TL;DR

Evan Williams Bottled in Bond is a Heaven Hill product distilled in Louisville, bottled in Bardstown, and built to the exacting standards of the Bottled in Bond Act: one distillery, one season, 100 proof, minimum four years in oak. The mashbill is 78% corn, 10% rye, 12% malted barley, and the profile leans into the Heaven Hill house character: malty, earthy, sweet at the core with some rough edges and a thin exit that don't go away with time. In a five bottle blind against Weller Special Reserve, Buffalo Trace, Benchmark Bonded, and Old Grand Dad Bonded, it took the top spot. At $20 to $22 it is one of the most honest value plays in bourbon. Not the bottle I reach for when I have better options open, but a genuinely capable pour that earns its place on any shelf.

Quality Score - 6.0 Very Good - A cut above

Value Score - 6.5 Fair Value - MSRP is a good deal but don't overspend

Nose - 4.1

Malt, vanilla, brown sugar, ethanol presence.

Palate - 6.1

Barley, baking spice, caramel, nuttiness.

Finish - 5.5

Warm, orange peel, thin exit, faint acetone.

Neck Pour

March 20, 2026

>I switched to Evan Williams from Jim Beam years ago and never looked back. I just couldn't remember why until I opened this bottle.

I don't have notes from my first pour of Evan Williams Bottled in Bond. I'm not sure I could tell you what year it was. What I remember is that I was deep into whiskey sours at the time, making them constantly, and I had been a Jim Beam guy. Someone pointed out that Evan Williams was cheaper and hit harder at 100 proof, and that was enough. I made the switch and didn't think much more about it. It lived on my shelf as the workhorse bottle for a long time.

That was years ago. The bottle I'm reviewing now got its first pour on March 20, 2026. I hadn't kept Evan Williams on regular rotation in a while, so cracking this one felt a little like checking in on an old habit. Named for the man credited with opening Kentucky's first commercial distillery back in 1783, the brand itself has become the second largest selling bourbon in the country. The BiB expression came along in 2012, and it's the version of the bottle most serious bourbon drinkers point to when they want to make the value argument.

I could smell the fingerprints of the distillery on this one immediately. I had been drinking something else from the same house recently and the family resemblance was there on the nose. Amber with some red in the glass. The nose is malty with vanilla and brown sugar underneath, and there is more ethanol presence than I expected at 100 proof. Not harsh exactly, but it announces itself. On the palate you get barley and baking spice on top of a sweeter caramel base. The finish is warm, medium length, with a little orange that shows up late. I won't pretend it isn't rough around the edges. There's a nuttiness to it and something a little thin and acetone-adjacent on the exit. But the Heaven Hill malty earthiness is in there doing its thing, and the whole package is genuinely enjoyable. It's dialed back compared to others in that distillery's lineup. At this price that's not a complaint.

Blind Pour

May 16, 2026

>My old go-to showed up and reminded me why it earned that spot.

The Budget Bourbon Boogaloo was a five bottle blind my wife poured for me: Weller Special Reserve, Evan Williams Bottled in Bond, Old Grand Dad Bonded, Benchmark Bonded, and Buffalo Trace. Everything in the lineup was under $30. The goal was simple. Put the label face down and let the whiskey do the talking.

Sample 5 was EW, though I didn't know that going in. On the nose there was something earthier and a little funky underneath a core of familiar sweetness. Caramel and vanilla doing the expected work, but with something else adding body. On the palate the funk was balanced rather than overwhelming, with some fruit weaving through it. It wasn't the prettiest bottle of the evening but it was the most complete. I kept going back to it.

Before the reveal I called Sample 5 as EW specifically because of that earthier quality underneath the sweetness. I had the WSR and BT swapped, but the EW call was clean. When the reveal confirmed it I wasn't surprised. The earthiness that could have read as a liability was doing real work in the glass. It added depth and body without taking over. That's the thing about this bottle blind: it just keeps earning your attention.

EW took the top spot in the ranking at 6.0, edging out WSR at 5.8 and BT at 5.6. Full breakdown and notes on all five bottles are in the Budget Bourbon Boogaloo blind tasting post.

Open Pour

May 20, 2026

>Evan Williams Bottled in Bond is exactly what it says it is, every single time.

Two months into this bottle and the profile hasn't moved. No softening, no opening up, no surprises. What I got on March 20 is what I'm getting now. For a bottle at this price point, that kind of consistency is worth something. You know what you're buying.

The BiB designation means something here beyond the marketing. One distillation season, one distillery, government supervised aging, exactly 100 proof. The 78% corn mashbill keeps this in familiar bourbon sweetness territory, with the rye low enough at 10% that the spice stays quiet. What you're really tasting is the Heaven Hill house character, that malty earthiness that runs through the whole portfolio, just turned down a notch. The rough edges I noted on the neck pour are still there. The thin exit is still there. These aren't flaws that resolve with time. They're just part of the profile at this proof and this price.

In the blind it beat out Buffalo Trace, Weller Special Reserve, Benchmark Bonded, and Old Grand Dad. That result held up with no asterisks. It won because the earthiness that might put some people off was actually the most interesting thing in the lineup. It had more going on than anything else in that $25 bracket.

At $20 to $22 this is a legitimate buy. I'm not reaching for it on most nights when I have better options open, but it earns its place. If you want something with actual depth at a price that doesn't require any justification, this is it. If you're new to bourbon and want to understand what Heaven Hill's house character tastes like without spending much to find out, start here. And if you've been sleeping on it because the label is plain and the price is low, that's on you.

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

TL;DR

Old Grand-Dad Bonded is a high-rye straight bourbon from Jim Beam, 100 proof, bottled in bond, somewhere north of four years old, and priced right around $25. It went last in a five-bottle budget blind tasting where context worked against it — a pepper-forward, high-rye spice profile is a tough sell in round four of a back-to-back comparison. Alone in a Glencairn it shows vanilla, orange, caramel, cinnamon, and a funky rye-spiced finish that actually has something to say. The reputation is deserved, and I understand why people love it. It just isn't the bottle I keep coming back to. If high-rye is your thing and you haven't spent $25 on this yet, you should. If you're somewhere in the middle on rye spice, there are other bottles at this price point that'll serve you better.

Quality Score - 5.0 "Good - Good, just fine"
Value Score - 4.1 "Poor Value - I'm complaining about price"

Nose - 4.0

Vanilla, oak, and orange with a raw grain dustiness underneath that never fully resolves. Tells you what you're dealing with before the first sip.

Palate - 5.2

Caramel and oak up front, then pepper and cinnamon take over. The rye is doing real work and not being subtle about it.

Finish - 5.0

Funky rye spice with lingering cinnamon. A little wild on the exit. Medium length, nothing that makes you chase it.

Neck Pour

2023

>I cracked it, poured it, and put it back on the shelf. That was my review for two years.

Old Grand-Dad Bonded has a reputation in budget bourbon circles that borders on mythological. A hundred proof, high-rye, under $25, and one of the most recommended bottles you'll find on any corner of the internet where people argue about whiskey. That reputation is why I bought it in the first place. I had no particular reason to doubt it.

I did anyway.

My first bottle was just off. Not in any catastrophic way, but off in a way that's hard to shake. The nose had that raw grain thing going on, almost dusty, and the palate didn't pull it together the way I expected. Lots of alcohol presence, unbalanced, with a funky profile that didn't read as interesting — it just read as unresolved. I got through some of it and stopped reaching for it. Eventually I stopped thinking about it.

What kept it in the back of my mind was the reputation. Not the marketing. The quiet, persistent word of mouth from people who don't have a reason to oversell a $25 bottle. That's a different kind of signal. So when I put together a budget blind tasting and OGD was a natural inclusion, I figured it was time to give it another look. And when that was done, I figured I owed it a full sit-down.

Blind Pour

May 16, 2026

>It announced itself immediately. That was the problem.

See the full writeup here: Budget Bourbon Boogaloo

The lineup was five bottles all under $30: Weller Special Reserve, Evan Williams Bottled in Bond, Old Grand-Dad Bonded, Benchmark Bonded, and Buffalo Trace. My wife poured and labeled them. I had no idea what was in which glass.

Sample 4 didn't make me work for it. Cardamom and cloves up front, pepper on the exit, leather underneath. Layers, no question. I kept going back and forth between wanting to call it ginger and then crossing that out. It was the most distinct thing on the table and I knew immediately what the high-rye spice profile meant. I guessed OGD before the reveal without much hesitation, and I was right.

The problem was context. Tasting five bourbons back to back in a single sitting rewards certain profiles and punishes others. A bottle with some sweetness and crushability is going to read better in round five than a bottle that leads with pepper and demands your attention from the first sip. OGD got a 5.0 and landed last in the ranking. I don't think that's a dishonest score. But I also don't think it's the whole story. When you're calibrating one whiskey against four others in rapid succession, the one that hits hardest in the wrong direction is going to pay for it. OGD paid for it.

I said in my takeaway that the rye spice is real, the layers are there, and it's worth a try if high-rye is your thing. I meant that. I also meant it when I said it wasn't the bottle I was reaching for. Both of those things are true, and they're easier to say when you're comparing it to four other bottles at the same time. Alone in a Glencairn is a different conversation.

Open Pour

May 19, 2026

>This is a better bottle than I gave it credit for. It is also exactly the bottle I thought it was.

Two months in, poured neat in a Glencairn, Old Grand-Dad Bonded reads differently than it did in either of my previous encounters. The nose opens with vanilla and oak, some orange coming through, and underneath all of it that same raw grain dustiness I picked up in the blind. It's not a flaw. In this context it's just part of the character. The palate has sweet caramel and oak but also real pepper and cinnamon, and the finish is funky in that rye-forward way — medium length, more cinnamon, a little wild on the exit.

The mashbill explains most of this. 63% corn, 27% rye, 10% malted barley. That rye percentage is more than double what you'd find in a standard Beam product. It's why this bottle tastes the way it does, and it's why my first bottle put me off — at a lower proof with less development, that rye can read as harsh rather than spiced. This bottle is better. Whether that's the batch, whether it's time on my palate, or both, I can't say for certain.

There's a footnote worth including here. Beam Suntory also makes Basil Hayden, named after the same Meredith Basil Hayden Sr. that Old Grand-Dad honors — his grandson Raymond named the brand after him. Same distillery, same mashbill, 80 proof, premium packaging, two to three times the price. My wife's favorite bottle, actually, though she'd be the first to admit it's as much sentiment as anything else. The pitch on OGD Bonded has always been that it's the honest version of that story: more proof, more flavor, less marketing. I think that pitch is basically right.

I also think it depends on what you're looking for. If you want a bottle that works in a cocktail without thinking about it, OGD earns its keep. The rye spice carries through sugar and water without losing itself. Neat, it's a 5.0 bottle for me. The value score sits at 4.1, and the honest answer behind that number is that I'm not buying another one. This is a bottle for certain moods and certain applications, and mine don't come around often enough to justify the shelf space. If you like high-rye profiles and you've never spent $25 on it, you should. If you're somewhere in the middle on rye spice, there are other bottles at this price point that'll make you happier.

