Reviews

What happens when a South Carolina bourbon takes a detour through an Oloroso sherry cask? You get graham crackers and Fig Newtons in the middle of your whiskey…and its delicious.

A strong Texas story, but a very young bourbon

Long before bourbon became a worldwide phenomenon, German immigrant Philip (Phil) Hollenbach built Fortuna into one of Kentucky’s best-known whiskey brands during the late 1800s. At its height, Fortuna was one of the dominant bourbon labels in Chicago and throughout much of the Midwest before Prohibition and changing times slowly erased it from history. By the late 1950s, the brand had disappeared almost completely.
Fortunately, that wasn’t the end of the story.

Hard Truth Distilling Co. has been pouring out of Nashville, Indiana — Brown County, hill country about an hour south of Indianapolis — since 2015. When the still finally went in, bourbon was the first thing Master Distiller Bryan Smith laid down, which means a bottle like this one has been years in the making for a distillery that’s only recently started showing its bourbon hand.

When 13th Colony first announced Barrel Symphony: Composition No. 1, we wrote about it as a curiosity piece. At that time, Symphony had not even been released. We only had the specs, the concept, and the promise. We were told by the folks at 13th Colony this had been in the works for sometime. Now we have it!

Before we even poured a glass, the bottle made an impression. The presentation is outstanding. From the classic label design to the elegant bottle shape, everything about it suggests old-world whiskey craftsmanship. It looks like something that belongs on a mahogany back bar rather than a crowded liquor store shelf.
Once opened, the whiskey backed up the appearance.

Some bourbons announce themselves with age, proof, and pedigree.
This Old Elk Wheated Bourbon walks in with all three: 7 years old, 118.1 proof, and part of the 2022 series from barrel #8287. On paper, that sounds like a bottle with plenty of depth, power, and soft wheated sweetness. In the glass, though, this one was more complicated.

Frey Ranch Farm Strength Uncut Bourbon comes from Fallon, Nevada, where Frey Ranch Farmers + Distillers has built its identity around a true field-to-bottle whiskey model. The grain is grown there. The whiskey is distilled there. It is matured there. It is bottled there. That matters.

Barrel Symphony — What happens when Bourbon and Rye stop competing and start playing together There are whiskey releases that feel like a line extension, and then there are releases that feel like a distillery planting a flag. 13th Colony’s Barrel Symphony: Composition No. 1 seems to be a new flag from this great Georgia…

Some bottles make you curious before you ever pull the cork. Oak & Eden Spire Select Wheat & Spire is one of those. There is literally an oak spiral inside the bottle. That is not a marketing note hiding in fine print. That is the whole idea. Oak & Eden has built its identity around what it calls in-bottle finishing, using a spiral-cut piece of oak, the spire, inside the bottle to continue shaping the whiskey after traditional barrel aging.