think I was a little biased scoring it right next to the Blanton's Straight From The Barrel. It is long, with lots of dried fruit and clove, and surprisingly little rye spice for a mash bill I have pegged around 47% rye. The final mash bill I work from is 50% corn, 47% rye, 3% malted barley, and that is derived, because this is a sourced and blended whiskey.

One honest change since I first opened it. The bright notes have faded. The bottle is maybe two thirds gone now, and that orange peel and citrus lift I got on the neck pour has largely left. It was a minor note to begin with, so not much has really changed, and this is still an absolutely delicious pour.

This bottle shows how good a blender can be, and how far these non distilling producers have come. I do not know much about the Found North process. I know they say it is aged at high altitude, and I know some of the barrels in here ran past 22 years old. I have not delved far into Canadian whisky or compared it side by side, so I am genuinely curious how much the colder climate changes things. I would have expected a lot more tannin out of something with this much age on it. The age statement is only 10 years, but the older stock is not throwing the heavy tannin I would pull from a high aged Kentucky pour. It stays sweet. To me that is a real plus, and it has me wanting to understand Canadian maturation a lot better.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com Not sponsored, not gifted, bought myself at retail.

TL;DR

A 9-year Elijah Craig Barrel Proof single-barrel pick, a Montana store selection at 119.7 proof. It won my pre-wedding tasting and beat the ECBP batch A125 I had going, then got humbled in a blind against a Found North Snow Day and a Blanton's Straight From The Barrel, where its imbalance stood out next to two more composed pours. The finish is what saves it. Scores 8.2 for quality. The single-barrel premium is about fifteen dollars over the standard release, still a bit much but acceptable here. Available, and a shelfer at the price. If you want the safer buy, the standard release does most of what this does.

Quality Score - 8.2

Excellent - Really quite exceptional

Value Score - 5.8

Baseline Value - MSRP is spot on

Nose - 8.0

Hot. It is almost 60 percent, so some of that is just proof, but there is also a sharp cinnamon running through it. Under that sits the classic Heaven Hill note, roasted and malty, with a hint of chocolate and plenty of vanilla.

Palate - 7.4

A lot going on, some good and some not, and it never fully comes together. There is sweetness and baking spice, but also an earthy streak. The vanilla and cinnamon carry over from the nose, joined by oak char and a hint of black pepper.

Finish - 8.5

What rescues the pour. Rich caramel, long, and it is what pulls this out of merely great and into excellent. It runs hot and a little tannic, but I forgive it for the caramel.

Neck Pour

March 27, 2026

The night before my wedding, this was the pour I kept coming back to.

The night before the wedding I set up a small tasting for everyone: Jack Daniel's Heritage Barrel, Booker's, Eagle Rare, and this. Good company. Any of them could have carried the night. But of the four, this was the one I kept going back to, and by the end of the flight it was not close.

So I pushed it further. I had an open bottle of the ECBP batch A125 I had been working through and genuinely enjoying, and I poured the two side by side. This barrel outran it. Rounder, fuller, less of the sharp edge that A125 carries. That was the moment I decided I liked this pick enough that I did not need to hold onto the A125 anymore. I gave it to my brother. On the eve of the wedding, with everything else going on, this was the bottle that earned the attention. That is a good sign for any pour.

Blind Pour

July 24, 2026

I thought this one could hang with anything. Blind, it came in third, and I could not get past the imbalance, though it was up against some monster bottles. Full Blind Review Here

I had quietly filed three bottles in what I call the 9+ club, pours I reach for and rate highly in my head but had never actually put side by side. This was one of them. So I did the honest thing and blinded it against the other two, a Found North Snow Day and a Blanton's Straight From The Barrel. Labels off, three coded glasses, one night. Full write-up here: Blind in the 9+ Club.

This came up as sample three. Dusty oak on the nose, like walking into an old retired bread factory with funk of malt and grain that I could not pull apart. On another night I might have loved exactly that. This night it was too much. I wanted one pour of it and no more, and I noticed I finished the other two glasses first while I sat with it.

I still scored it an 8.2 blind, which means it held (barely) onto excellent, but next to the composure of the Snow Day and the Blanton's it fell to third and out of incredibel. And here is the part that stung. I knew it was the Elijah Craig from the first nose. The funk gave it away. I went in thinking this one could be up at the top, and blind, stripped of the label and the story, the imbalance was the thing I could not get over. That is exactly why I blind everything. The glass does not care what I expected.

Open Pour

July 28, 2026

The palate never quite comes together, but the finish is rich enough to pull the whole pour into excellent.

A word on what this actually is, because the label does a lot of work. Standard Elijah Craig Barrel Proof is a 9 to 12 year small batch, uncut and straight from the barrel, that Heaven Hill puts out three times a year with the proof swinging from batch to batch. This is the single-barrel expression of that same line. In another world this barrel might have been dumped into the next batch instead of bottled on its own. Its 9 years is about the same age statement the more recent releases have carried, and it is the same 78% corn Heaven Hill bourbon underneath. So the question is not whether Elijah Craig can make great whiskey. It is whether pulling one barrel out and charging extra for it earns the premium.

The standard release runs $75, already slightly steep, and this barrel was $90. Fifteen dollars over for a single barrel is still asking a bit much. I have said elsewhere that most single-barrel premiums are far too much, and I mean far too much. The worst I have seen is Still Austin Cask Strength, where the same store on the same day had the standard at $70 and the single barrel at $120. That is insane, a fifty dollar tax for the words single barrel on the label. Against that, fifteen dollars is acceptable, and in this case I think the barrel was good enough to justify it. That still lands the value around average on my scale. But I nudged it up for one reason: availability. This expression is everywhere and always for a reasonable price. You can find it, and being able to actually buy the thing counts for something.

One note for anyone newer to this. Elijah Craig Barrel Proof has been doing excellent work for a long time, and I would not let the whiskey-geek counterculture talk you out of it. You hear that it will never be C923, or that they make these too young now and the run is over. Yes, this is only 9 years, four short of C923. But across four or five years of batch releases plus single barrels like this one, this is an outstanding production run, and the doom about it being finished is overblown. Don't let the guy who's always talking about the fish that got away convince you the one in your cooler isn't impressive. Would I like to try a 13-year version. Of course I would. But this is damn good, it is on the shelf, and I can go buy another one tomorrow. I cannot wait for more.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com. Not sponsored, not gifted, bought myself at retail.

I've had these three in what I quietly call the 9+ club for a while now. Bottles I reach for, rate highly in my head, and have never actually reviewed or put side by side. So I'm fixing that the only honest way I know how. Labels off, three glasses, one night.

The lineup: a Found North Snow Day, a Blanton's Straight From The Barrel, and an Elijah Craig Barrel Proof private barrel. Snow Day is Found North's First Flurry, a 10 year Canadian whisky that badly undersells itself. The age statement says 10, but it is a blend of old rye and old corn stock with components running well past 20 years, married together and finished in port casks. It went out to mailing list subscribers last Christmas at $120 with a two bottle option, and I should have taken the second bottle. The Blanton's is Straight From The Barrel, barrel 378 out of Warehouse H, dumped in early 2023 at 127.6 proof. It is the export only bottle a lot of people call the pinnacle of Buffalo Trace short of Pappy 15, and it is also the most hyped and most expensive thing on the table. The Elijah Craig is a 9 year single barrel private pick at 119.7 proof, a Montana store selection, and it was a clear step up from A125, the last big batch I had from this line. Rounder, less of the harshness. I would have blinded those two head to head, but I gave my A125 away to my brother once I decided I liked this barrel more.

All three have been open four to eight months and are sitting around half full, so they are well past any bottle shock. The proofs are all within shouting distance, 115 to 128. This should be a fair fight.

The Setup

Three coded samples in front of me, one through three. I know the three bottles on the table. I do not know which pour is in which glass.

Sample One

Strong vanilla up front with an earthy undertone running beneath it. Honey and brown sugar. This one is balanced in a way that pulls me in immediately. The finish is long, and it opens into cardamom, clove, and cinnamon that keep going. And the mouthfeel. This is the most viscous pour of the three by a good margin, the kind of weight that coats the glass and your tongue. There is fruit in here too, pear or maybe peach. Of the three noses, this is the one I keep going back to.

Sample Two

Lighter, with more ethanol on it, but not in a burning way. It reads more like corn sweetness than heat. There is not much beyond that on the nose. The flavor, though, is great. Good oak, still on the sweet side, but there is a clean, strong cinnamon finish that pushes the sweetness aside and lingers. Real length here. The mouthfeel is not close to sample one, and that is the one thing holding it back tonight.

Sample Three

Dusty oak on the nose, like walking into an old retired bread factory. Something tells me this is not the oldest whiskey on the table, despite how it smells. It is not as rounded as the other two. What it does have is funk, great tangled notes of malt and grain that I cannot pull apart, in the best possible way. But tonight it is a little too much of that funk. I want one pour of it and no more. I notice I finish the other two glasses first while I write this.

The Rankings

All three are distinct enough that on a different night, in different weather, in a different mood, I could reach for any of them and be happy. That is worth saying before I rank them, because none of these is a loser.

But I have to score them. Sample two edges in front of sample one. There is something darker in there resonating with me tonight. It is close, close enough that on another night I flip a coin and it lands the other way. Sample two gets a 9.3. Sample one gets a 9.2. Sample three fell behind, and tonight it is just barely holding onto the excellent rating. It gets an 8.2. That is still a monster score.

The Reveal

Sample one is the Found North Snow Day. Sample two is the Blanton's Straight From The Barrel. Sample three is the Elijah Craig.

Wow. What a finish.

If I had to guess which was which, I would have had it backwards. I would have called sample one the Blanton's and sample two the Snow Day. Something in the Blanton's read like Canadian whisky to me, and the Snow Day read like the Kentucky icon. That says everything about how good the blenders at Found North are, that their Canadian whisky is what my palate reached for when I went hunting for the Kentucky legend. Hats off to them. Sample three I knew. That was the Elijah Craig from the first nose. The funk gave it away.