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

Five Bottles. One Blind. Zero Shame.

Let me set the scene for you.

I've got 5 bottles with the labels hidden, a notepad, and the creeping suspicion that this could either go really well or completely humiliate my palate in front of the internet. Tonight I'm blind tasting 5 of my favorite budget bourbons, all under $30, and ranking them against each other with no labels to bail me out.

The lineup: Weller Special Reserve, Evan Williams Bottled in Bond, Old Grand Dad Bonded, Benchmark Bonded, and Buffalo Trace. Yes, I'm aware that WSR and BT are getting price gouged to 3 to 4 times MSRP in a lot of markets right now. These 2 I was lucky enough to grab at or under $30. Old Grand Dad came in at $25. EW is $22. Benchmark is the bargain of the bunch at $17, and honestly that's part of why we're here tonight.

The whole thing started when I picked up the Benchmark Bonded on a whim. It's been recommended to me a few times and I'd already tried the full proof and didn't care for it. Too hot, too unbalanced, and I drink neat so adding water wasn't in the cards. But the bonded version is a different story. Good enough that my first instinct was to compare it to Eagle Rare, which is a ridiculous thing to say about a $17 bottle of bourbon. I don't think it actually gets there, but the fact that I had the thought at all was enough to make me want to put it in a proper blind.

And yes, I can already see the comments: the full proof is better. No. It isn't. It's overproof and completely unbalanced. Could I add water or ice? Sure. Am I going to? No. Moving on.

Some Context Before the Labels Come Off

It's worth knowing a little about where I'm coming from with these bottles, because it shapes what I'm expecting going in.

Evan Williams Bottled in Bond was my budget go-to for years. Before that it was Jim Beam. EW felt like a step up and it stuck. I remember dark cherry on it, and I have a soft spot for it that I'm well aware of. More recently I've been exploring the $50 range, so it's been a while since I've spent real time with these bottles. But the bias is there.

Old Grand Dad is probably the black sheep of this group for me personally. I had it early in my collecting days and there was a funk to it that I could not get past. More of a nutty/leathery quality. I now know its what Beam is known for. At the time I wasn't sure what to make of it. Maybe I've grown. Maybe I haven't. We'll see.

On the mash bill side: Benchmark and Buffalo Trace share the same low-rye Buffalo Trace mash bill, estimated around 10 to 12% rye. WSR is the only wheater of the bunch at around 16% wheat. OGD is a high-rye at 27% rye. EW sits at 10% rye. That means Weller should be the softest of the night, BT and Benchmark should be similar in character with proof being the main variable, OGD should be the spicy outlier, and EW should be familiar territory for me.

All 5 are sitting at either 90 or 100 proof. The consistency there was intentional. I wanted proof to be less of a wild card and the actual juice to do the work.

Alright. Let's find out how wrong I am.

The Nose

Sample 1 opens with sweet vanilla and cherry, light and a little bright. The cherry, though, is not a good cherry. It's that cheap maraschino cherry that comes in a jar and glows an unnatural shade of red. You know the one. It's a little artificial and a little aggressive, but there's sweetness underneath it.

Sample 2 is immediately different. Darker on the nose, more oak presence, less forward vanilla. This one has some depth to it before I've even taken a sip. Honestly, best nose of the 5 by a pretty clear margin. High hopes for this one.

Sample 3 doesn't have much to say. Cherry and vanilla again, similar territory to Sample 1 but without the medicinal quality. Quieter. Clean, even.

Sample 4 goes dusty on me. Some oak, maybe a little strawberry, and something that a certain kind of reviewer would call leather. I'll just say it's dry and a little rough.

Sample 5 is also in dusty oak territory, but where Sample 4 went fruity, this one leans toward brown sugar. A little warmer, a little sweeter.

Heading into the palate: Sample 2 has my attention. Everything else is either promising or TBD.

The Palate

I'm going to walk through all 5, but know that I went back to each of these at least 3 times. First impressions can lie.

Sample 1 is good. Maybe even very good on the first pass. Standard bourbon flavors done well, caramel and vanilla fading into light oak with some fruit underneath. It's enjoyable. The problem is that it takes a second or third sip to notice it, but there is something slightly artificial about this one on the palate. Not offensive, just off. Like someone made a very convincing imitation of sweetness using something that isn't quite sugar. You don't catch it until you're comparing it to something else, but once you catch it you can't un-catch it.

Sample 2 is also good, verging on very good, but it falls flat compared to what the nose promised. There's honey in there and a hint of baking spice with a sweet finish that doesn't stick around long. The gap between nose and palate is a little disappointing. I keep going back to it hoping it will deliver and it keeps being fine.

Sample 3 has another short finish and not much happening on the front end. A little cinnamon at the end, nothing dramatic. Here's the thing though: I keep going back to it. And the more I do, the more I like it. It's not asking anything of me. It's just approachable and easy and genuinely pleasant to drink. There's something to that.

Sample 4 is different. Cardamom and cloves up front, peppery on the exit with some leather underneath. It's got layers, I'll give it that. I kept going back and forth between wanting to call it ginger and then crossing that out. The pepper note really dominates and it's not exactly what I reach for. Certainly interesting. Just not my thing.

Sample 5 is good to very good, sweeter with caramel and vanilla and then something earthier and a little funky underneath. The funk is balanced here rather than overwhelming, and there's some fruit weaving through it. When funk works it works, and when it doesn't it takes over everything. This one is riding the line well.

Before the Reveal, My Guesses

I can't help myself.

Samples 2 and 3 are both falling flat, which points to WSR and BT at 90 proof. The darker oak on the nose of Sample 2 made me think Weller for whatever reason, so I'm calling Sample 2 as WSR and Sample 3 as BT. Sample 4 is a pretty obvious giveaway with the high-rye spice profile, so that has to be OGD. If Sample 1 has that artificial sweetness thing, I'm calling it Benchmark. Which makes Sample 5 the EW. That earthier quality and the familiar sweetness underneath tracks.

Ratings going into the reveal: Sample 4 at 5.0, Sample 1 at 5.2, Sample 2 at 5.6, Sample 3 at 5.8, and Sample 5 at 6.0. Samples 3 and 5 are splitting hairs. I could go back and forth on those 2 all night and I considered putting both at a 5.9. But I have to commit to something.

The Reveal

"God this could go so poorly" is genuinely all I'm thinking right now.

Sample 1: Benchmark Bonded. Called it. The artificial sweetness makes a lot more sense now. 5.2.

Sample 2: Buffalo Trace. Oh. So I had the WSR and BT completely backwards. BT had the best nose of the evening and that darker, oaky profile made me think Weller. I can see why. They're closer than I expected. 5.6.

Sample 3: Weller Special Reserve. So that was the wheater all along. The soft, clean, crushable character makes complete sense for WSR in hindsight. 5.8.

Sample 4: Old Grand Dad. Zero surprise here. The high-rye spice profile announced itself immediately. 5.0.

Sample 5: Evan Williams Bottled in Bond. There it is. My old go-to, still showing up. 6.0.

What I'm Taking Away From This

Mixing up the WSR and BT is the most interesting outcome of the night to me. Both landed close together in the rankings, which tracks, but they got there differently. BT had the best nose and couldn't quite back it up on the palate. WSR had a quiet nose and then revealed itself as the most drinkable bottle of the evening. That's a real difference in how these 2 show up.

EW taking the top spot doesn't feel like bias to me. The earthiness that could have been a liability was actually doing real work in the glass, adding depth and body without overwhelming anything. Some people will not enjoy that quality and I get it. If you want something sweet and clean, WSR or BT is your answer. If you want something with more going on, EW gets there.

The Benchmark result is the one I keep thinking about. It put in a solid first impression and then started losing ground with every return visit. That artificial quality is something you don't notice right away, but once you do it's hard to ignore. I went in thinking it might challenge the top of this lineup and it unfortunately landed mid. Given that I had it first, and thought it was quite good initially makes me think it has potential if its the only thing you drink that night.

BT had the best nose, hit the right flavor notes on paper, honey and baking spice and a clean finish, and I still couldn't put it above WSR or EW. The nose-to-palate gap was just too much. It being surprisingly distinct from the Benchmark is also a big part of why I misidentified it as Weller. Same mash bill, but at 90 proof it reads pretty differently than Benchmark at 100.

OGD in last place. No hate, but not for me. The rye spice is real, the layers are there, and I'll give it full credit for presenting more to unpack than anything else tonight. But the pepper dominance kept pushing me away. Worth a try if high-rye is your thing and you want to spend $25. Not the bottle I'm reaching for.

Final Ranking

Rank	Bottle	Score
1	Evan Williams Bottled in Bond	6.0
2	Weller Special Reserve	5.8
3	Buffalo Trace	5.6
4	Benchmark Bonded	5.2
5	Old Grand Dad Bonded	5.0

Everything here lands solidly in the Good category, with EW just edging into Very Good territory. For a lineup that tops out at $30 that's a solid outcome. These are all capable, honest bottles of bourbon and any of them can make a real case for your favorite.

On value: EW is my winner here. At $22 it's only $5 more than Benchmark and in my opinion the better bottle by a clear margin. BT and WSR are both good value and could be the right call depending on your palate, but only at actual MSRP and honestly only if by some miracle you find them $25 or lower. If you're hunting them and paying secondary prices, that math changes fast.

If I had to sum up how I'd use these: EW for the first pour when I want something with some depth, WSR for everything after that when I just want to drink without thinking about it.

Full reviews for each of these bottles are coming in the next week or so. And if you've got a budget bottle you think I'm sleeping on, drop it in the comments.

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

Okay so I've been away from the whiskey for about a week. Was having fun getting the website up and reviews out, but then things that shouldn't feel similar were starting to. So tonight could go well or it could expose me. Should be a fresh palate and clean slate.

Anyway, tonight I asked my wife to pick three bottles out that I haven't reviewed yet. I don't know anything about them except they're somewhere on my list of thirty-five still waiting (yeah it was time to start pacing myself). She brings them up and I check the noses...

They're all totally different.

The Noses

Sample 1 stops me. It is so good. Toffee and vanilla, rich and deep. What the hell did she pick out? So rich and sweet, minimal ethanol.

Sample 2 is good. Almost as good as Sample 1, but completely different in character. Brighter? Maybe just not so sweet. There's something here that reads like rye to me, or maybe just oak doing something specific. Cherry coming through. Still an 8, just in a different way. Markedly familiar, but I can't lock down why.

Sample 3 and I don't hesitate. Peanut and caramel. Jack Daniels. The nose is perfect. Another 8.

Three bottles, three totally different profiles. Which is exactly when I start wondering if I'm about to overhype something.

The Tasting

Sample 1 gets my first sip back. The palate is grainy and woody, not a ton of detail in that initial pass. But the finish! The finish doesn't quit. It keeps going and going. Second sip opens things up. Light cherry, honey, vanilla. So so so good. What is my wife doing to me.