The Verdicts

A high score does not automatically mean buy, so here is where the money comes in.

Start with the Blanton's, tonight's blind winner. It won, but barely, over a whiskey that costs a fraction of it. The premium this bottle commands is far too much to make it a regular purchase. It is good. It is not worth secondary money. At MSRP it is a stretch, but it is a genuinely cool bottle to have on the shelf, so I would buy it once, maybe twice, and leave it there. Winning the blind by a tenth of a point does not change that math. It is the same lesson I learned with allocated Buffalo Trace bottles.

The Elijah Craig. Once again, I am not sure single barrel private picks are worth the markup. This one ran about fifteen dollars over the standard release, and yes, it was better than A125. But better by enough to justify hunting down a specific barrel and paying up for it? That is a tough sell for me. The standard release does most of what this does. I gave it the full Open Pour treatment here.

And the winner. Snow Day is worth every penny. It is not a screaming value the way a sub thirty dollar shelf bourbon is, nobody calls a $120 bottle a bargain. But it earns its price, and I will be first in line for the next release. I should have bought two.

Three bottles I had quietly filed in the 9+ club, and two out of three earned the spot. A Canadian blend that outdrinks its label and a Kentucky icon that is better on the shelf than on the receipt. But I would reach for any of them. Just know what you are paying for.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com Not sponsored, not gifted, bought myself at retail.

TL;DR

E.H. Taylor Small Batch is a bottled-in-bond Kentucky straight bourbon from Buffalo Trace, 100 proof, no age statement, made on the low-rye Mash Bill #1. It scored a 6.5 for quality. In my Blind Loyalty tasting it landed a blind 7.3 and second of three, but living with the open bottle settled it lower on preference. I paid $100 for it because that is what allocation does to you, but the value problem runs deeper than my bad luck at the register. Even at its roughly $50 MSRP this is only a 4.5. It is a solid, sweet, easy bourbon. I find it underwhelming, though plenty of people really love it, and it is not one I reach for when cheaper bottles do more.

Quality Score - 6.5

Very Good - A cut above

Value Score - 4.5

Poor Value - I'm complaining about price

Nose - 6.5

Limestone minerality up front, then caramel, vanilla, and a touch of Buffalo Trace grape.

Palate - 7.0

Sweet and easy. Caramel and light fruit, thin but clean, about what a bottled-in-bond should give you.

Finish - 6.1

Sweet and gentle, a little one-note.

Neck Pour - November 2025

A wall of limestone, and for a minute that is the only thing in the glass. Then it settles into classic Buffalo Trace.

Neck pour on this bottle was back in November of 2025. The minerality hit first and hit hard. Limestone, clear as anything, and at first it was the only note I could find. That is the thing with a fresh bottle. If there is one unexpected or overwhelming thing in the profile, your brain locks onto it and nothing else gets through. A few sips in and it faded. The more of these blind tastings and reviews I do, the more I am convinced that how you meet a whiskey matters about as much as what is in the glass.

Once I got past the minerality, the classic notes showed up. Caramel and vanilla with a bit of that grape Buffalo Trace is known for. The palate is thin, but that is about what I expect from a bottled-in-bond at this proof. Easy-drinking bourbon, no doubt about it, with some nice sweet fruit running through it. The minerality was genuinely interesting, and interesting is good.

I am glad this pour happened in November. It was cold out, and cold weather makes whiskey more enjoyable for me. My tastings these days land in the summer heat, and they tend to fall a little flat because of it. Meeting this bottle in the cold did it a favor.

Blind Pour - April 24, 2026

Second of three, and the one bottle in the flight I had actually overpaid for.

I put this up against Eagle Rare 10 Year and the Wild Turkey Jimmy Russell 70th Anniversary in a blind. The full breakdown is in the blind loyalty post. E.H. Taylor came out as Sample 1: soft, well-rounded, sweet oak, with some cinnamon I only found on the second pass. I scored it a blind 7.3 and put it second. Good whiskey. The Wild Turkey 70th took the night, and it was not close once I sat with all three.

The honest part of that post is the price. I paid $100 for this bottle. In three years of buying bourbon in my market I had never once seen E.H. Taylor on a shelf, so when I found one I paid what was in front of me. That is how allocation works on the buyer's side, and it is a bad deal.

Open Pour - June 17, 2026

Solid, but not Great. There are too many bottles I would pour first.

I did the open pour on June 17, and I sat on this review for a while after the blind. Same story as the Eagle Rare from that night. I think I held off because I find both of these a little underwhelming. I am something like 25 full reviews deep now, plenty of them on cheaper and easier-to-find bourbons, and there are just too many good options I would reach for first. I will say this plainly, though: I find these bottles underwhelming, and I also know a lot of people really, really enjoy them. That is a real split and worth naming.

Do not misread me. E.H. Taylor is solid. It is not Great. Maybe it is too sweet. I like bourbon on the sweeter side, but it needs some character to round it out. It is a plain sugar cookie. A plain sugar cookie can be good, but when there is a chocolate chip or a snickerdoodle around, I am going for those first.

On price: I paid around $100 for this, which is far over the roughly $50 MSRP, and that alone would sink the value. But it goes further than my bad luck at the register. Even at MSRP the value is still only a 4.5. A 6.5 bourbon at $50 is not a deal when there are 7s and 8s sitting near that price.

I am landing on a 6.5, which ties it with Wild Turkey 101, a bottle that runs about half the price at MSRP. WT101 is another totally classic bourbon profile, again on the sweeter side, but with some interesting funk that rounds it out. I am honestly more drawn to that. In the blind, E.H. Taylor lost to the 70th Anniversary Wild Turkey, which was a real step up from standard 101. Tied on score, E.H. Taylor still loses most nights on preference. The value score drops accordingly.

Quick edit: for the price I would strongly recommend JDSBBP

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com Not sponsored, not gifted, bought myself at retail.

TL;DR

Maker's Mark Cask Strength Batch 25-03 is a 7 year old wheated Kentucky straight bourbon bottled at 109.6 proof for $50. It uses Maker's signature mashbill of 70% corn, 16% soft red winter wheat, and 14% malted barley, and comes non-chill filtered straight from the barrel. In a blind tasting it beat the Weller 107 head to head, and while the Weller Full Proof pulled ahead as a bonus comparison, that's a much harder target. This bottle rewards patience, opening up considerably with air and revealing apple custard, vanilla, toffee, and a dark chocolate and cinnamon undertone that wasn't obvious on first crack. At $50 for this age and proof, the value case is almost embarrassingly strong. Wheated bourbon fans who have written off Maker's as a well drink brand owe themselves a look at what the Cask Strength is doing.

Quality Score - 7.8

Great - Well above average

Value Score - 8.0

Very Good Value - Buy on sight, consider even 1.5x MSRP

Nose - 8.2

Apple custard, vanilla, toffee, baking spice.

Palate - 7.8

Sweet oak, caramel, vanilla, dark chocolate, cinnamon.

Finish - 7.2

Clean, oak, soft spice, medium length.

Neck Pour

May 8, 2026

"Classic Maker's Mark DNA turned up to eleven. First crack and I already know this was the right call."

I came into this bottle with some real context. I reviewed the Maker's Mark Keepers Release 2025 not long ago and walked away underwhelmed. A 6.5 isn't a bad score, and plenty of people love those Wood Finishing Series releases, but it just didn't do it for me. In that review I pointed directly at the Cask Strength as the bottle I'd rather have in my hand, and for less money. So here we are. I've been drinking the non-age-stated Cask Strength releases for a while now and enjoy them, but Batch 25-03 is my first of the age-stated era. Maker's started putting the exact age and months on the label in early 2026, and I appreciate the transparency. Some people online were claiming it was different juice going into the age-stated bottles, but from everything I could find, it's the same wheated mashbill, same barrels, same process. That said, with a batched product, quality moves around batch to batch. My hopes were high going in.

Cracked it on May 8th. The color is great right out of the gate, deep dark amber, nothing to complain about there. Fresh bottle so there's a fair bit of ethanol on the nose at first, but underneath it the Maker's character is completely unmistakable. Apple pie sweetness, brown sugar, vanilla, baking spice. It's classic but it's dialed in. What strikes me most on first nose and first sip is the coherence. Everything is working together. Nothing is fighting anything else. That coherence carries right through to the palate and it makes for a really smooth, enjoyable drink, especially at 109.6 proof.

Honestly, this is a step up from the last batch of Cask Strength I had. I don't remember which batch that was, but something about this one feels more put together. If I'm being critical, it runs a little thin. Not a dealbreaker, and this batch does come in on the lower end of the proof range for this expression, which probably contributes to that. But the mouthfeel is still great and the flavor is coherent and real. The finish runs medium length, enjoyable throughout. I could ask for more flavor, and some batches probably deliver that, but I'm not sitting here disappointed. I'm sitting here thinking I need to put this next to a Weller 107 and see what happens.

Blind Pour

June 6, 2026

"The perfect wheater for me. And it wasn't particularly close."

I did exactly what the Neck Pour made me want to do. Pulled out the Weller 107 and set up a blind pour, labels off, no idea which was which. Just two glasses.

Sample 1 came out of the gate with sweet cherry and grape on the nose, some confectioners sugar, and a nice sweet oak presence. Smooth and enjoyable with a lingering cherry wood finish. Soft, well-rounded, drinking down around 100 proof feel. Medium finish. Good bourbon. I put it at a 7.1.

Sample 2 had a more seasoned wood nose right away. Oak forward, and not much else initially, but I kept coming back and eventually found some apple tucked in there. Really clean across the palate. Drinks even softer than Sample 1, maybe down around 95 proof feel. Sweet caramel, medium-long finish. I preferred it immediately. Gave it a 7.8. This is the exact right flavor profile for me. Maybe a little simple, but it's hitting every note I want from a wheater.

Unblinding: Sample 2 was the Maker's Mark. Wins head and shoulders above the Weller 107. The Weller had something a little overly sweet that I didn't take to, and I really liked the oak character on the Maker's by comparison.

As a bonus check on myself, I pulled out the Weller Full Proof to see where it landed. And yeah, the Full Proof beats the Maker's. Oh lordy, that is good. The mature oak and oily mouthfeel on the Full Proof is on another level. But that's a different bottle at a different price, and the fact that the Maker's held its own in the company of two Wellers is worth noting.

Open Pour

June 12, 2026

"This bottle opened up. What I thought was a ceiling turned out to be a starting point."

Coming back on June 12th, about a month after the Neck Pour, and this bottle has done some real work with air. The ethanol that was sitting on top on first crack has stepped aside. What's left is clean from nose to finish with excellent wheat character running all the way through. On the nose I'm getting apple custard, vanilla, and toffee. The palate has shifted too. Brown sugar has given way to something more like vanilla coke, a lighter, cleaner sweetness backed by nice sweet oak. The finish is clean, maybe too clean for some, but it works for me.

The production story here matters. Maker's enters barrels at 110 proof, lower than most distilleries, which is why this expression tops out in the 107-114 range rather than climbing into the 120s. They also rotate barrels by hand during aging, which evens out the warehouse temperature swings and produces more consistency across the batch. The result is a wheated bourbon that doesn't try to overpower you, and I think that's exactly where this batch succeeds. At 109.6 proof, everything is in balance. The proof is right in the sweet spot. Compare that to some of other producers which push above 120 proof, (Looking at you Larceny BP) where you can start to feel the edges come apart. More proof is a double-edged sword, and this batch makes a strong case for restraint.

Sitting on the back porch with this one, I'm finding more to chew on than the Neck Pour suggested. There's almost a coffee undertone coming through that shifts it from the Weller's cherry coke territory into something darker, more like dark chocolate and cinnamon. The flavors are balancing in a way that lets you crush it if you want, or slow down and pick at it. Either works. It doesn't have the complexity or the mature oak to push into the 8s, but it's close.

At $50, this is an easy recommendation. Think about what you're actually getting here: over seven years of age and 109.6 proof from a well-run distillery with a proven wheated mashbill. That is a screaming deal by any measure. It beat the Weller 107 blind, held its own in a conversation that included the Full Proof, and costs less than either of them. If you're a wheated bourbon fan and you've been sleeping on Maker's Cask Strength, Batch 25-03 is a good reason to pay attention. Buy it, open it, and give it some time.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com. Not sponsored, not gifted, bought myself at retail. Also on instagram openpourwhiskey

TL;DR

Wild Turkey 101 is a Kentucky straight bourbon from Lawrenceburg, Kentucky. NAS blend of 6, 7, and 8 year barrels, 101 proof, $25. Jimmy Russell has been making it the same way since 1954, one mashbill across the entire lineup, low distillation proof, deepest char on the barrel. It won a blind two-bottle comparison against Evan Williams BiB on preference, not complexity. It's a little light on flavor for what the proof promises, and that's the honest critique. But it's consistent, widely available, and never gets worse. My current pick for best bourbon under $30. If you want to see what this distillery can do with more age, track down the Jimmy Russell 70th Anniversary 8 Year. Otherwise, this one is always on the shelf. Buy it.

Quality Score - 6.5

Very Good - A cut above

Value Score - 6.8

Fair Value - MSRP is a good deal but don't overspend

Neck Pour

May 20, 2026

>Bought it for the people (well and myself).

I've had Wild Turkey 101 more times than I can count. It's been on my shelf in some form for years. When the comments on the Budget Blind came in asking where the WT101 review was, I went and got a bottle. Not because I needed to rediscover it. Because it was the right thing to do.

That's sort of the thing about this bourbon. It doesn't require an occasion. Jimmy Russell has been making it the same way since 1954, same single mashbill, same low distillation proof, same #4 char on the barrel, and it has never asked you to make a moment out of it. It's just there. Reliably, every time. The Jimmy Russell 70th Anniversary showed what this distillery can do with a few more years of age and a reason to celebrate. The standard 101 shows what they can do without any of that.

Nose is toasty oak and vanilla up front with an orange note that reads more like pith than zest. There's a slight funk to it, but it's not a flaw, it's just the house character settling in. Palate is spicy: cinnamon and oak, not sweet, more dry and assertive. Finish is medium length, light caramel, exits cleanly. Nothing lingers past its welcome.

It's lighter on flavor than the proof suggests it should be. That's the honest critique. You're getting a 6.5. Not because it's lacking, but because it's doing exactly what it promises and nothing more.

Blind Pour

June 3, 2026

>The label didn't change anything. I already knew which one I wanted.

See my full post: The Budget Blind: Wild Turkey 101 vs Evan Williams BiB

The setup was a direct response to reader feedback from the Budget Bourbon Boogaloo. Two samples, labels covered: Wild Turkey 101 against Evan Williams BiB. The $25 benchmark versus the $22 overachiever that had no business being there.

On the nose, sample 1 (the Turkey) was the more welcoming of the two. Honey, cinnamon, that faint funky orange note settling in underneath. Sample 2 was earthier and darker, reaching for dried fruit and bright oak where the Turkey went sweeter. On the palate, sample 1 followed its nose closely. Honey carrying through, light fruit, easy finish. The funk made a brief appearance on the back end and wasn't entirely welcome, but it didn't stick around long enough to be a real problem.

The honest difficulty with this tasting was that they complemented each other. Sample 1 was refreshing after the density of sample 2. Sample 2 felt more satisfying after the sweetness of sample 1. Neither one was complex. But picking a winner on pure enjoyment was harder than it had any right to be at this price point.

I picked the one I'd reach for more on a random Tuesday. Sample 1 won. The lighter, sweeter profile was the one I kept going back to even when sample 2 was technically showing more. Sometimes you don't want more. You just want easy.

The reveal landed more or less where expected. The honey and cinnamon on sample 1 read as Turkey even without the label.

Open Pour

June 4, 2026

>This is what dependable looks like at $25.

Wild Turkey 101 doesn't evolve much with air. It arrived as it is and it'll stay that way. If anything, the cinnamon spice on the palate feels slightly more settled. The caramel on the finish has a bit more presence than it did on the neck pour. But this is not a bottle you're going to be surprised by in month three.

The production story here is worth understanding. Wild Turkey uses one mashbill across their entire lineup: 75% corn, 13% rye, 12% malted barley. From 101 up through Russell's Reserve and Rare Breed, the grain recipe doesn't change. What changes is age, barrel selection, and proof. They also distill at a lower proof than most producers, which means more congeners going into the barrel and more character coming out. The #4 char on the barrels, the deepest standard char used in bourbon, drives the vanilla and caramel. That slightly funky orange note on the nose is Wild Turkey's house character. It shows up on the 101, it shows up on the Jimmy Russell 70th Anniversary 8 Year in a more refined form. It's a throughline. Once you know it, you can pick it out blind.

That 70th Anniversary bottle scored a 7.0. Eight years old, $50, exceptional blind performance against EH Taylor and Eagle Rare. If you want to see what happens when Wild Turkey gets more age and more intention, that's the one. But it's gone from shelves. This one isn't.

Wild Turkey 101 is my current pick for best bourbon under $30. The only real criticism is that it's a little light on flavor for what the proof promises, and I'm not walking that back. But consistency has real value. This bottle tastes exactly like the last one, and the one before that. Jimmy Russell has been making it since 1954. That's not an accident.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com. Not sponsored, not gifted, bought myself at retail.

TL;DR

Smokeye Hill Blue Corn Barrel Proof is a four-grain Indiana bourbon contract-distilled at MGP from a proprietary blue corn mashbill, aged in Colorado Springs, and bottled at 132 proof without chill filtration. It won the 2024 ASCOT Award for best small batch bourbon in a blind that included George T. Stagg, which is a real result and worth mentioning. Don't get me wrong, a year with the bottle open has been enjoyable but I'm not quite ready to give it that good of a score. Easy drinking for 132 proof, accessible to people who don't normally drink whiskey, but light on complexity relative to the price. At $85 there are better options.

Quality Score - 7.0

Great - Well above average

Value Score - 3.2

Bad Value - Just not buying again

Nose - 6.3

Light vanilla, noticeable corn, faint leather. Welcoming but quiet. Doesn't tip its hand at 132 proof, which is either impressive or a warning depending on what you're hoping for.

Palate - 7.2

Candy corn sweetness with a buttery mouthfeel. Brown sugar, a little caramel. Drinks easier than it has any right to at this proof.

Finish - 6.8

Medium-short. Fades cleanly without much trailing character. Nothing pulling you back for another sip.

Neck Pour

May 2025

>Drinks easier than it impresses. That's a strange thing to say about a 132 proof bourbon.

Smokeye Hill is named for a cattle ranch in Arizona with a Prohibition-era history. The land was a bootleggers' hideout during the dry years, and the founder's family has owned it for generations. The bourbon itself is contract-distilled at MGP in Lawrenceburg, Indiana, from a proprietary mashbill built around heirloom blue corn, then trucked out to Colorado Springs to be barreled and aged. Blue corn has been cultivated by Indigenous peoples of the Southwest for thousands of years and has a noticeably sweeter, more delicate character than field yellow corn. That's not just marketing. You can taste it in the glass.

First pour: the nose is lighter than 132 proof should deliver. Vanilla, corn, a wisp of leather. Welcoming, not interesting. The palate is the best part with candy corn sweetness, buttery mouthfeel, brown sugar underneath. The finish is medium-short and wraps up cleanly without asking for anything.

It drinks so much easier than the proof suggests that I kept handing glasses to people who don't drink whiskey. They typically like it and then get blown away when I show them the number. And that keeps happening with this bottle. There's something genuinely accessible here that I'm probably not rewarding fully on a quality scale built for complexity. Still, a year in, nothing has developed past that initial read.

Blind Pour

May 29, 2026

>Got this one right but otherwise don't have anything new to say.