I'm thinking about two bottles in my bar. Both have that absurdly long finish that just haunts you. One's the Penelope 18 Year. The other's Blanton's Straight from the Barrel. The cherry note and my sinuses not being ripped off by a hazmat tips me toward Blanton's. For those who don't know the Penelope 18 Year is an American Light Whiskey and comes in at 140.2 proof making it Hazmat "Per 49 CFR 175.10(a)(4), this concentration is flammable enough to be restricted by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in aircraft." That kind of proof is usually obvious.

Sample 2 is enjoyable. Like really, really enjoyable. Dark cherry, brown sugar. Comes with this developed oak. Markedly familiar like I know I've had something like this recently. Old Forester 100 Proof Single Barrel comes to mind, its been a while and I remember dark cherry. That fits. I like Old Forester, and this is hitting that same territory. I don't remember it being this good. This is great but not excellent. The oak tonight though is just a bit off for me; good, but just takes this down a notch from excellence with some bitterness.

Sample 3 is the one I'm actually confident about. Toasted marshmallow, toffee, oak char hitting like only Jack Daniel's can, then all that sweetness pulling it back into drinkability. This is Jack Daniel's Heritage Barrel. Has to be.

My wife makes me lock these in before the reveal. So here goes, my guess is Sample 1 -> Blanton's Straight from the Barrel and I'm scoring it an 8.7. Sample 2 -> Old Forester Single Barrel 100 Proof and I'm scoring it a 7.9. Sample 3 -> Jack Daniel's Single Barrel Heritage Barrel and I'm scoring it a 7.6.

The Reveal

Sample 1 was Penelope 18 Year American Light Whiskey.

I was so close. What's killing me is how could I write that "low-ethanol" note on the nose. Literally in my own handwriting. I was certain this was not 140 proof. Just that wonderful sweet nose. Maybe I can blame that its been open a few months. Doesn't matter. The 8.7 holds. This is an impressive bottle.

Sample 2 was Weller Full Proof Single Barrel.

Ah. Of course it felt familiar. I'd just reviewed the 107, which is close but not quite. This is a step up on mouthfeel and overall punch, except tonight there was some bitter oak that didn't want to move. Drinking well below on the proof for me to think 100 proof rather than its actual 114 proof. Could I have scored it higher had I not just come from the Penelope? Maybe. But for now I'm standing by 7.9. It's excellent whiskey and a clear upgrade from the 107 (which I gave a 7.1). I will give it a revisit to see if that bitter oak dissapates without having it right next to the Penelope.

Sample 3 was Jack Daniel's Single Barrel Heritage Barrel.

Got that one right. Honestly held its own against two heavyweights. Maybe a touch over-oaked some might say, but offers a really nice and different profile. Maybe a hair too easy to drink if I'm honest. But I prefer it to the Woodford Reserve Double Oaked which I certainly consider over oaked, and the 7.6 stands.

What Actually Happened

Feel hoenstly pretty good about the scores I gave which is great. These three could not be more different and quite the test. I think my wife might have been paying more attention to me when I talk whiskey than I gave her credit for...

Going to kick myself over the Blanton's guess. But I did write down cherry and low ethanol. Not that my Straight from the Barrel is low proof I think its 127, but I remember that Penelope kicking me in my sinuses the first time I opened it. Maybe some evaporated, maybe its because I wasn't in a glencairn glass.

The Penelope is the real winner tonight. Clean, sweet, long finish, exactly what you should be hunting for. I do think the Weller was surprising tonight, I haven't noticed that developed oak bite before in that bottle, its usually much cleaner on the palate. I'm going to have to do a revisit, I think it was a fluke from coming off that hazmat Penelope.

Full reviews on all these bottles coming shortly or may already be live by the time this is posted so check them out.

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

TL;DR

Jack Daniel's Single Barrel Heritage Barrel is a 100 proof Tennessee whiskey built on the standard Jack Daniel's mashbill but aged entirely in a heavily toasted, low-char barrel from day one, with a notably low 100 proof barrel entry. The result is banana cream, toasted marshmallow, and vanilla sweetness up front, with that unmistakable Jack Daniel's oak char backbone showing up restrained and refined rather than leading with the sledgehammer. It held its own in a blind tasting against serious competition and has converted every guest I've put it in front of. At $70 MSRP it's a genuinely interesting bottle with a real production story behind it. At $80, which is where it tends to sit in practice, whether the price is fair is up to you.

Quality Score 8.0 "Excellent - Really quite exceptional"

Value Score 5.0 "Baseline Value - MSRP is spot on"

Nose 7.5

Banana cream, toasted marshmallow, vanilla sweetness, a little cinnamon.

Palate 8.1

Rich and sweet, the toasted barrel doing real work without announcing itself. Toasted marshmallow, banana, and brown sugar. That Jack Daniel's backbone is present but restrained.

Finish 7.4

Brown sugar and gentle oak char lingers briefly. Nothing here is demanding or difficult.

Neck Pour

May 13, 2026

>Jack Daniel's description on the label was the first time I've ever thought a bottle described itself accurately.

I found this one on a roadtrip home for Thanksgiving, spotted it on a shelf in Idaho while Montana was still slow to see distribution. Bought it on impulse.

Cracked it at Thanksgiving with the family alongside the Woodford Reserve Double Oak, which I'd brought as the crowd-pleaser. It worked. The family went for the Double Oak and left me more of the Heritage Barrel, so no complaints. On first nose I got exactly what the label promised: banana cream, toasted marshmallow, vanilla sweetness, a little cinnamon. That Jack Daniel's backbone present but restrained, more of a signature than a statement.

First sip confirmed the direction. This isn't Jack Daniel's coming at you with the volume turned up. It's the same DNA rearranged into something more refined. The palate is rich and sweet, the toasted barrel doing real work without announcing itself. The finish lingers with brown sugar and a gentle oak char. Smooth enough that you have to remind yourself this is 100 proof. What I didn't expect was how complete it felt at that proof, given that my reference point for Jack Daniel's special releases is the Single Barrel Barrel Proof, which is a different animal entirely.

The bottle description stopped me: vanilla, marshmallow, toffee, brown sugar. Every whiskey label says something like that. This one meant it and beat my expectations. Not because I expected it to be bad, but because I expected a finish product, something sweetened and softened on top of an existing whiskey. What I got instead was a bottle that had been built this way from the first day it went into the barrel.

Blind Pour

May 6, 2026

>Zero hesitation. This bottle has an identity you don't mistake.

My wife picked three bottles from the unreviewed backlog without telling me what they were. Full post on that tasting here. When I got to Sample 3, I didn't pause. Toasted marshmallow, toffee, that specific oak char Jack Daniel's produces. There's a sensory fingerprint here that survives label removal. I called it before the first sip was finished.

Context did some damage on the score. Coming off Sample 1 and Sample 2, both running harder and hitting differently, the Heritage Barrel's more measured 100 proof profile reads softer than it deserves to in isolation. The 7.6 I gave it blind was honest to the moment, but I've revised that up to 8.0 on reflection. It was the third bottle in that lineup. That's a lineup problem, not a whiskey problem.

What it did well even in that context was hold its identity. It didn't get lost. It just tasted exactly like itself, which is more than a lot of bottles can say.

Open Pour

May 13, 2026

>Jack Daniel's Single Barrel Barrel Proof crossed with toasted marshmallow crème brûlée, proofed down without losing the plot.

The bottle hasn't changed much since opening, and I expected that. There isn't much here you'd want to mellow out. The profile is already settled and coherent from the first pour, partly proof, partly the nature of what the toasting process produces: a whiskey that's already integrated rather than one still working something out.

What makes this bottle interesting technically is that it isn't a finish. The whiskey aged entirely in the toasted heritage barrel from day one, no secondary treatment. Barrels are toasted for 24 minutes, twice as long as standard Jack Daniel's cooperage, then flash-charred to just barely qualify under Tennessee whiskey regulations. Combined with a 100 proof barrel entry, well below the standard 125, the result pulls more wood sugars into the spirit over time and produces something that reads sweet without being sugared. That distinction matters to me. I've had a mixed history with toasted barrel finishes, and the Maker's Mark Keeper's Release is a good example of why. That bottle used toasted oak staves and came out so wood forward and dry it read like fresh lumber, especially on opening. The Heritage Barrel avoids all of that, and I think it avoids it precisely because the toasting is baked into the aging process rather than layered on top of a finished whiskey.

The strongest argument for this bottle is the guest pour. I've served it at a family Thanksgiving and at my wedding tasting, and it converts. The banana cream note is so distinctive that I rarely have a guest not find it, and that shared moment of recognition is a genuinely fun entry point into showing people how tastings work. Most people who don't drink whiskey have a preformed opinion about Jack Daniel's. This tends to revise it.

My only real reservation is the price. I paid around $80 on both of my bottles, above the $69.99 MSRP, which meant hunting a few hours north to find it. At $70 the value proposition is solid for a well-made, distinctive Tennessee whiskey with a real production story behind it. At $80, which is where it seems to have settled locally, the quality score has to carry the weight. It does, but just barely. The third bottle is waiting for prices to come down.

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

TL;DR

Caramel, dark cherry, and vanilla on the nose, sweet and smooth on the palate with good oak and baking spice, and a finish that is plenty long even if it's the weakest link on an otherwise excellent bottle. It held up in two separate blinds and has only confirmed itself over a year of pours. MSRP on single barrel picks runs around $85. At that price it's an easy buy. I paid $120 and would go to $130. Past that you're paying for the name as much as the whiskey, and there are great bottles that don't require that hunt.

Quality Score - 8.9 "Excellent - Really quite exceptional"

Value Score - 8.0 "Very Good Value - Buy on sight, consider even 1.5x MSRP"

Nose - 8.8

Caramel, dark cherry, and vanilla. Rich and sweet, and at 114 proof it has no business being this approachable. No ethanol bite pushing you back. Just inviting.

Palate - 9.0

Caramel, baking spice, and cola. The oak is present and well-integrated, adding weight without bitterness. The mouthfeel is what the Weller Full Proof reputation is built on and in my opinion it earns it completely. Smooth and sweet at a proof that should have more edge than this.

Finish - 8.0

Warm and coating. Crème brûlée fading into a light chocolate note. Plenty long, though relative to how strong the nose and palate are it's the weakest part of the bottle. A minor complaint on an otherwise excellent glass.

Neck Pour

Spring 2024

>First allocated bottle I found in the wild.

Spring 2024, Grizzly Liquor, random weekday. Just walked in and there it was. Barrel #688, a store pick, sitting on the shelf like it wasn't a big deal. If you know Weller, you know how that feels.

This was my first time in the Weller Full Proof profile entirely. No prior frame of reference, just the reputation and the fact that this shares its wheated mashbill with the Pappy Van Winkle lineup. The "poor man's Pappy" framing gets thrown around a lot and I went in skeptical of it. It sets an unfair expectation in both directions. This was also the most I had spent on a bottle at that point, $120, and I was nervous it wouldn't deliver.