Part of Wife Pour Wednesday #2, a four-bottle blind of high-proof barrel proof bourbons. Full write-up at the companion post.

Sample one. The nose opened light and welcoming like usual with vanilla, corn, faint leather. Approachable, nothing demanding attention. The palate had candy corn sweetness and a buttery mouthfeel I liked, but the finish came and went quickly. Nothing trailing. Medium-short at best. I scored it a 6.8 against the others, called it fine, and guessed it was Smokeye Hill. I mean 6.8 is a good score, but I hoped I could give it more.

It wasn't really a palate identification so much as the profile matching what I already knew about the bottle. The ASCOT win over Stagg is a real result and I don't dismiss it. Maybe on a different night, different lineup, different context. In this lineup, against JD Single Barrel Barrel Proof, 1792 Full Proof, and Booker's, it came in third of four. But kept a pretty good score.

Open Pour

May 30, 2026

>A year in and it's the same bottle. It's just not enough for $85.

The Smokeye Hill has been open about a year. Nothing has changed in a way that matters. The nose is still quiet, the palate is still buttery and sweet without layering much past that, and the finish still signs off before you want it to. Some bottles develop with air. This one settled into what it was early and stayed there.

I've genuinely enjoyed having it around. The accessibility is real. People keep liking this bottle when I pour it for them, and at 132 proof that's worth something. The blue corn is doing something here that field corn doesn't, a sweeter, more delicate character that makes the whole thing drink softer than the number suggests. That achievement is legitimate. It's just not $85 worth of achievement.

At that price there are bottles doing more in the glass. I'd buy another bottle of Smokeye Hill at $50. At $85 I wouldn't.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com. Not sponsored, not gifted, bought myself at retail.

I did the Bottled in Bond Boogaloo a few weeks ago and the comments had one consistent note: where's Wild Turkey 101?

Fair. It's a legitimate question. The honest answer is I didn't have any at the time. The slightly more honest answer is that I also wasn't sure what the point would be. Wild Turkey 101 is the benchmark. It's the bottle everyone already knows is good. Putting it in a flight of bonded bourbons felt like inviting the varsity starter to a JV scrimmage just to prove a point. If you don't believe me check my review of the Jimmy Russell 70th.

But the people have spoken, and I am nothing if not responsive to feedback. Tonight I'm giving WT101 its moment, just not the one anyone expected. Instead of a six-bottle flight, it's a one-on-one against Evan Williams Bottled-in-Bond. The unfair challenger. The $22 bottle that has absolutely no business being in the same conversation.

Two samples. Labels covered.

For a side by side comparison of the two visit here.

The Nose

Sample 1 opens with honey and cinnamon. There's a little funk underneath that gives me slight pause, but it settles. It's the more welcoming of the two noses. Not asking much of you.

Sample 2 is earthier. Dried fruit, raisins, and this oddly bright oak that shows up where you don't expect it. The funk is there too, maybe more present than on sample 1. Darker energy overall. More going on, but not necessarily more pleasant.

The Palate

Sample 1 follows the nose. Honey carries through, cinnamon, light fruit, easy finish. That bitter orange funk from the nose makes a brief appearance on the back end and I'm not entirely sure I love it, but it doesn't linger long enough to be a problem. Clean enough. Goes down easy.

Sample 2 reaches for plums and dark caramel instead of the lighter fruit on sample 1. There's better depth here, a longer finish, the darker flavors hang around. But the funk is doing more work on this one and it's a little harder to ignore. Still good. Just rougher around the edges.

Here's the honest problem with this comparison: I keep picking up the other glass and liking it more. Sample 1 is refreshing after the density of sample 2. Sample 2 feels more satisfying after the sweetness of sample 1. They're not complex bottles. But they balance each other out in a way that makes picking a winner harder than it has any right to be at this price point.

The Predicament

Neither of these is going to make you stop mid-sip and think. They're good for the money. That's the correct framing and I want to be honest about it. But within that framing they're doing their jobs well, and the contrast between them is real.

If I have to pick one, I'm going on gut: which of these do I reach for more often on a random Tuesday. Which one am I going to actually crush more of. On that question, sample 1 wins. The lighter, sweeter profile is the one I keep going back to even when sample 2 is technically showing me more. I don't always want more. Sometimes I just want easy.

Sample 1 wins. 6.4. Sample 2 gets a 6.2.

The Reveal

Sample 1 is Wild Turkey 101. Sample 2 is Evan Williams BiB.

Not super surprised. The honey and cinnamon on sample 1 read as Turkey even without the label. The darker, earthier depth on sample 2 is what you'd expect from a Heaven Hill product doing its best at $22.

The more interesting part of tonight came after the reveal. I poured a 1:1 blend of both into a clean glass and I'm pretty sure it's better than either one on its own. The sweetness from the Turkey cuts the earthiness of the EW. The depth from the BiB fills in what the Turkey is missing in body. Together they land somewhere neither one quite reaches alone. It's a little ridiculous. Two budget bottles mixed on your counter arriving at something you'd happily sit with for a full evening. But there it is.

What to Take Away

Wild Turkey 101 at $25 is exactly as good as everyone says it is. A 6.4 at that price is a strong score. Of course it's good. Jimmy Russell has been making it since 1954. The funk is there if you're looking for it but it doesn't get in the way.

Evan Williams BiB at $22 punches above its weight. A 6.2 here means it's delivering more than the price suggests, even if the rougher edges are noticeable. If someone asks you where to start with bourbon on a budget, this is one of the correct answers.

Neither wins by a mile. Both are good for what they are and what they cost. And if you want to do something slightly unhinged on a weeknight, grab a bottle of each, mix them equally, and see what happens. Worst case you've spent $47 and learned something. Best case you've accidentally made one of the better everyday pours on your shelf.

Full individual review on WT101 is in progress. Full Evan Williams review is here.

TL;DR

1792 Full Proof Single Barrel is a high-rye Kentucky straight bourbon from Barton 1792 Distillery in Bardstown which is the oldest fully operating distillery in the city, established in 1879. The name honors the year Kentucky joined the Union. The Full Proof is bottled at its original 125 barrel entry proof without any water reduction, running approximately 8.5 years old. I had a rough first opening that I chalked up to a bad pick and ended up putting the bottle into cocktails for months. Then it won the blind at an 8.2. Toffee, coffee, and banana on the nose. Balanced, well-structured, oaky and clean on the palate. Best pour of the night at a price that most of the competition can't touch. Buy it if you can find it.

Quality Score - 8.2

Excellent - Really quite exceptional

Value Score - 7.9

Good Value - Great deal, go as high as 1.2x MSRP

Nose - 8.8

Toffee, coffee, banana. Rich and inviting right away. This is the kind of nose that earns attention before the first sip.

Palate - 8.0

Opens sweet and subdued, then an oaky banana finish follows and keeps going. Good balance between the sweetness and the heat. Neither one is in charge.

Finish - 8.0

Medium-long. Oak and banana carry through cleanly. The length feels earned.

Neck Pour

November 2025

>I enjoy 1792 Small Batch. This confused me and I'm still not sure why.

Barton 1792 Distillery has been running continuously in Bardstown since 1879, which makes it the oldest fully operating distillery in what most people call the Bourbon Capital of the World. The brand name is a nod to the year Kentucky became the 15th state. The 1792 line has expanded significantly under Sazerac's ownership with Single Barrel, Full Proof, Bottled in Bond, Sweet Wheat, and a few others alongside the flagship Small Batch. The Full Proof is a specific expression: bottled at the same 125 proof the barrels were filled at, without dilution, after approximately 8.5 years of aging.

First opening was harsh. The 1792 Small Batch is something I genuinely like and have recommended to others. Its reliable, well-priced, interesting high-rye character so I expected this to track in the same direction with more intensity. It didn't, at least on that first pour. I might just have been in a spot where I haddn't been drinking that high proof stuff. Could have been oxidation from a bad seal. Could have been a bad night. Put it in the cocktail rotation and mostly left it alone.

Worth noting: it made great cocktails. Love that extra high proof in my manhattan. That's not nothing.

Blind Pour

May 29, 2026

>Best pour of the night. I was completely sure it wasn't the 1792.

Part of Wife Pour Wednesday #2, a four-bottle blind of high-proof barrel proof bourbons. Full write-up at the companion post.

Sample three. The nose had toffee and coffee and banana, a combination that I absolutely loved. It opened sweet and clean, not blasting, and then an oaky banana finish came in and kept going. Real balance between the sweetness and the heat. I kept coming back to this glass more than the others. Scored it an 8.2 and called it the clear favorite of the night.

Then I guessed it was 1792 and immediately second-guessed myself because I'd been treating this bottle as a cocktail ingredient for months. The blind caught something real: whatever was off on the first opening, six months of air had either fixed it or the first openings were just bad days for a high proofer. The bottle I had the least confidence in won the tasting. Honestly its why I really like my format for reviews.

Open Pour

June 1, 2026

>The bottle I was mixing into cocktails won the blind. I have some things to reconsider.

Poured it neat the day after the blind for the first time in months. The nose landed exactly where the blind did with toffee, coffee, banana, inviting and structure. The palate is balanced in a way the first opening didn't deliver: sweet up front without being cloying, oaky and clean through the middle, banana note carrying into a finish that earns its length. Whatever the first opening was I think its still in there. There is heat, but the sweetness balances it well. That first pass on the palate has no trace of ethanol but it does come through in the end which makes this a very interesting pour.

The Full Proof is an interesting expression within the 1792 lineup. It's bottled at its original barrel entry proof rather than being reduced to a target number, which means you get the whiskey as it actually went into the barrel, just after 8.5 years. The high-rye mashbill puts spice into the profile, but here it's integrated rather than sharp, riding alongside the sweeter banana and toffee character rather than overrunning it. To be honest reading my notes I really didn't find much spice. The age is doing real work pulling everything into place. I do like my rye well aged.

The value score needs some explanation. At $60 this is an excellent quality-to-price ratio if you can find it near MSRP. It's genuinely hard to find outside Kentucky and a handful of markets, which is why the score isn't higher. Find it at $60 and it earns something much better.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com. Not sponsored, not gifted, bought myself at retail.

TL;DR

Jack Daniel's Single Barrel Barrel Proof is a Tennessee whiskey put through the Lincoln County Process. Charcoal mellowing step through ten feet of sugar maple that defines the category and then aged and bottled from a single barrel at whatever proof it came out at, usually around 129. Mashbill is 80% corn, 12% malted barley, 8% rye, registered at the oldest distillery in the US since 1866. With the proof and how it comes accross in excellent in your face JD fasion this is not for a beginner, but it does a genuinely good job of balancing barrel proof heat against heavy oak char and real sweetness. I'm not going to stop buying these.

Quality Score - 8.0

Excellent - Really quite exceptional

Value Score - 5.8

Baseline Value - MSRP is spot on

Nose - 8.0

Butterscotch, peanut butter, rich and dessert-like. The charcoal mellowing rounds the edges in a way that reads as depth rather than softness. Makes you want to sip before you're done smelling it.

Palate - 8.2

Peanut butter and sweet caramel, nutty with banana on the back end. The heat and the oak char are both present and neither one is winning. Real balance for a barrel proof whiskey.

Finish - 7.8

Clean and satisfying. Slightly shorter than the proof would suggest. The oak char carries through without drying out on the exit.

Neck Pour

April 2025

>The Lincoln County Process is doing real work here. It always has been.

Jack Daniel's has been registered at its Lynchburg, Tennessee distillery since 1866, which makes it the oldest registered distillery in the United States. The Single Barrel Barrel Proof is the top expression in the lineup: one barrel, no water added, bottled at cask strength. Proof varies by barrel but runs around 129. Mine is 132. The mashbill is 80% corn, 12% malted barley, 8% rye same as everything else Jack Daniel's makes.

What sets Tennessee whiskey apart from bourbon is the Lincoln County Process, where the freshly distilled spirit drips through ten feet of sugar maple charcoal before it ever touches a barrel. It takes three to five days. Most producers skip it entirely. The effect on the glass is real: the edges round out in a way that reads less as softness and more as depth. The charcoal mellowing shows up in how the sweetness and the oak char stay in balance at high proof, neither one running over the other.

First pour: the nose is butterscotch and peanut butter. Rich, dessert-like, the kind of combination that makes you want to take a sip before you're done smelling. The palate is sweet caramel and peanut butter with banana on the back end. The heat is fully present at 132 proof and it isn't hiding, but it's balanced with some great oak char. The finish runs slightly shorter than expected and signs off cleanly. You want one more sip before it's done.

This is not a beginner bottle. The proof announces itself. But for someone with some barrel proof experience, it delivers every time. I've never opened a bottle of this that I didn't like.

Blind Pour

May 29, 2026

>I had this glass all night and didn't know it. That's embarrassing in the most useful way.

Part of Wife Pour Wednesday #2, a four-bottle blind of high-proof barrel proof bourbons. Full write-up at the companion post.

Sample two. The nose changed the energy immediately with butterscotch up front, then peanut butter announcing itself, rich and dessert-like. I kept going back to smell it before I took a sip. The palate was sweet caramel and peanut butter, very smooth, nutty with a hint of banana on the back end. I scored it a 7.8 and called it one of the two standouts of the night. Guessed it was Booker's.

It was the JD. The bottle I'd been hoping to find in the lineup all night, the one I genuinely love, and I scored it second and misidentified it in the same sitting. The word "slightly lacking" is going to bother me. I've had this bottle plenty of times. The blind caught something real: I expected Booker's to be rich and nutty and dessert-forward, so that's where I put the rich, nutty, dessert-forward glass. That's not tasting. That's expectation leading the witness.

Revising the blind score of 7.8 up to 8.0 with how well these single barrels perform time and time again. The full body of work with this bottle earns it.

Open Pour

May 31, 2026

>Chronically underrated. The blind keeps proving it and I keep being surprised.

This bottle has been open a few months and the profile hasn't shifted. Butterscotch and peanut butter on the nose, sweet and balanced on the palate, clean finish that runs a little short but doesn't disappoint. Nothing surprising. That's the thing about this release it's consistent. Every bottle I've opened has delivered roughly the same experience. At barrel proof from a single barrel that consistency is harder to pull off than it sounds.

I did some reading after the blind. The Lincoln County Process the charcoal mellowing step was taught to Jack Daniel by Nearest Green, who worked at the Call Distillery before Jack started his own. Green taught the technique, Daniel built the distillery around it, and it's been there ever since. Whether the charcoal is responsible for the specific way this whiskey holds together at 132 proof I can't prove in a glass. It's the most logical explanation I have for why it drinks differently from everything else at this proof level.

At $65 this is one of the stronger values in high-proof American whiskey. The value score isn't higher because the 1792 Full Proof Single Barrel exists at $45 to $50 and won the blind this bottle came in second in. That's an honest comparison. Still, $65 for something this reliable and this good is a deal. I keep coming back to it. JD has a distinguished profile I can't find anywhere else.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com. Not sponsored, not gifted, bought myself at retail.

TL;DR

Booker's By the Pond Batch 2025-02 is a seven-year Kentucky straight bourbon from Clermont, bottled uncut and unfiltered at 126.5 proof from eight different warehouse locations across the Beam property. The batch is named after the pond behind Booker Noe's house, where he and his son Fred spent afternoons together. The story is good. The bourbon didn't work for me at any point. First opening, in the blind, and months later with the bottle half empty and plenty of air on it. Screaming ethanol from nose to finish with nothing to balance it. I saved this bottle specifically for my wedding and opened it alongside an Elijah Craig Barrel Proof private barrel, which blew it out of the water without breaking a sweat. At $100 this is a hard pass. First and last Booker's.

Quality Score - 5.5

Good - Good, just fine

Value Score - 2.9

Terrible Value - These are special occasion bottles

Nose - 4.2

Toasted oak, vanilla, some allspice. Something going on early that never develops. The ethanol cuts through before anything gets to finish a sentence.

Palate - 6.0

Cinnamon, pepper, some caramel underneath. The sweetness is real but it gets buried under heat that builds fast and doesn't back off.

Finish - 5.5

Long, harsh, and unresolved. Ethanol all the way through the exit. The kind of finish that makes you put the glass down rather than pick it back up.

Neck Pour

March 27, 2026

>I saved this for my wedding. The Elijah Craig I opened alongside it made that a mistake.

Booker Noe was Jim Beam's grandson and served as master distiller at Clermont for decades. In 1988 he started bottling his personal cask strength stock to give to family and friends at the holidays. That eventually became a commercial product, and Booker's became the first mass-market uncut, unfiltered bourbon in the American market. Fred Noe, Booker's son and the seventh-generation Beam master distiller, has continued the tradition. Four batches a year, each one named and given a story. By the Pond is the second of 2025, named for the backyard pond where Booker raised catfish and eventually put a roof over it after the maple tree kept dropping leaves in. It's a good story. The batch was aged 7 years, 1 month, and 20 days and pulled from eight different warehouse locations across the Clermont property.

I picked this bottle specifically to open at my wedding. It felt like the occasion for something with a name and a price tag. Opened it alongside an Elijah Craig Barrel Proof private barrel pull. The ECBP was noticeably better and it wasn't close. That set the tone for the whole neck pour.

The nose has something going on early, maybe, but the ethanol cuts through before it develops into anything. The palate has cinnamon, pepper, and some caramel underneath, but the heat builds fast and nothing brings it back. The finish is long in the wrong direction. Harsh and unresolved. That's not a good sign for a $100 bottle on what was supposed to be a good night.

Blind Pour

May 29, 2026

>Dead last. I benched it for WT101 and then found out what it was.

Part of Wife Pour Wednesday #2, a four-bottle blind of high-proof barrel proof bourbons. Full write-up at the companion post.

Sample four. The nose had something going on maybe allspice but nothing that stood up after the butterscotch and peanut butter and toffee and coffee that came before it. Mild sweetness up front, heat building fast, then ethanol on the exit. Too much, unresolved. I was going to score it in the 5s and made sure I grabbed Wild Turkey 101 to reset my palate and double check. The 101 was better. Scored it a 5.8 and guessed 1792.

I was completely wrong. I wanted Booker's to be better, figured it had to be better at nearly double the price. The blind format called out my bias cleanly.

Open Pour

June 2, 2026

>Half empty for months. The air hasn't helped.

The bottle has been sitting half empty for a while, which is the scenario where you find out whether a barrel proof bourbon opens up over time. Here, the ethanol dominance on the whole pour is still there. The nose still drops off after the early oak and allspice. The palate still buries whatever sweetness is underneath heat that has nothing holding it in check. Nothing has changed for the better. The air did not fix it.

I've had this bottle long enough to know my issues with it are not a bad night or a bad pour. They're consistent across every stage of this review. I'd rather have Wild Turkey 101. I'd much rather have the 1792 Full Proof at half the price. I'd rather have the Elijah Craig Barrel Proof that I opened on the same night I opened this, which was better and cheaper and didn't give me any of these problems.

At $100 the bar is high and this doesn't come close to clearing it. The Booker's line has a genuine legacy and some batches earn the reputation. This one wasn't the batch. Unfortunately I didn't like it to the point its likely my first and last bottle of Booker's for me. Happy to be proven wrong by a different release, but I'm not buying another one to find out.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com. Not sponsored, not gifted, bought myself at retail.

Four blind pours. One theme. Let's see if my palate can keep up.

Wife Pour Wednesday is back. My wife has graciously agreed to reprise her role as Chief Pouring Officer, which means she pours while I'm not looking and hands me glasses until I either figure something out or embarrass myself. Usually both.