It delivered and then some. The nose stopped me immediately. Caramel, dark cherry, vanilla. Rich and sweet without being cloying. At 114 proof it has no business being this approachable, but here we are. First sip was everything the nose promised. Smooth and sweet, good oak with baking spices and cola coming through on the palate. The finish coated and lingered. I didn't need more time with it to know this was something. It went straight to the top of what I'd had, and I've been stingy with it ever since.

Blind Pour

May 6, 2026

>It felt familiar for a reason.

My wife set this one up as part of Wife Pour Wednesday, three bottles from the collection, labels hidden, chosen by her. I didn't know what was in the lineup. She poured, I nosed, I tasted, I locked in scores before the reveal. You can read the full account here.

In that blind this was Sample 2. I had it pegged as Old Forester Single Barrel 100 Proof. Dark cherry, brown sugar, developed oak. Markedly familiar but I couldn't pin down why. I scored it 7.9 and flagged a bitter oak note that was keeping it from excellence.

When my wife flipped the card my reaction was "of course." I had just reviewed the Antique 107 and the family resemblance was sitting right there in front of me the whole time. The Full Proof is a clear step up from the 107 on mouthfeel and density, but that wheated DNA runs through both. As for the bitter oak, I'm now confident that was entirely context. The Penelope 18 Year came first in that session, an American Light Whiskey coming in at 140 proof with that extreme dessert sweetness. Coming off that, everything reads drier, more structured, more oaky. That's not information about the Weller, that's just what happens to your palate after something that extreme. The blind score of 7.9 doesn't reflect this bottle. The full review score is 8.9.

There was also a Christmas 2025 blind where this went up against the Antique 107, Maker's Cask Strength, and the Holladay Soft Red Wheat Rickhouse Proof. I'll be honest that it was a fast session after a few drinks and I didn't give it the scrutiny I normally would. What I can tell you is the Full Proof won. The extra density of flavor and the mouthfeel improvement over the 107 put it there, and every revisit since has backed that result up.

Open Pour

May 12, 2026

>Still that nice rich Weller I first opened.

The bottle has been open over a year and my opinion of it hasn't changed so much as it has settled. It's opened up slightly but the core is the same: rich, sweet, well-integrated oak, no rough edges anywhere. It's confirmed itself over time rather than surprised me.

One thing worth clarifying since it comes up: "Full Proof" does not mean barrel proof. It means Buffalo Trace entered the distillate into the barrel at 114 proof, below the legal maximum of 125, and proofed it back to match that entry point for bottling. The mashbill is Buffalo Trace's Wheated No. 2, the same one behind the Pappy Van Winkle lineup. Wheat in place of rye pulls the profile toward something softer and sweeter, and at 114 proof that matters more than you might expect. This bottle drinks noticeably softer than the number suggests.

I pull it out for occasions and for people with a genuine interest. It lands every time.

I recently had it next to the Holladay Soft Red Wheat Rickhouse Proof to confirm the ordering on my ratings. The Holladay is an excellent bottle and I'd genuinely be curious how others rank the two. It has a longer, more interesting finish and that soft red wheat character is something distinctive worth seeking out on its own terms. I'm just more drawn to what the Weller is doing, that classic approachable wheated bourbon profile at a proof that adds real weight without adding heat.

One thing I want to address directly: in the Wife Pour Wednesday blind I had the Penelope 18 Year ranked above this. I'm reversing that now. The Penelope is genuinely impressive for what it is, but what it is is a 140 proof hazmat dessert whiskey. Tasting anything alongside it or immediately after it is not a fair fight, and the Weller paid for that context in the session. On its own terms, the Full Proof is the more complete and more versatile bottle. The Penelope is a spectacle you pull out on special occasions. This is something you actually want in your glass.

I paid $120. MSRP on single barrel picks runs around $85, though I've seen a wide range at retail. At $85 this is outstanding value. I'd pay up to $130. Past that you're paying for the name as much as the whiskey, and there are great bottles that don't require that hunt.

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

TL;DR

Eighteen years, 140.2 proof, and it drinks softer thanks to that sweetness. The Penelope is clean, sweet, and relentless on the finish. Second-fill oak barrels and a corn-forward mashbill at cask strength. Blind, it held up against genuine competitors with the label off. At $100 this is the right call if you're chasing something different from the bourbon category.

Quality Score: 8.7 - "Excellent - Really quite exceptional"
Value Score: 7.4 - "Good Value - Buying again, would even pay 1.2x MSRP"

Nose: 8.1

Ethanol front and center, but what stops you is the sweetness. Rich vanilla, a little orange zest. Deep and inviting.

Palate: 8.8

Hot but not as caustic as expected. Light cherry, honey, vanilla. Custardy sweetness throughout. Drinks noticeably softer than the proof suggests, but even a 130 proof is still hot.

Finish: 9.2

This is the standout. The finish doesn't quit. Just relentless custardy vanilla. Hot but actually quite pleasant.

Neck Pour

May 11, 2026

>This is my first hazmat whiskey.

The FAA regulates anything above 140 proof as hazardous materials and won't let it fly. I've been hearing about this bottle for a while. Finding it locally felt like a long shot. Usually we're behind on these rare releases, if we even see them. This time we were at the front of the line apparently. Paid $100 for it back in Jan/Feb, which I believe is the MSRP, and I was genuinely excited to crack it open.

First thing on the nose is the ethanol. Front and center. That's what I expected at 140.2 proof. But what really stops me is how sweet this is. Rich vanilla, maybe a little orange zest. Deep and inviting. This is something special.

The palate is hot. Yeah, it's a hazmat. But not as caustic as I was bracing for. You know that moment where you take a sip and you palate just lights up? I didn't have that. Maybe I just went easy on the sip but I don't think so. My tougne is definitely still dissolving. What actually stops me is the finish. Holy crap this goes on forever. Just this custardy vanilla that does not quit. Hot but actually quite pleasant. Light honey and vanilla underneath. So so so good. I keep coming back to that finish. It's relentless in the best way.

This one knocked my socks off. Now it is pricey at $100 (assuming you even find it that cheap). So I don't think its something I can give that high of a value score to, but I would buy this again in a heartbeat.

Blind Pour

May 11, 2026

>First in the blind. Still first with the label on.

See my full post: Wife Pour Wednesday #1

My wife picked three bottles I hadn't reviewed yet. I don't know which is which. I'm tasting blind and she's got me locked in before the reveal. This was Sample 1.

The nose stops me. Toffee and vanilla, rich and deep. So good. I'm standing there thinking what the hell did she pick out. So rich and sweet, minimal ethanol. I can't lock down why. The profile is familiar but I can't place it. On the palate, grainy and woody at first pass, not a ton of detail in that initial moment. But then the finish hits. The finish doesn't quit. It keeps going and going. Second sip opens things up. Light cherry, honey, vanilla. So so so good. What is my wife doing to me.

I'm thinking about two bottles in my bar. Both have that absurdly long finish that just haunts you. One's the Penelope 18 Year. The other's Blanton's Straight from the Barrel. The cherry note and my sinuses not being ripped off by a hazmat tips me toward Blanton's. That combination is hard to fake. I lock in an 8.7 before the reveal.

Then it was the Penelope.

I was so close. What's killing me is how could I write that "low-ethanol" note on the nose in my own handwriting. I was certain this was not 140 proof. Just that wonderful sweet nose. Maybe it's been open a few months and some evaporated. Maybe it's because I wasn't in a Glencairn glass the first time. Doesn't matter. The 8.7 holds.

The blind confirmed something the neck pour already pointed at. The Penelope is clean, sweet, with that finish that's unlike anything I've had. Which isn't that big of a surprise with the high proof and it not being a bourbon. That profile held with the label off. It holds here too. Even when I wasn't sure what I was tasting, I knew it was special.

Open Pour

May 11, 2026

>The sweetness, the mouthfeel, but especially the finish. It's unlike anything I've had.

Mid-bottle now, and the Penelope has mellowed a little but not a ton. There's something interesting happening with the glass. In a Glencairn, that ethanol is front and center. I nose it and I'm right back to thinking about hazmat and heat. In a wider tasting glass, it's completely different. Very pleasant. Inviting. That sent me through a head trip. I suppose the whiskey experts are right about the glass making a difference for nosing. I'm using the Glencairn for this pour and it changes everything.

So here's what's actually happening. This bottle is 18 years old, distilled in Indiana at the historic Seagram's distillery, now MGP/Ross & Squibb. It's aged in second-fill oak barrels, which is a big part of the draw of American Light Whiskey category. The mashbill is 99% corn and 1% malted barley. That grain profile and the second-fill oak makes this so much less tannic and oak driven. Makes for a desert whiskey.

I pulled this out for a tasting I hosted recently. The people I served it to didn't know anything about it and often didn't drink much whiskey and were still impressed. Which is saying something if you can make a hazmat approachable. That's when I knew this wasn't just a good bottle.

At $100 this is the right call if you're chasing cask strength and you want something different from the bourbon category. Distribution is the harder problem. But if you see it, buy it.

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

TL;DR

Cherry cola and caramel, simple and well rounded. Fruit-forward wheated bourbon at 107 proof with no weak link across nose, palate, or finish. The proof is present and knows its place, which is the whole game at 107. Buy it at $50 MSRP without hesitation. At $65, still worth it. Above that, pass.

Quality Score - 7.1 "Great - Well above average"

Value Score - 7.2 "Good Value - Buying again, would even pay 1.2x MSRP"

Nose - 7.0

Red cherry, candied caramel, vanilla. Settled and composed, nothing fighting for space. The ethanol stays polite for 107 proof, which at this stage of the bottle feels like a feature rather than a coincidence.

Palate - 7.6

Sweet red fruit up front, that signature Buffalo Trace grape note, caramel and vanilla through the mid-palate. Full and coating. The heat is present and knows its place.

Finish - 7.6

Medium. Cherry wood and vanilla leading, dry oak and a touch of tobacco on the exit. Fades cleanly.

Neck Pour

April 30, 2026

>Don't chase it, just enjoy it when you find it.

There is a version of this review that writes itself, and I am aware of that. Weller Antique 107 has been covered thoroughly, praised consistently, and priced accordingly by anyone who got there ahead of the reviewers. I'm writing it because if you're building a whiskey shelf and you haven't tried it, you should, and because it helps the reader understand my rating scale with a nice anchor point. Also, its just a good test for me.

Color is a warm amber, nothing dramatic. The nose is immediately sweet, red cherries and candied caramel with vanilla underneath. What you don't get is a nose full of ethanol, which at 107 proof is doing more work than it lets on. The palate follows through cleanly. Sweet red fruit up front, that classic Buffalo Trace grape note in the background, caramel and vanilla carrying the midpalate. The heat is present but it knows its place. The finish is medium length, cherry wood and vanilla, and it fades without overstaying.

This is one of those bottles that makes a convincing case for higher proof sipping whiskey to someone who hasn't been there yet. The proof adds weight and flavor without becoming the whole conversation. If you've been drinking lower proof bourbon and wondering what the next step looks like, this is it. And if you're already well past this point in your palate, you already know what I'm going to say: it's still worth having around.

Compared to most wheat whiskey in this range it punches well above. The obvious comparison for me is Maker's Mark, and the gap is real from what I've tried. This is more complex, more interesting, and for my money worth the price.

That being said, try to stay near MSRP please. It's not worth chasing into prices above $65.

Blind Pour

April 30, 2026

>Blind quality in the Great catagory and would pay $65.

See the full writeup here: Weller Antique 107 vs Old Fitzgerald BiB 7 Year

Two samples, labels off, both wheated bourbons. My palate was already running on an earlier pour of the Holladay Soft Red Wheat Rickhouse Proof, an outstanding bottle in its own right and a wheated bourbon, so I went in oriented without being locked onto anything specific.

The Weller announced itself on the nose. Grape and cherry, something sugary and settled underneath. More composed than the competing sample, the rough edges absent. The palate opened with fruit and vanilla and a cola note running underneath without dominating. Nothing fighting for space. The finish came up shorter than I wanted, but what led into it was built well enough that the exit felt earned rather than just over.

First place was not a difficult call. The Weller profile is readable once you have spent real time with it. When the label came back on, I wasn't surprised.

Pricing deserves a direct look. I paid around $65 for this bottle in December, as close to MSRP as my market gets. That was my ceiling going in, and what I found in the glass confirmed the number. The quality is real. At $50 MSRP this is a straightforward buy. At $120 on the secondary, no blind result changes that math.

Open Pour

May 5, 2026

>Always going to be a buy at MSRP, but good luck finding it.

The bottle is running low and there's no backup on the shelf. That's not a tasting note but it tells you something. You don't run out of bottles you're indifferent about.

Mid-bottle the Weller Antique 107 is exactly what it has always been. Nothing has shifted in a direction worth flagging. The nose is settled and composed, the palate delivers the fruit and caramel profile cleanly, and the finish earns its length without demanding patience. The tight scores across nose, palate, and finish reflect a bottle that doesn't have a weak link so much as a consistent ceiling. It performs at the same level in every category, which for a bottle at this price point and proof is harder than it sounds.

This is the bottle I reach for when someone is learning about whiskey. Not because it's simple, but because it makes the case for higher proof sipping without requiring the drinker to work past anything. The heat is present and knows its place. The flavors are accessible without being one-dimensional. It's a good teaching pour precisely because it doesn't need to be explained. But more than that, I like it.

The value score reflects market reality rather than bottle quality. At $50 MSRP this is one of the better buys on the shelf. At $65, which is as close to MSRP as my market gets, it's still worth it. Above that the glass alone can't justify. The quality is real. The hype is also real, and at secondary prices the hype is doing too much of the work. Find it at MSRP and buy it without hesitation. Run out without a backup and feel appropriately bad about it.

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

TL;DR

Prickly pear, baking spice, and the softest mouthfeel you'll find at 121.5 proof. If the label wasn't in front of you, you would not guess the number. That's the whole story in one sentence. The soft red wheat grain is doing real structural work, pulling the profile toward something coherent and surprisingly gentle at cask strength. Mid-bottle some of the lighter floral notes from the neck pour have settled, but the palate and finish hold. At $75 if you see it, buy it.

Nose - 7.6

Stone fruit and warm baking spice, vanilla underneath. The lighter floral and fruit-forward notes make it stand out.

Palate - 8.5

Prickly pear and baking spice, molasses and leather mid-palate. Rich and coating. The mouthfeel is still the best thing in this glass and it hasn't gone anywhere. The soft red wheat is still doing real structural work at 121.5 proof, keeping everything pulled together.

Finish - 8.2

Long and dry. Seasoned oak and cinnamon with some bitterness from the char that holds through the exit. The fruit from the palate lingers at the edges without dominating.

Neck Pour

April 30, 2026

>Soft red nose, soft red palate, soft red finish. Yes, Yes, Yes!

Disclaimer that this is my second bottle so you already know my recommendation as someone who rarely buys the same bottle rather than trying something new. Yes it's that good. This will be my memory of my first pour maybe a year and a half ago.

Holladay has been distilling in Weston, Missouri since 1856, and their Soft Red Wheat line carries that history into something worth paying attention to. To carry the Real Missouri Bourbon designation, the corn has to be grown in-state, and the whole process, mashing, fermenting, distilling, aging, bottling, stays on Missouri soil. The soft red wheat itself is a specific grain choice, lower protein, minimal gluten, and it pulls the profile toward something softer and sweeter than a rye-forward mashbill would. That's not marketing (okay maybe not ALL marketing). You can taste it.

This is a gorgeous pour. Nothing crazy dark, but darker for a six-year-old bottle. The nose is immediately inviting, baking spice riding underneath something fruity almost floral, warm and approachable for 120 proof. This is my first soft red wheat and it's easy to see why the grain was selected. 121.5 proof and the nose gives nothing away.

The palate is where it earns my attention. Prickly pear and baking spice, rounded out with that wheat and corn sweetness underneath. A little leather mid-palate if you go looking for it. The "prickly" in that pear note is earned, not just a descriptor I reached for. There's edge here, some bite, and the finish leans into that rather than backing off. Still, the whole thing drinks noticeably softer than the proof suggests, somewhere around 110 by feel.

This one knocked my socks off when I first cracked it. That doesn't always happen. At this price point, it gives a lot of bottles in the $70 to even $100-plus range a serious run. I think this is my favorite wheated bourbon to date by some margin.

Blind Pour

May 1, 2026

>First in the blind. Still first with the label on.

Part of the Grain of Truth wheated bourbon blind. Full tasting notes and rankings at the companion post.

I had this one first in the pour order and nearly talked myself out of the right answer. The nose led with candied cherries and vanilla, inviting right away, the kind of nose that pulls you in rather than making you work for it. Real fruit presence, not a faint suggestion of it. On the palate it was rich and velvety, great fruit flavor, and drinking noticeably soft. Soft enough that I reached for Weller Special Reserve as my guess for a moment. The mouthfeel was too rich, too present for 90 proof, but the proof wasn't telegraphing itself either. That combination is hard to fake. There was a little bitter oak on the finish that took it down a peg, something like an herbal note underneath if you went looking for it, but the dry finish made me want another sip rather than putting me off.

What the blind confirmed is something the neck pour already pointed at. The soft red wheat grain is doing real work here, pulling the whole profile toward something softer and more coherent than the proof has any right to deliver. At the neck pour I called this my favorite wheated bourbon by some margin. Blind, against three genuine competitors with the label off, that held up without any help from the story on the bottle. The mouthfeel is in a different category from everything else in this lineup. All the flavors are working together rather than pulling in opposite directions, and that coherence is what separates it.

Strong buy.

Open Pour

May 5, 2026

>The soft red wheat is still doing the work.

Mid-bottle, the Holladay Soft Red Wheat is a little less of what made the neck pour memorable. The lighter, brighter notes, the ones that made this feel almost floral, have settled back. What's left is still excellent. The mouthfeel is still exceptional, the palate is still coherent and rich, and the finish still earns its length. But some of what made the neck pour feel like a discovery has faded a touch.

That's not a disqualifying observation. It's what bourbon does. It settles. The question for the Open Pour is always whether what remains after oxygenation holds the score the earlier stages suggested. Here it does, with a minor haircut on the nose.

The blind confirmed the important things. Soft enough to mistake for a lower proof pour, rich enough to stand out in a four-bottle lineup of genuine competitors, coherent enough that all the flavors are still working together rather than pulling in different directions. That profile held with the label off. It holds here too.

At $75 this is still the right call in the wheated bourbon category. The Larceny Barrel Proof is $10 less and more complex in certain directions, but the Holladay drinks easier, sits better in the glass longer, and doesn't require you to work past the heat to get to the good stuff. The Maker's Mark Keepers Release is right there as a direct price comparison and I'd take the Holladay without thinking about it. The soft red wheat grain is doing something the stave finishing on the Keepers can't replicate.

Buy it if you can find it. Distribution remains the harder problem.

Quality Score 8.5

Excellent - Really quite exceptional

Value Score 5.5

Baseline Value - Needs to be MSRP

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

TL;DR

Apple, vanilla, and oak that doesn't quite know when to stop. The Maker's DNA is recognizable from first sniff. The stave finishing is the story from there, and not always a flattering one. It dominated the palate on first opening and while its been tempered slightly with time in an open bottle it still isn't background texture. The honest math is this: Maker's Mark Cask Strength is $40 and drinks within close range of this bottle with a great profile. This bottle is essentially charging you $35 for the stave finishing which overrides the wheat softness you were likely going for in the first place. It isn't where it needed to be at $75.

Nose - Apple, vanilla, soft caramel. The bright oak from the staves. What's underneath is recognizably Maker's, warm and approachable, but there isn't much beneath the base profile to reward the extra attention.

Palate - Smooth entry, vanilla and red fruit, cinnamon mid-palate. The stave influence is just omnipresent. Makes the bottle taste young.

Finish - Short to medium. Dry toasted oak and cinnamon. Bitter oak on the exit.

Neck Pour

January 2026

>The oak staves don't enhance here. They take over.

Writing this from memory. I opened this bottle back in January and didn't take notes at the time, so what follows is my honest recollection of that first pour rather than a glass in front of me right now.

I'm partial to Maker's. The Cask Strength at $40 is one of the better deals on the shelf and I reach for it often, so I came to this one with some goodwill. The Keepers Release is the second entry in a five-year Wood Finishing Series, this one inspired by the warehouse team that still hand-rotates every barrel at Star Hill Farm. Ten virgin toasted American white oak staves, two different finishing durations, 109.2 proof. With my history with Maker's and for $35 more for a bottle I was hoping this would take a significant step up.

The nose delivered. Strong apple, vanilla sweetness, solid bright oak backbone. Classic wheater territory, recognizable Maker's DNA, nothing that raised a flag.

The palate is where the stave finishing announced itself. Smooth entry, but the young oak came in hard and stayed. Heavy tannins, toasted oak through the finish. To me there was an astringency that the wheat character couldn't soften. For a wheated bourbon I want that softness to do the work. Here the staves were doing all of it, and I wasn't really a fan.

I had the Maker's French Oak a few years ago and remember also not being a huge fan. It was good, but didn't leave me wanting more enough to buy another bottle when it ran out.

I think this unfortunately falls into the same category for me. It's good, but nothing exceptional. Hopefully it opens up, but I think this early underwhelming sip is going to be the anchor on this one. Love a good wheater, but in general I'm looking for more balance and overall darker notes.

Blind Pour

May 1, 2026

>The DNA is there. The staves are louder than they should be.

Part of the Grain of Truth wheated bourbon blind. Full tasting notes and rankings at the companion post.

I picked this one out by signature. The vanilla-forward entry, bright red tree fruit, that recognizable Maker's oak backbone coming through clearly even without the label. The nose opened with apple and solid bright oak, classic wheater territory. On the palate the cinnamon from the nose followed through alongside the fruit, and the oak stave influence was there but better integrated in this setting than it felt at the neck pour. It held up well enough for second place, which surprised me a little coming off a skeptical first impression.