This time I actually picked the bottles before the session. All four are unreviewed, all four are high-proof barrel proof bourbons sitting on the shelf waiting their turn. I'm on a no-buy until I work through what I've got, which is either discipline or punishment depending on the day. Comparing them at similar proof levels felt like the right way to do it. The blind part just keeps me honest about what I'm actually tasting versus what I expect to taste.

I handed her the four bottles. I left the room. She poured. That's the whole setup.

Wife Pour Wednesday #2: Blind Barrel Proof Showdown

First Pour: The Warm-Up

Sample one opens with a fairly light nose. Vanilla up front, noticeable corn, a tiny wisp of leather somewhere in the back. Not complex, but not offensive. It's the kind of nose that says approachable more than it says interesting.

The palate delivers candy corn sweetness. Buttery mouthfeel, which I appreciate, but the finish wraps up quickly and cleanly. Medium-short at best. Nothing lingers. It drinks easier than it impresses, which might be the point depending on what this is.

6.8. It's fine. It's genuinely fine. That's not a dig, but it's not a compliment either. There's nothing here pulling me in for a second sip.

Second Pour: Now We're Talking

Sample two immediately changes the energy in the room.

The nose on this one is genuinely great. Butterscotch up front, followed by what I can only describe as peanut butter doing its best to introduce itself. It's a nutty, rich, almost dessert-like nose that makes you want to take a sip before you're done smelling it.

The palate follows through. Peanut butter and sweet caramel, very smooth overall, and honestly I'm not finding a lot to complain about. If I'm reaching for criticism, I'd say it might be slightly lacking something. A little more complexity, maybe. But I keep coming back to it. Nutty, with a hint of banana on the back end. It's just a satisfying glass of whiskey.

7.8. One of the two standouts tonight, even at this early point in the session.

Third Pour: The High Point

Okay. This is good.

The nose has toffee and coffee and banana, which is a combination that sounds like it shouldn't work and absolutely does. The whiskey opens sweet up front, subdued actually, not blasting you, and then this oaky banana finish follows and keeps going. There's real balance between the sweetness and the heat. Neither one is running the show.

I find myself going back to this glass more than the others. The finish has length. The balance feels intentional. It's not trying to be anything it isn't, and what it is happens to be really good.

8.2. Clear favorite of the night.

Fourth Pour: Uh Oh

Sample four is not doing it for me.

The nose has something going on, maybe allspice, but it's not particularly distinguishing. The mild sweetness up front gets quickly overwhelmed by heat. Cinnamon, pepper, and then on the exit: ethanol. Too much ethanol. The finish is harsh in a way that feels unresolved rather than just young.

At this point I'm frustrated enough that I break from the lineup and grab a pour of Wild Turkey 101 to reset my palate. WT101 is a benchmark. It's reliable. After one sip of the 101 I go back to sample four and... yeah. The Wild Turkey is better. Not a good sign.

This one is just too hot on the exit. There's potential in the early nose that never gets developed, and the ethanol dominance on the finish kills whatever goodwill the front end built. 5.8.

The Rundown

Sample	Score
1	6.8
2	7.8
3	8.2
4	5.8

Two standouts, two that lagged. Sample four lagged the hardest.

Guesses (and What That Says About Me)

I know what the four bottles are. I picked them. What I don't know is which glass is which. Here's what I think:

• Sample 1: Smokeye Hill Blue Corn Barrel Proof
• Sample 2: Booker's By The Pond
• Sample 3: Jack Daniel's Single Barrel Barrel Proof
• Sample 4: 1792 Full Proof Single Barrel

I want to be transparent about something: these guesses are almost entirely based on what I want to be true, not what I actually detected. I've been partial to the JD Single Barrel Barrel Proof for a while and I was hoping it was in the lineup. Assigning it to my highest-scoring sample feels suspiciously convenient. And the bottle of 1792 on the shelf has mostly been going into cocktails because I didn't love it neat the last time I had it. Putting 1792 on sample four conveniently assigns my least-favorite pour to the bottle I already didn't like.

That's not tasting. That's confirmation bias with extra steps.

The Reveal

Labels get revealed. I look at them. I need a moment.

Sample one was Smokeye Hill Blue Corn Barrel Proof. Got that one right, and honestly it makes sense in hindsight. Light, corn-forward, easy drinking. Fine for what it is. I think it's actually impressive that the proof can drink so low when being so high. But in a blind I can't give it points for that.

Sample two was Jack Daniel's Single Barrel Barrel Proof. Not Booker's. The JD. The bottle I had been mentally gunning for all night, the one I was sure was my top pour, and I gave it a 7.8 and called it slightly lacking. I said the nose was great but something was missing. That something was apparently my ability to recognize a whiskey I genuinely love.

Sample three was 1792 Full Proof Single Barrel. My favorite pour of the night. The one I scored an 8.2. The one I described as balanced and intentional and going back to more than the others. The same bottle I've been mixing into drinks for months because I didn't enjoy it neat. Now to be fair that bottle has been over half empty for like 6 months so who knows what the air did to it but still.

Sample four was Booker's By The Pond. Dead last. 5.8. Too hot on the exit, too much ethanol, reached for the Wild Turkey 101 as a palate cleanser. Booker's. One of the most respected high-proof bourbons on the market, and I benched it for a benchmark. I think I know why it's sitting on the shelf unpurchased at every major liquor store.

What This Actually Means

I got sample one right and everything else spectacularly wrong in the most instructive way possible.

The 1792 Full Proof Single Barrel is genuinely good. I knew that the moment I smelled it and again when I tasted it, and then I filed it under "least favorite" in my guess because of how I'd been treating the bottle. That's a bias problem, not a palate problem, and the blind format caught it cleanly.

The JD Single Barrel Barrel Proof is also genuinely good, I'm not suddenly revising that opinion, but "slightly lacking" is going to haunt me a little. I've had that bottle plenty of times. I should have known.

And Booker's. I don't fully understand the Booker's result yet. Maybe the specific batch, maybe the night, maybe the lineup context. Whatever it was, that one needs a rematch on its own terms.

The no-buy rule stays in effect. Apparently I have a lot left to learn about what's already on the shelf.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com. Not sponsored, not gifted, bought myself at retail.

TL;DR

Heaven Hill Bottled in Bond is a 7-year Kentucky straight bourbon, 100 proof, 78% corn mashbill, currently sitting at a firm $50. It's the distillery's namesake bottle, the one they first released in 1939 and the one that became the best-selling bourbon in Kentucky. I bought it out of mild curiosity and barely paid attention to it for a year. Then I ran it blind against Still Austin Red Corn BiB and Bulleit BiB, called it the balanced classic bourbon in the lineup, and guessed it was Bulleit. It wasn't. If you like dark, sweet, well-built Kentucky bourbon and you're not chasing complexity, this is an easy recommendation at $50. Buy it, open it, and don't wait a year to give it the credit it deserves.

Quality Score - 7.7

Great - Well above average

Value Score - 7.6

Good Value - Great deal, go as high as 1.2x MSRP

Neck Pour

February 2025

>I bought it out of curiosity and almost forgot about it. One blind tasting changed that.

Heaven Hill has been making bourbon since 1935. The Bottled-in-Bond is their namesake, the bottle they first released in 1939 that became the best-selling bourbon in Kentucky. For decades it lived as a $12 to $15 six-year sold almost exclusively in-state. When they discontinued that version in 2018, the bourbon community went through a brief period of grief. What replaced it in 2019 was a year older, dressed up, and available nationally. The price went from $15 to $40 overnight.

I bought this bottle about a year ago, mostly on reputation and value story. I liked it. I just never got attached to it. It sat on the shelf as a reliable option without ever demanding much attention from me.

First nose was exactly what you expect from a well-made low-rye Kentucky bourbon. Oak up front, but not heavy. Baking spice underneath, vanilla, clove, a little icing sugar. Classic and clean. First sip confirmed it: dark, sweet, well-structured. Nothing complicated, nothing wrong. It performed like a fundamentally sound bourbon that knew exactly what it was.

It met expectations. A year later, after a blind tasting that humbled me, I realized I'd been setting them too low.

Blind Pour

May 23, 2026

>Woops that was humbling.

Full blind post with all three bottles here: Bottled in Bond Boogaloo

The setup for the Bottled in Bond Boogaloo was three 100-proof bourbons poured blind by my wife on the back patio. Heaven Hill BiB, Still Austin Red Corn BiB, and Bulleit BiB, the bottle I'd called my whiskey of the year. Three bottles I genuinely liked, all meeting the same legal standard, all completely different from each other. I wanted to know if I actually knew what I liked or if I was just following the story I'd been telling myself.

On the nose, number two, which turned out to be Heaven Hill, came through differently than number one. Where Still Austin was dark and syrupy and almost molasses-adjacent, Heaven Hill was brighter. Fresh oak at the front, not heavy barrel oak, almost floral. Caramel and vanilla underneath. The opposite energy from number one but just as good.

On the palate it opened up: toffee and caramel leading, a solid oak backbone keeping it grounded, a little anise in the background. Clean and sweet without tipping into candy territory. Beautifully executed. Fully resolved in a way that one of the other bottles wasn't.

I had convinced myself that number two was Bulleit. Correct in all the expected ways. Nothing weird. Just solid well-built bourbon that tasted like what a bourbon was supposed to taste like.

The reveal was humbling. Number two was Heaven Hill. The bottle I'd barely paid attention to for a year. The one with no emotional story attached. My guess for Bulleit was actually number three, the one I'd called thin and a little grainy.

I went back and checked everything. New pours, blind and unblind, labels out and labels hidden. Same result every time. Heaven Hill was number two. It wasn't close.

Open Pour

May 28, 2026

>After a year and a blind tasting that humbled me, I finally know what this bottle is.

The bottle has opened up since I first cracked it. The oak has settled into the background where it belongs. The nose now leads with something brighter, fresh oak and allspice with a little warmth underneath. The palate has gotten richer. Brown sugar and maple syrup, dark and sweet, the kind of profile I keep coming back to. The finish is medium-long and easy, not demanding, not abrupt. It just fades cleanly and invites another sip.