The neck pour left me unconvinced that the stave finishing was earning its keep. Blind, without the label, the bottle placed second in a four-bottle lineup and I want to be honest about that result. But second place doesn't change the math. At $75 you are paying $35 more than Maker's Cask Strength for a bottle where the stave finishing overrides the wheat softness that makes the base bourbon worth buying in the first place. The wood is doing all the talking and I'm not sure the conversation is worth having at that premium. For $75, the Soft Red Wheat is right there.

Open Pour

May 5, 2026

>The oak settled down. What's left is the question.

Time has done something to the Keepers Release. The young bright oak that dominated the neck pour has tempered. It's no longer running the conversation the way it was in January. That's the good news.

The less convenient news is what's underneath it. With the aggressive stave character dialed back, what remains is a well-made cask strength Maker's Mark with a finish that still announces itself more than it should for $75. The wheat softness comes through more clearly now, which is encouraging, and the palate is more integrated than the neck pour suggested it would be. But the stave finishing is still omnipresent. It hasn't become background texture. It's still the loudest thing in the glass, just less combative about it.

The blind result is worth revisiting here. Second place in a four-bottle lineup was a better result than the neck pour led me to expect, and I noted at the time that it complicated my early impression. It does, slightly. But second place behind the Holladay Soft Red Wheat and ahead of a 90-proof control bottle is a more modest achievement than the label's price tag implies. The Keepers finished ahead of Weller Special Reserve. At $75, that's the bar.

The value score is where this lands hardest. Maker's Mark Cask Strength is $40 and drinks within close range of this bottle. The stave finishing costs you $35 to add wood character that overrides the wheat profile you were buying in the first place. With time in the bottle, that wood has settled enough to make the Keepers more enjoyable than it was on opening night. It hasn't settled enough to make the math work.

If you have a bottle, it's worth revisiting. It's better than it was. It's not better than it needed to be.

Quality **7.2 "**Great - Well above average"

Value **3.2 "**Bad Value - Not buying unless discounted"

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

Bourbon, 7 yr, 100 Proof, $60, Heaven Hill, Bardstown KY

TL;DR

Baking spice, cherry, and a mouthfeel that 100 proof has no business delivering. The grain funk that complicated the first pour has settled across the life of the bottle into something earthier and more integrated. Seven years of age shows on the palate where it matters. The finish is where this bottle gives back some of what the palate earns, medium length and a little dry at the close. The honest comparison in this price range is Larceny Barrel Proof A125, and the Old Fitz handles its grain character and I think is preferable despite running 25 proof points lower. Try it near MSRP without hesitation.

Nose

Sweet apple, and lots of baking spice. Earthy grains underneath if you go looking.

Palate

Honey, dark caramel, vanilla wafer with toasted oak mid-palate. Silky mouthfeel that still punches well above 100 proof. Seven years is showing in the right places.

Finish

Medium length. Some oak dryness at the close. The finish is where this bottle gives back some of what the palate earns. Pleasant but shorter than the texture promises.

Neck Pour

January 2026

>Not sure what I was expecting, but I was pleasantly surprised!

I should be upfront about something. This bottle has been open since January and I'm only now writing this up. What follows is from memory, and the memory is that I came into this one with a touch of calibration problem.

Old Fitzgerald has built enough of a reputation around the decanter series that even a $60 permanent release carries an unfair amount of expectation. I knew this was a wheated Heaven Hill product at 100 proof and seven years, and I had it filed somewhere around the Heaven Hill BiB 7 Year and Larceny Small Batch. The first pour showed me it was actually between the HH BiB 7 Year and something more.

The nose was the first thing to reset me. Baking spices and green apple, clean and forward and better than I was prepared for. It's not typical for the nose to be what I remember most from a first pour, but here we are.

The palate doesn't totally match it on total flavor, but what it brings is mouthfeel that punches well above 100 proof. Thick, coating, syrupy in the best way. There's caramel and apple sweetness in there, balanced and easy, but the texture and mid-palate is the real story. You can taste the seven years. I had this pegged as a Heaven Hill BiB 7 Year adjacent experience and it's clearly a step above that. Heaven Hill knew what people were expecting after years of chasing decanter releases. They hit the mark.

Finish is sweet and lingers. There's some occasional astringency at the back that keeps it from being seamless, but it doesn't derail anything. Far less funk than Larceny but not as light as the HH BiB either.

At $60 this is a legitimate weekender, and the mouthfeel alone puts it a step above Larceny Small Batch and the Heaven Hill BiB. The real debate would be between this and the Larceny Barrel Proof which is a compliment in and of iteself.

Blind Pour

April 30, 2026

>Strong quality at MSRP of $60. The market corrected just in time.

See the full writeup here: Blind Loyalty: Weller Antique 107 vs Old Fitzgerald BiB 7 Year

Two samples, labels off, both wheated bourbons. My palate was already running on an earlier pour of the Holladay Soft Red Wheat Rickhouse Proof, an outstanding bottle in its own right and a wheated bourbon, so I went in oriented without being locked onto anything specific.

The Old Fitz came up as Sample 1 and it was the more complicated of the two to read. The nose opened earthy and grounded, sweet oak and char with something deeper underneath. Not immediately likable, but not off either. More considered. First sip gave me pause, something adjacent to cough syrup that I flagged and then revised on the second pass. Caramel and dry oak came through once I got out of my own way. The mouthfeel was the best thing in the glass, full and coating in a way that made me want to go back rather than move on. The finish was shorter than the texture promised.

I expected apple on the nose. Didn't get it. Cooler indoor environment, controlled conditions. Notes shift. I noted it and moved on.

Second place in a two-bottle blind can still be good result. The Old Fitz lost on profile preference, not on quality. There is a mood for this bottle and the earthiness and funk it brings, and on a different night the gap might be narrower.

The pricing story here is worth telling. At launch this bottle was hitting $150 on secondary, which was indefensible then and looks worse now that I have actually tasted it. The market has largely corrected. At or near the $60 MSRP the price is fair for what is in the glass, and I mean that straightforwardly. I am still working out where this lands relative to the Larceny Barrel Proof, which is the comparison that keeps coming back to me. More on that after the open pour.

Open Pour

May 5, 2026

>Still a great nose and mouthfeel.

Over the lifetime of this bottle the grain funk mellowed. What I flagged early on as something to work past has settled into the background, earthier and more integrated, and somewhere along the way it stopped being something I was noting against the bottle and started being part of why the bottle tastes like what it is. That's not a reversal of the earlier impression. I think its some mellowing and also just me getting to know the pour.

The mouthfeel never wavered. At 100 proof it was the best surprise at the neck pour and it's still the best thing in the glass. Thick, coating, the kind of texture that makes you want to sit with it rather than pace through it. Seven years of age shows on the palate in a way that a younger bottle at similar proof wouldn't deliver, and that's the real value argument here.

If you've read the Larceny Barrel Proof A125 review you know I'm not always a grain funk advocate. My score there reflects it. The honest note is that I enjoy this bottle more than A125 despite the 25 proof point gap running the other direction, and I'm scoring accordingly. The Old Fitz keeps the funk in its lane. The Larceny A125 lets it drive. That's the difference, and at comparable price points it matters.

The finish is where this bottle gives back some of what the palate earns. Medium length, clean, a little dry at the close. Nothing offensive but shorter than the texture in front of it promises.

At $60 MSRP this is a legitimate buy. The market corrected after the initial release gouging which is good as this bottle isn't good enough to really be on the secondary market. It's not the most exciting wheater in the rotation but it's one of the most consistently enjoyable, which over the life of a bottle turns out to matter more than the first pour suggested.

Quality 7.1 - Great, Well above average

Nose 7.6

Palate 7.5

Finish 6.9

Value 5.5 - Baseline Value, Might buy again, but needs to be MSRP.

The short version of the method: I do a Neck Pour when I first open a bottle, a Blind Pour at some point in the middle where I taste it against something else without knowing which is which, and an Open Pour at the end that pulls everything together. The idea is that a single pour doesn't tell me much, bias toward a label is real, and bottles change with air. If you are like me and most bottles sit open for a while between pours, hopefully the format resonates. I'm new to posting reviews publicly so I'm still finding my footing here. Just having some fun with it.

The basics: 125 proof. NAS (6-8 year estimate). Batch A125. From Heaven Hill in Bardstown KY. ~$65 MSRP.

Neck Pour

April 29, 2026

>Affordable earthy overproof wheated bourbon.

Disclaimer that this is probably my second or third bottle of this. I've had a few earlier batches. A125 is the latest for me. Bottle opened maybe 2 months ago and this is my memory of that opening.

Heaven Hill has been releasing Larceny Barrel Proof three times a year since January 2020, and it won Whisky Advocate's Whisky of the Year that same year. A125 is the sixteenth batch, the first of 2025, and it landed at exactly 125 proof (scripted?). The mashbill is 68% corn, 20% wheat, 12% malted barley, the same recipe as standard Larceny and the Old Fitzgerald line. No age statement, but Heaven Hill puts these barrels in at six to eight years. MSRP is $65 which I think has been creeping up since initial release. I want to say my first bottle of this was $50ish?

The nose is caramel apple and sweet vanilla, warm and welcoming at first sniff. Earthy underneath, more grain-forward than I expected but it is a wheater. The ethanol announces itself and doesn't fully step back.

The palate tracks the nose, caramel and apple with baking spice, but what I'm going to call grain funk that showed up on the nose follows through and I'm not the biggest fan of it here. The finish is long. What catches me off guard is the mouthfeel. Not thin exactly, but thinner than I would expect for a 125 proof.

At $65, you're paying $35 more than standard Larceny Small Batch for the barrel proof version. That premium buys you 33 additional proof points and the flavor concentration that comes with them. Whether that trade is worth it depends entirely on how much you want the heat and funk.

Jumping forward to today, I've been on a run of barrel proof bottles the last few days, and context is doing some damage here. The Holladay Soft Red Wheat and an Elijah Craig Barrel Proof Private Barrel are both in the rotation right now. Single barrel pull on the Craig, so it's just the one I have, but it drinks in line with the regular releases, maybe a touch better. At $10 more I'd reach for either without thinking about it. They're absolute standouts. I think many may be in the same boat with me there.

Here's where I'm going to go out on a limb... Then there's the Old Fitzgerald Bottled in Bond 7 Year. I just finished a neck pour of it the other day, and I keep finding myself preferring it despite the 25 proof point gap. At 100 proof and roughly $60, the Old Fitz is running a different game. The flavors there are more balanced, the age shows on the palate in a way this batch doesn't quite match, and the mouthfeel is syrupy where the Larceny BP feels surprisingly light (again not light, just surprisingly light). The earthy notes are still there on the Old Fitz, but they take a back seat rather than leading the charge. High proof is great, but it's a lot harder to do right than it looks. Just because you're getting more ethanol for your money doesn't mean you got a great deal.

So the value case for Larceny BP is real and I can argue it. I'm just not sure it wins the argument for me personally.

Blind Pour

May 1, 2026

>Complex and hot. I'm probably not reaching for it often.

Part of the Grain of Truth wheated bourbon blind. Full tasting notes and rankings at the companion post.

The nose made a strong first impression in the blind, sweet earth and real complexity underneath, which made the palate a harder landing than expected. Vanilla and caramel coming in upfront, then charred oak, bitter chocolate, and a dry exit with grain funk running through the mid-palate. The heat at 125 proof was a lot to work past. The mouthfeel landed thinner than the proof suggested, sitting closer to the Weller than to the Holladay, which caught me off guard for a barrel proof release.

At the neck pour I flagged the grain funk and the lighter-than-expected mouthfeel, and both showed up again blind without the label to explain them away. That consistency matters. Earlier batches of this didn't hit quite the same way for me, they were markedly better quality. Whether that is barrel selection, age at dumping, or just this batch running a little rough at 125 proof, A125 didn't match what I remember from my first bottle. The complexity is real, real enough to put it above a clean 90-proof pour in the rankings, but in this company the heat and the funk were too much to work past in a single sitting. The value case at $65 is legitimate. I just find myself making that case for other bottles instead.

Fair value at MSRP if you are looking to challenge your palate and maybe you enjoy it, but maybe look for another batch?

Open Pour

May 5, 2026

>I want to like it. I just can't.

Nose

Caramel apple and sweet vanilla, warm and welcoming. The nose is still the best part of this bottle and it hasn't changed much. Earthy grain underneath.

Palate

Caramel and baking spice up front, then the grain funk arrives and doesn't move. Charred oak and bitter chocolate mid-palate. The mouthfeel runs thinner than the proof suggests.

Finish

Long and hot. Grain funk carrying through the exit with sustained heat behind it. Nothing pulls it back together on the way out, and the length here is a liability rather than an asset.

This bottle has been open around 2-3 months, long enough to call it a full evolution and to know the punch isn't going anywhere. The grain funk has settled a only a fraction. The heat is still a lot to work past. The thin mouthfeel at 125 proof, which caught me off guard at the neck pour, is still thin. Time hasn't fixed what I flagged early.

The comparison that keeps coming back to me is the Old Fitzgerald BiB 7 Year, which shares the same mashbill and distillery and runs at 100 proof. Tasted side by side the Old Fitz is wonderfully oily, the kind of mouthfeel that 100 proof has no business delivering. The Larceny A125 watered down to that range is thin, young, and without the age on the palate to compensate. Same grain bill, same house, very different result. Seven years of age is doing real work in that bottle that this batch can't replicate at any proof.

I've had earlier batches of this that I liked considerably more. I don't have one on hand to compare directly, but the memory is clear enough that I know A125 isn't representative of what this line can do. Whether that's barrel selection, age at dumping, or just this batch running rough at 125, I can't say with certainty. What I can say is that I want to like this bottle and I can't get there.

At $65 the value case exists on paper. In practice, the Old Fitz at $60 is the better bottle by enough of a margin that the $5 difference isn't the conversation. If you're set on Larceny Barrel Proof, look for another batch.

TL;DR

Caramel apple on the nose with baking spice and heat throughout, grain funk on the palate, and more heat on the finish. The nose is the best part of this bottle. Everything after it is harder to work past. The palate runs thinner than 125 proof should be, the grain funk never integrates, and the finish is long but harsh. Diluted to roughly 100 proof and tasted against Old Fitzgerald BiB 7 Year neat, the gap in mouthfeel and age character is stark. Same mashbill, same distillery, noticeably different result. Earlier batches of this line were better. A125 is not the version to judge the lineup by. At $65, the Old Fitz is $5 less and the better bottle. If you're committed to Larceny Barrel Proof, look for another batch.

Scores

Quality - 6.0 "Very Good - A cut above"

Value - 3.4 "Bad value, not buying again unless discounted"

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

Two wheated bourbons. One blind. No calibration sip needed tonight because I had been working through a neck pour of the Holladay Soft Red Wheat Rickhouse Proof earlier and my palate was reasonably oriented. Two samples in front of me, don't know which is which.

Head to head comparison of the two can be found Here

Overall the two are pretty evenly matched on age, proof, and mashbill. Technically they are also matched on MSRP but I think we have to admit the Weller is probably going to cost you at least $65 and many are going to ask for a lot more.

The Nose

Sample 1 opens with sweet oak and char. Earthy underneath, grounded rather than offputting.

Sample 2 is immediately different. Grape, sweet cherry, confectioner's sugar or cotton candy. Lighter overall, more settled. The rough edges aren't there.

Sample 2 is more immediately likeable. Sample 1 takes a second. I'm already leaning toward 2.

First Pass on the Palate

Sample 1 is funky and earthy on entry. Something cough syrup adjacent gives me pause. The mouthfeel is excellent though. Full and coating, the kind of texture that makes you want to sit with it. I set the funkiness aside and go back.

Second sip on sample 1 reads differently. Caramel and dry oak, cleaner than the first pass suggested. I'm revising the cough syrup note down to a passing impression. That happens. First sips sometimes mess with you.

Sample 2 is cherry and vanilla upfront, something close to cola underneath. More well-rounded than 1. Lighter overall, or maybe just softer. Hard to separate those without knowing the proofs. The finish is shorter than I'd like, but what comes before it is delicious.

The Rankings

Two in the blind, so the comparison is clean. Sample 2 wins. Not by a lot, but I'd reach for it first any night. The earthiness and funk on sample 1 are distinctive, and I respect them, but in a direct comparison tonight they lose. There are times I would like it, but on average I'm going to say it's something I wouldn't be in the mood for too often.

One honest note before the reveal: I expected apple on the nose from the Old Fitz. Tonight it wasn't there so I'm a little thrown. Cooler weather, more controlled environment indoors. Notes change.

My guess is Sample 2 is the Weller. The grape nose and then cherry and sweetness showed up clearly enough that I'm not second-guessing it. Sample 1 has the earthiness I associate with Heaven Hill wheaters. Going in confident.

The Reveal

Got it right. Weller is sample 2, Old Fitz is sample 1.

Not a surprising outcome for anyone who has spent time with both bottles. The Weller profile is readable once you know what you're looking for.

Pricing is where both of these have a story worth telling directly.

Weller Antique 107 is routinely marked up from its $50 MSRP into triple digits. I paid around $65 for this bottle back in December, which is as close to MSRP as I can get in my market, and I consider that the ceiling. The quality is real. The hype is also real, and the hype is running ahead of what's in the glass. At $50 it's an easy buy. At $120 on the secondary, hard pass.

The Old Fitzgerald story is different. The 7 Year BiB is a recent permanent release at $60 MSRP, and the initial price gouging has largely settled. At launch I saw it hitting $150, which is unacceptable for a 7 year BiB at 100 proof without having tried it and even more unacceptable now that I have tasted it. Looks like the market corrected. At or near $60, the price is fair for what's in the bottle. I'm even playing around with saying I prefer this over the Larceny BP, stay tuned on that one.

Neither of these is a bad pour. I would put both in the Great category actually. But neither is worth what the secondary has asked.

My Scores · Blind Pour

These are blind tasting scores only. Final scores follow the open pour.

Weller Antique 107 — 7.6 · Great

Old Fitzgerald BiB 7 Year — 7.1 · Great

Full individual reviews are now live.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com. Not sponsored, not gifted, bought at retail. New to all of this, if you see something broken please let me know and I will fix it!

All of the selected bourbons are wheated and some are extremely sought after. Weller Special Reserve is a $30 90-proof bottle that I've seen on whiskeywallofshame for $200. Larceny Barrel Proof is a 115-125 proof flavor bomb that won Whisky Advocate's Whisky of the Year on its first release. Maker's Mark Keepers Release is a $75 wood-finished release of one of my favorite budget bottles Maker's Cask Strength. And Holladay Soft Red Wheat Rickhouse Proof is the bottle I keep reaching back for over and over again, my current favorite wheated bourbon by some margin.

Same mashbill category, very different proofs, very different prices, very different reputations. The question was simple: when the labels come off, does any of that matter?

Spoiler: yes but not as much as you'd think.

Full individual reviews on all the bottles here are in progress. This is just the blind.

Quick note before we get started I have an easy rundown of the four bottles side by side here if you want to get oriented.

The Setup

Quick calibration pour of 1792 Full Proof. Randomly selected because its high proof but a totally average pour. Then to the four unlabeled glasses in front of me.

The lineup is Holladay Soft Red Wheat Rickhouse Proof at 121.5, Larceny Barrel Proof A125 at 125, Maker's Mark Keepers Release 2025 at 109.2, and Weller Special Reserve at 90. Going in, I already know the honest answer to whether a $30 90-proof bottle can run with three higher-proof wheaters in the $65 to $75 range. But its a good control for the blind.

The Nose

Sample 1 leads with candied cherries and vanilla. It's inviting right away, the kind of nose that pulls you in rather than making you work for it. There's real fruit presence here, not a faint suggestion of it.

Sample 2 is quiet. Nothing offensive, nothing particularly exciting. The nose is there but it's not doing much to sell itself.

Sample 3 opens with vanilla and bright oak. More fruit shows up on the palate than the nose suggests, leaning toward red tree fruit, apple-adjacent. I think some call this orchard fruit. Still working on the vocab. There's something familiar about it, a signature I feel like I've run into before.

Sample 4 might have the best nose of the four. Sweet earth, some complexity underneath. It makes a strong first impression.

First Pass on the Palate

Sample 1 - Excellent. Rich and velvety mouthfeel, great fruit flavor, and it's drinking noticeably soft. Soft enough I think it might be low proof Weller SR. There's a little bitter oak on the finish that takes it down a peg, but it's a minor complaint on an otherwise excellent glass. The dry finish actually makes me want another sip. Something like an herbal note underneath if you're looking for it.

Sample 2 - The toned-down version of Sample 1. Caramel apple, classic wheater profile, smooth and calm finish. It's genuinely pleasant. It's just the wrong glass to taste right after Sample 1. I revist after the other two and that first impression holds.

Sample 3 - Tracks the apple notes from Sample 2 but with more fruit character and that cinnamon from the nose following through. It's good DNA, but I'm going to say it's too bright for me. It drinks young. It has a clear identity, but unfortunately tannic and bitter.

Sample 4 - Comes at you with a sledgehammer. The nose promised complexity and the palate delivers it in every direction at once, vanilla and caramel colliding with charred oak, bitter chocolate, and a dry exit. Funky with some grain mid-palate to finish. The mouthfeel is thinner than the others. Closer to Sample 2 and it runs hot. Not a criticism of the whiskey exactly, just a lot to process in one sitting. The heat is honestly too much, hard to work past the grain too.

First Guess

Sample 1 - Holladay Soft Red Wheat. It's drinking soft enough that for a moment I wonder if it's the Weller, but the mouthfeel is too rich, too present. The Soft Red Wheat is the only one of the four that drinks this far below its proof while still giving you this much to work with. That combination is hard to fake.

Sample 2 - Weller Special Reserve. Low-key, low-proof, pleasant. It's doing what a 90-proof wheater does.

Sample 3 - Maker's Mark Keepers. There's a distinct signature here I recognize. The bright oak, the vanilla-forward entry, the red fruit. It's Maker's DNA coming through clearly.