I pull this bottle out often now. It's what I reach for when I want something reliable and good without having to think about it. When I have guests who don't drink much bourbon, this is what I pour them first. Approachable enough that it doesn't intimidate, complex enough that it holds up. That combination is harder to pull off than it sounds.

At $50 this is a steal. I paid $50, thought it was pricy at the time, and now think I was wrong. A year in, a blind tasting on the books, and a bottle I never expected to care about is one I'll keep buying.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com. Not sponsored, not gifted, bought myself at retail.

TL;DR

Still Austin Red Corn Bottled in Bond is a 6-year Texas straight bourbon built around Jimmy Red corn, a heritage variety that brings a savory, earthy richness you won't find in a conventional bourbon. The mashbill is 36% Jimmy Red, 34% white corn, 25% rye, and 5% malted barley, bottled at 100 proof as part of Still Austin's seasonal BIB series. It won a three-way blind tasting against Heaven Hill BIB and Bulleit BIB, and held up to a side-by-side with Weller Full Proof at 114 proof. This is one of the most distinctive bourbons I've had at any price. The ancho chili and brown butter character is genuinely unlike anything else on the market. At $80 it's exceptional value. Buy it if you find it.

Quality Score - 9.0

Incredible - An all time favorite

Value Score - 8.5

Very Good Value - Buy on sight, consider even 1.5x MSRP

Nose - 8.8

Ancho pepper, cinnamon spice, roasted nuts, orange peel, black tea.

Palate - 9.5

Sweet oak, earthy brown butter, savory and creamy with an oily mouthfeel, dried fruit, allspice, butterscotch, honey.

Finish - 9.0

Cinnamon, vanilla, cloves, long and lingering.

Neck Pour

March 2025

>I got the last bottle on the shelf after driving a few hours. I didn't go looking for it specifically. I just got lucky.

Still Austin Whiskey Co. opened its doors in 2017, the first whiskey distillery in Austin city limits since Prohibition. The origin story is almost too good: Cleveland Seals, a retired Texan with a dream of making whiskey, and his son Chris, who agreed to a "feasibility study" mostly as an excuse to travel and drink with his dad. That study became a genuine mission. They broke ground in 2014, spent three years building the distillery, and released their first straight bourbon in 2020. Every grain they use is grown in Texas. The Red Corn BIB launched in summer 2023 as the first of a planned four-season series, each release built around the ingredients and character of its season. The 2025 edition is the third vintage of that recipe, now at 6 years old.

I wasn't hunting for it. I was passing through and spotted one bottle left on the shelf. That was it. I bought it without hesitation and drove home wondering if I'd overhyped myself.

I hadn't. The nose stops you immediately. There's ancho chili pepper and cinnamon spice right at the front, but they're not aggressive. They're deep and warm, like something slow-cooked rather than sharp. On the palate, sweet oak leads into what I can only describe as earthy brown butter, a savory, creamy quality with an oily mouthfeel that you don't expect from a 100 proof bourbon. It doesn't pour like oil. It just coats. The finish is cinnamon, vanilla, and cloves, long and lingering in the best possible way.

This is not a standard bourbon. The Jimmy Red corn is doing something here that conventional corn simply doesn't do. The spice and the sweetness are perfectly balanced, neither one winning, and that ancho chili note is the kind of thing you taste once and remember. I drove a few hours for a bottle I almost missed. Immediately worth it.

Blind Pour

May 23, 2026

>I thought I had it figured out. I didn't have all of it figured out.

The setup was simple. My wife poured three one-ounce blind pours on the back patio while I looked the other way. Three bottled-in-bond bourbons, all 100 proof, all at least six months open: Heaven Hill BIB, Still Austin Red Corn BIB, and Bulleit BIB. One of which I had called my whiskey of the year. We called it the Bottled in Bond Boogaloo. Full write-up is here.

Number one stopped me on the nose. Dark, syrupy, almost molasses-adjacent. Rich and sweet without being cloying. On the palate it was immediately coating, wrapping the whole mouth in sweetness that had real structure to it. Allspice, butterscotch, ripe peach, honey, and then right at the tail end of the finish, that funky earthy ancho chili note. Complex. Layered. The kind of whiskey that rewards slowing down. I scored it an 8.4 and said it was going to win.

It did win. And I correctly identified it as Still Austin. That distinctive ancho chili character is apparently hard to miss once you know it.

What I got completely backwards was everything else. The bottle I thought was Bulleit, beautifully balanced with toffee and clean oak, was Heaven Hill. The bottle I thought was Heaven Hill, thin and a little grainy with ethanol showing through, was Bulleit. My whiskey of the year scored a 7.2. The bottle I had no emotional attachment to scored an 8.2.

The Still Austin held up cleanly. The blind confirmed what I already suspected: this is not a bourbon that benefits from comparison. It just wins one.

Open Pour

May 24, 2026

>This bottle has been open for about a year and a half and it keeps getting better. That's a rare thing to say.

The shift since first opening has been gradual but real. Those more savory, earthy qualities have come forward as the bottle has breathed. The sweet spice is still there, but the brown butter creaminess is more pronounced now, more central. Whether the whiskey has actually changed or my palate has gotten more attuned to what it's doing, I can't say with certainty. Probably some of both. Either way it's been genuinely enjoyable to watch this bottle evolve over a year and a half of slow pours.

The mashbill tells you something if you know what to look for. Seventy percent of the corn in this bottle isn't ordinary corn. It's Jimmy Red, a heritage variety grown in Texas, combined with white corn, high-rye for a craft bourbon at 25%, and a touch of malted barley. Still Austin also uses a six-month slow water reduction process before bottling, coaxing more caramel and vanilla character into a whiskey that could otherwise skew rustic. The result is a bourbon that drinks richer and more complex than its 100 proof suggests. The ancho chili note isn't a quirk. It's what this combination of corn, grain, Texas climate, and intentional production actually tastes like.

I've been nursing this bottle because I knew getting more would be difficult. Still Austin has limited distribution outside Texas, and this is a seasonal release. They won't make this exact bottle again. What's in the glass is what there is.

Pouring one as I write this, as I do for every Open Pour. Nothing fundamentally new to report, which is itself the report. This whiskey is exactly what I thought it was. Except now I think it's even better than my blind score suggested.

I pulled out a bottle of Weller Full Proof to compare. Weller Full Proof is a 114 proof wheated bourbon with a devoted following and a secondary market that runs well above retail. The Still Austin Red Corn BIB, at 100 proof and $80, has more going on. More flavor, more character, more complexity. For it to outperform a bottle 14 proof points higher with considerably more hype behind it, the value case writes itself.

This ties my Four Roses OBSQ at 9.0, the highest score I've given. For a bottle at $80 to reach that mark, the value score goes up accordingly. Way up. Buy every Still Austin BIB you can find near MSRP. I intend to.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com. Not sponsored, not gifted, bought myself at retail.

It started as a simple question: how well do I actually know the bottles I love?

I've been reviewing all my open whiskeys for Open Pour since the site launched about a month ago, and a pattern has emerged. I know what I like when I taste it, but I don't always know why I like it until I try it next to something else. Blind tasting forces the issue. It strips away the label, the marketing, the price tag, and the story you've been telling yourself about a bottle. It's just liquid in a glass and your honest reaction.

So tonight my wife is pouring three bourbons into 1 oz disposable tasters on the back patio while I look the other way, and we're calling it the Bottled in Bond Boogaloo. Three bottles, all 100 proof, all meeting the exacting standards of the 1897 Bottled-in-Bond Act. Three bottles I genuinely like, one of which I even called my "Bourbon of the Year 2025". We'll see how they hold up when I don't know which one is which.

The lineup: Heaven Hill Bottled in Bond, Still Austin Red Corn Bottled in Bond, and Bulleit Bottled in Bond. If you're thinking those three couldn't be more different from each other while sharing the same designation, you're right.

The Setup

Let me give you the quick context before we get into it.

Heaven Hill Bottled in Bond is a 7-year Kentucky straight bourbon with a classic low-rye mashbill (78% corn, 10% rye, 12% malted barley) bottled at 100 proof. It's what I would consider the flagship bourbon for the Heaven Hill family, a direct lineage to a bottle they first released in 1939 that was once the best-selling bourbon in Kentucky. I picked it up mostly out of curiosity maybe a year ago? Solid reputation, strong value story. I liked it but I never developed an attachment to the bottle or the brand. It just existed somewhere on the shelf.

Still Austin Red Corn Bottled in Bond is a craft Texas bourbon built around Jimmy Red corn, a heritage variety that is reported to bring a distinctive nutty, earthy richness that you don't get from conventional corn. The mashbill is 36% Jimmy Red, 34% white corn, 25% rye, and 5% malted barley. It's part of Still Austin's seasonal Bottled in Bond series and quickly became one of my absolute favorites. Funny enough I also bought it a year ago on the same trip that I bought the Heaven Hill. People still call Still Austin a "craft" distillery, and I get why, but if they keep making whiskey like this I'm not sure the label is going to stick much longer. The Red Corn BiB has this subtle ancho chili thing happening that I've never tasted in any other bourbon. It's just different in a way that makes you want to pay attention.

Bulleit Bottled in Bond is Bulleit's first-ever in-house distillate, aged 7 years from the Spring 2017 distillation season at their Shelbyville, Kentucky facility. Classic high-rye mashbill (68% corn, 28% rye, 4% malted barley), 100 proof, the works. I called this bottle my whiskey of the year when I first had it. I loved it. But I never really sat with it side-by-side against anything else, and tonight that changes.

All three bottles have been open for at least six months. They've opened up completely. Fair game all around.

For a detailed breakdown of the bottles visit the website

The Nose

Number one stops me immediately. Dark and syrupy. There's something almost molasses-adjacent happening, rich and sweet without being cloying. This is a great nose.

Number two is the opposite energy but honestly just as good. Brighter. There's oak right at the front, but not the heavy barrel oak of an over-aged whiskey. This is fresher somehow, almost floral. Like the wood is fresh timber but not dominant. Also excellent, just completely different.

Number three is sweet and lighter, with some fruit coming through. Stone fruit maybe. Softer than the first two. Good nose, just a notch below the others.

At this point I've pretty much decided number one is going to win, it's phenomenal on the nose. If that keeps carrying through to the palate, it's going to score very well.

The Palate

Here's where things get interesting.

Number one is immediately coating. It wraps the whole palate in sweetness, but this isn't a sugary dessert bourbon. The sweetness has structure to it. As I sit with it I start picking up allspice, butterscotch, ripe peach, honey, and then right at the end of the finish, that funky little ancho chili earthy note. Complex. Layered. The kind of whiskey that rewards slowing down.

Number two is also excellent, but in a completely different direction. Toffee and caramel up front, but then this overarching oak character that's balanced really well. Some anise in there too. It's a more straightforward bourbon profile, but beautifully executed. Clean and sweet with enough oak backbone to keep it from tipping into candy territory.

Number three has a little edge on it. A touch of grain spice, some ethanol showing through in a way the other two don't have. Not bad at all, still a good whiskey. Sweet undertones with apricot or pear and maple syrup, but comparatively it feels a little thin. Where one and two feel fully resolved, three feels like it's still working something out.

I go back and forth through all three a few times. One is pulling clear ahead. Two is excellent and would be my everyday pick for anyone. Three is good, just outgunned tonight.

The Guess

Going into this blind I had strong opinions coming in. I've been a Bulleit fan for years. I've been a Still Austin evangelist since I first had the Cask Strength Bourbon. And I respected Heaven Hill without being particularly attached to it.

After going through these multiple times, here's where I land:

Number one, with that ancho chili complexity and the dark layered sweetness, has to be Still Austin. That character is unmistakable, or at least I think it is.

Number two, with the classic caramel-toffee-oak profile and that clean drinkability, feels like Bulleit to me. Correct in all the expected ways, nothing weird, just solid well-built bourbon.

Number three, lighter and grainer, must be Heaven Hill. The bottle I barely remembered.

I score them:

• Number 1: 8.4
• Number 2: 8.2
• Number 3: 7.2

And I'll be honest, I'm scoring number one higher partly for complexity and distinctiveness. If you asked me which one I'd reach for on the second or third pour of the evening, it would probably be number two. Easier to drink, more versatile. It would be a disservice to drink number one while distracted.

The Reveal

Well. That was humbling.

Number one is Still Austin. Got that right.

But two and three? Completely backwards. Number two, the one I called beautifully balanced Bulleit with the toffee and clean oak, is Heaven Hill. The bottle I forgot about. The one I had no emotional attachment to. The one I wasn't supposed to care about.

And number three, the thin one with the grain spice and the ethanol edge that I scored a 7.2? That's Bulleit. My whiskey of the year.

I had to go back and check everything. I pulled out all the bottles, new pours blind and unblind, looked at the labels, and then immediately blinded them again. Same result. Bulleit is number three. Every time.

What to Do With That

Here's the thing. A 7.2 is a Great score. I would absolutely recommend Bulleit Bottled in Bond to anyone. If you're curious about what Bulleit actually tastes like when it's made in-house and aged properly, this bottle is worth trying. There's real quality there that absolutely takes it up a notch or two. I would also say if you like high rye its well worth a shot.

But I prefer dark, rich, sweet bourbons. I almost always bounce off high-rye profiles when I'm sipping neat. I know this about myself. I just sort of forgot it when I was telling myself the story about Bulleit BiB being my whiskey of the year. To be honest I didn't even know it was high rye until I sat down to write today. I was excited about what the bottle represented, which is Bulleit finally distilling their own juice after years of sourcing, and that excitement colored everything.

The comparison was the thing that clarified it. Without Heaven Hill and Still Austin in the same lineup, Bulleit's grain-forward spice reads as complexity. Sitting next to two bourbons that are richer and more resolved at the same proof and similar age, it reads as thin. I think its also suffering right now from trying to split the difference between the other two, both sweet and spicy but not doing either one at an excellent level. Think reality cooking show where the chef which executes the basics correctly wins over the other who tried to do too much.

I keep thinking about the Four Roses OBSQ single barrel I scored a 9.0. That's also a high-rye bourbon. But it's 11 years and 9 months old, and that age has done something to the rye. It's integrated. It's not fighting anything. Bulleit at 7 years might just need more time for the rye to settle down. Or maybe the answer is simpler: high-rye bourbons are always going to be better in my glass when they're building a cocktail, not sitting in a Glencairn. At least for most of them.

Heaven Hill, meanwhile, is suddenly a bottle I need to spend more time with. The fact that I forgot about it and then scored it an 8.2 blind says more about it than anything I could write.

Takeaways

Still Austin Red Corn BiB wins this blind at an 8.4. Complex, layered, and genuinely unlike anything else on the market. If you enjoy whiskeys that make you stop and think, this is your bottle.

Heaven Hill Bottled in Bond earns an 8.2 and comes out the biggest surprise of the night. A classic sweet Kentucky bourbon that delivers more than its reputation suggests. Excellent for beginners, underrated for everyone else.

Bulleit Bottled in Bond scores a 7.2. Great bourbon, especially if you love rye-forward profiles. Put it in a cocktail and it will absolutely deliver. Just know what you're getting into before you sit with it neat next to richer competition.

Full reviews on all three are coming over the next few weeks. Make sure to come back to make sure the scores stay put.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com. Not sponsored, not gifted, bought myself at retail.

TL;DR

Weller Special Reserve is Buffalo Trace's entry-level wheated bourbon, 90 proof, NAS, around $30 MSRP. It placed second in a five-bottle blind tasting against EW BiB, Buffalo Trace, Benchmark Bonded, and Old Grand Dad, which is honestly a better result than its flavor profile suggests. The nose is light, the palate delivers honey and soft oak without much complexity, and the finish doesn't linger. It's a clean, easy drinker that works best when you're not asking it to be more than that. Worth MSRP, not worth hunting, and not worth the $40 someone wanted to charge me once. If you want something soft and uncomplicated, this is a reliable answer.

Quality Score - 5.8 Good - Good, just fine

Value Score - 5.0 Baseline Value - MSRP is spot on

Nose - 5.0

Honey, caramel, light oak, quiet.

Palate - 6.0

Honey, soft oak, vanilla, light cinnamon.

Finish - 5.0

Clean, short exit, faint oak warmth.

Neck Pour

2025

>Soft, easy, and entirely forgettable. Which turns out to be its own kind of selling point.

I almost bought this bottle at a store I don't usually visit. I got there a few minutes too late, the shelf was already empty, and someone had just walked out with the last one. I remember being mildly annoyed. Looking back, I'm not sure it mattered. The store wanted $40 for a 750, which is just past the point where WSR makes sense as a purchase.

My first bottle eventually came from somewhere with better pricing and lower expectations. I opened it, poured a glass, and it was fine. Honey, some light oak, a little vanilla. Nothing pushed back. Nothing surprised me. It just sat there being pleasant, which for a 90 proof wheater is probably the whole point.

The nose is quiet. There's caramel and honey up front, a little sweetness that doesn't really develop into anything. The palate delivers on those same notes without adding much to them. Honey and soft oak, a clean finish that doesn't linger. It's the bourbon equivalent of a polite handshake.

I didn't love it. I didn't dislike it. I finished the pour, thought about what to reach for next, and moved on.

Blind Pour

May 16, 2026

>It fooled me, and the fact that it fooled me tells you most of what you need to know.

This one went into the Budget Bourbon Boogaloo blind tasting alongside Evan Williams BiB, Buffalo Trace, Benchmark Bonded, and Old Grand Dad Bonded. My wife poured. I had no idea what was in the glasses.

Going in blind, WSR came through as Sample 3. The nose was short, not much there up front. The palate had a little cinnamon toward the end, but nothing dramatic. My first pass through I noted it was pleasant and kept moving. Then I kept going back to it. I wrote in my notes that it wasn't asking anything of me, that it was approachable and easy and genuinely pleasant to drink, and that there was something to that.

I guessed it was Buffalo Trace. The reason I got it wrong is actually pretty telling. WSR had the quieter nose and the more drinkable palate. BT had the showier nose and couldn't quite back it up. I had them switched in my head because I was pattern-matching off the nose, and WSR barely has one.

It came in second overall at 5.8, just behind EW BiB. That's not where I expected it to land, but after thinking about it, I get it. The most drinkable thing in the lineup doesn't have to be the most interesting. Full breakdown in the Budget Bourbon Boogaloo blind tasting post.

Open Pour

May 22, 2026

>Refreshingly light, and that's both its strength and its ceiling.

The bottle is well into its middle section now and nothing has changed. That's about what I expected. Low proof wheaters don't tend to evolve dramatically with air. What you get at the start is what you get at the end.

The wheat mashbill keeps everything soft. No rye bite, no aggressive barrel push. At 90 proof the corn sweetness comes through cleanly but without a lot of force behind it. It's a lighter body bourbon by design, and the chill filtration smooths out whatever edges might have been there. The result is a clean, uncomplicated pour. Exactly what it was built to be.

I don't reach for this bottle when I want something to think about. I do reach for it when I want something that won't get in the way. There's a real use case there. It's the kind of thing you pour for someone who says they don't really drink bourbon, and it works every time.

On value: $30 MSRP is fine. The bottle earns that price. But the secondary market situation makes it mostly academic. If you find it for $25 or less, buy it. If someone wants $40 or more for it, leave it on the shelf. The whiskey is good. It's not that good. That's a lesson I almost learned firsthand.

It's not a bottle I'm going to chase. But it has a permanent seat in the Weller lineup, and for anyone building a collection that needs a solid wheated daily drinker, it makes the case for itself quietly and without drama. Which, again, is kind of the whole point.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com. Not sponsored, not gifted, bought myself at retail.