Sample 4 - Larceny Barrel Proof. The heat, the grain funk, the directional chaos on the palate. That's a 125-proof barrel proof release doing exactly what barrel proof releases do when they're a little rough around the edges.

The Rankings

Closer than expected. That's the honest answer. Getting into the details:

In Fourth: Sample 2 - Weller - 6.0. Pleasant, drinkable, but outclassed. Nothing wrong with it. Just everything around it is doing more.

In Third: Sample 4 - Larceny - 6.5. The complexity is real and so is the heat. The thin mouthfeel and the grain funk on the exit are doing it no favors in this company. A half step up from fourth to reward complexity, but most nights I'd reach for Sample 2 over this one. That pour brought the heat in a way that isn't always what you want.

In Second: Sample 3 - MM - 7.0. More coherent than Sample 4, more interesting than Sample 2. The cinnamon and red fruit are doing good work and the oak gives it some backbone, but its really bright young oak and overpowers the wheat profile in a lot of ways.

In First: Sample 1 - SRW - 8.0. Clear winner and highly differentiated from the others. The fruit is clean, the mouthfeel is exceptional, and it's somehow drinking like a 90-proof pour out of a 120-proof bottle. I'm serious about thinking it could have been the Weller since I had it first in the tasting order. The minor bitter oak on the finish is the only thing keeping it from being a perfect glass.

The Reveal

It makes for a bit of a boring reveal to get them all right but I'll be honest, this one wasn't a particularly hard blind to crack having selected the bottles. These four wheaters couldn't be more different, and I'd tasted all of them in the days leading up to this session. The Soft Red Wheat has an identity that's hard to mistake. Larceny Barrel Proof is a funky flavor bomb that announces itself. And between the remaining two, one was clearly running at a fraction of the proof of the other.

The surprise, if there is one, is how the Weller showed up. A $30 90-proof bottle finishing fourth out of four is not exactly a shock, but it wasn't embarrassed here either. It was genuinely pleasant. The problem is the company it was keeping. In a different lineup, sitting next to some standard-proof bottles at similar price points, it might place higher. Context is brutal but I think it's earned the 6 I gave it putting it into my Very Good category.

The bigger story is Holladay. I thought I had the Weller in my hand for a moment because of how approachable it was drinking. That's the whole game with the Holladay Soft Red Wheat. The soft red wheat grain delivers a softness that the proof doesn't telegraph. It's 121.5 proof and it drinks like it has nothing to prove. The mouthfeel is in a different category from the other three. I think the biggest thing working in its favor is that all the flavors are working together. Especially having it next to the Larceny which pulls in a lot of opposite directions, the SRW has a solid coherent profile that makes it easy to see past the proof.

Maker's Keepers finishing second does something to the neck pour impression I had going in. I came away from that first pour skeptical that the stave finishing was doing anything useful. Blind, without the label, it held up well enough for second place. Whether that changes my overall assessment on the full review is something I'm still sitting with. Probably not by much. But it's worth noting. That being said having a $75 bottle that really only hinders one of my favorite wheated budget bottles ($40 for Maker's Cask strength) I can't really recommend the bottle. The stave finish gets in the way of the pleasant wheat profile base and for a $35 premium? Going to have to pass. Or get the Soft Red Wheat for the same $75.

On Larceny: I've liked earlier batches of this more than A125. I don't have any on hand to compare against, but I know I liked my first bottle a lot more than this one. I'm going to say previous batches may have been older or just more selected for being able to tame that grain funk. At $65 the value case is good but for my money I would again recommend the Cask Strength Maker's unless you are trying to make a foray into complex high proof on a budget. Even then, maybe look for another batch. On drinkability though? Just pay the extra $10 for SRW.

The Holladay Soft Red Wheat is still my favorite wheated bourbon. A blind tasting with three genuine competitors just confirmed it. At $75, it's not cheap. But at $75 for a score in the 8-plus range, it's not expensive either. It's just good.

Buy it if you can find it. That last part may be the harder problem. I'm not sure this bottle sees wide distribution like the bottled in bond version.

I write these up at openpourwhiskey.com. Not sponsored, not gifted, bought at retail. New to all of this, if you see something broken please let me know and I will fix it!

Wild Turkey Jimmy Russell 70th Anniversary | 8yr | 101 proof | $50

Scores: Nose 7.2 | Palate 7.8 | Finish 7.5 | Overall 7.7 | Value 8.6

The short version of the method: I do a Neck Pour when I first open a bottle, a Blind Pour at some point in the middle where I taste it against something else without knowing which is which, and an Open Pour at the end that pulls everything together. The idea is that a single pour doesn't tell me much, bias toward a label is real, and bottles change with air. If you are like me and most bottles sit open for a while between pours, hopefully the format resonates. I'm new to posting reviews publicly so I'm still finding my footing here. Just having some fun with it.

The basics: 101 proof. 8 years. Limited 2024 release, bottled in Lawrenceburg, KY. ~$50 MSRP.

Neck Pour

Got this bottle about a year ago and sat on it several months before opening. Light gold in the glass, lighter than expected. Light fruit on the nose, honey, cinnamon. Classic and well-rounded on the palate, good finish. All correct. Nothing wrong, nothing that demanded a second look.

Didn't feel like much of a step up from regular 101 on first pour. Opened it anyway. No particular reason. Just really wanted to try it.

Blind Pour

Full blind review can be found here https://openpourwhiskey.com/blog/blind-loyalty/

Three unlabeled samples. I actually thought the WT was the EH Taylor. The darker oak, the weight on the finish, something I read as limestone minerality had it placed squarely in the Buffalo Trace camp. First place went to what I was certain was a bottled-in-bond product from Frankfort.

It was Wild Turkey.

Wild Turkey won against two allocated bottles. I did not give it credit for the depth of flavor it brings. Head to head my favorite was clear pretty much from the start. Blind score: 7.7 quality, said I would pay $70. I paid $50 MSRP. The value case was confirmed before I knew which glass was which.

Open Pour

Finishing the bottle with this review, couldn't help myself.

Coming back tonight, nothing has shifted dramatically. There's a touch of creaminess on the palate I'm noticing more clearly now. Satisfying weight, nothing oily or thick. Doesn't overstay its welcome.

Nose: Light fruit, honey, cinnamon. Pleasant. A bit light for the proof — lowest score of the three and it earned that.

Palate: Honey carries forward and picks up creaminess and light fruit. Well-rounded, nothing sharp or missing.

Finish: Clean exit, good length for 101 proof. Doesn't linger past its welcome.

Wild Turkey dropped the domestic age-stated 8-year expression in 1992. Thirty-three years without it on US shelves. The 70th Anniversary was the first time many American bourbon drinkers could buy age-stated Wild Turkey 8 Year. At $50 that's $6 and change per year of age.

I'll own the first impression: mild disappointment when I opened it. Saved it unopened for months so I had real hype going in, and it didn't feel like a meaningful step up from standard WT 101. However after the blind the correct read is that WT 101 really is that good. If you finish this bottle wishing Wild Turkey had pushed further, that's a compliment to both releases, not a knock on this one.

This bottle is gone and the limited release concluded. That being said, Wild Turkey 101 8 Year returned to US shelves in 2025 and I will be looking for some. Standard WT 101 is always there at under $30. In contention for best bourbon under $30, certainly in the top 5.

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

Four Roses Single Barrel Barrel Strength OBSQ | 11yr 9mo | 111.4 proof | $90

Scores: Nose 8.0 | Palate 8.5 | Finish 8.4 | Overall 8.4 | Value 7.0

Second review! I've been doing this for myself for a while with a format I put together to match how I actually drink bottles with multiple sittings, one blind comparison, notes written across more of the life of the bottle rather than one pour. I'm not claiming it's the right way to do this. It's just what I do, and I figured I'd share it.

The short version of the method: I do a Neck Pour when I first open a bottle, a Blind Pour at some point in the middle, and an Open Pour at the end that pulls everything together. The idea is that a single pour doesn't tell me much, bias toward a label is real, and bottles change with air. If you are like me and most bottles sit open for a while between pours, hopefully the format resonates. I'm new to posting reviews publicly so I'm still finding my footing here. Just having some fun with it.

Neck Pour

First thing I noticed was the color. Dark amber leaning toward copper. High-rye OBSQ expression, a Kris Co Liquor find at $90.

Nose is red delicious apples, dominating the profile. Browning with some orange zest. Maybe rose, maybe rye, hard to say which. Either way, it's distinctive. On the palate, syrupy and red delicious apples again. Something herbal in there that others call out on the OBSQ. Pretty hot with baking spices. Oily mouthfeel, super chewy. Full and demanding attention. The finish is long with complex lighter flavors I can't quite identify, but they're very good. Vanilla, oak, light pepper layered in. Nearly twelve years of age showing in how well rounded it is.

Blind Pour

Glass 1: red delicious apples immediately. Hard to miss. Nose is clean and recognizable. Syrupy and full on the palate with baking spices and a chewy mouthfeel. Excellent. The complexity is immediately apparent. Long and layered finish with flavors you can't quite identify but clearly appreciate.

Glass 2: way lighter. Still good. Definitely higher proof. Vanilla and oak forward. Not a lot going for it otherwise. Thin mouthfeel. Minimal complexity. The difference is fairly stark.

The reveal: Glass 1 was the Four Roses. Glass 2 was an Old Forester Single Barrel at 132 proof, also open about eight months. I've really enjoyed it and had a pour fairly often. Surprising how much it missed by for me with the nearly 20 extra proof and added cost ($90 vs $100). Not even close in a blind side-by-side. The Four Roses distinguished itself without the story.

Open Pour

A well-made whiskey that earns respect through complexity, not hype.

It's well-balanced despite the proof weight, which speaks to the age and quality. The finish doesn't quit. I'm still tasting red delicious apple on my tongue over an hour later, even after some sparkling water. That's remarkable for something this price.

Nose: Red delicious apples with browning apple skin, orange zest, and that high-rye character that's not typical for my collection. Clean, no sharp edges.

Palate: Syrupy and full. The apple theme continues alongside baking spices, oily mouthfeel, and a chewy character. There's something herbal in there I can't quite place, but it works.

Finish: Long and complex. Beyond the typical vanilla and oak. This isn't over-oaked for nearly twelve years. Lighter flavors you can't quite identify layered with vanilla, oak, and light pepper. That persistence is the story here.

The high-rye makes it distinct from the rest of my collection, and at nearly 12 years that character is earned, not forced. It's not an overpowering sweet bourbon with shallow flavors. There's real substance here. In a crowded field at $80–100, strong enough to consider buying again... if they still have any.

After finishing this review I did a little reading. The Q yeast strain is known for being floral, and on younger barrels it can read as perfume-forward enough to put people off. The extra age really plays a role in managing those notes. With my bottle being nearly 12 years it sounds like Kris Co did well on the pick. The distillery's own notes say the floral character mellows and melds with oak over long maturation. I also kept reading other OBSQ reviews expecting to see the apple I couldn't stop tasting and mostly found herbal notes instead. That's the single barrel program for you.

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