Taconic Cabernet Cask Bourbon Review

By Richard Thomas

Rating: B-

Taconic Distillery has come a long way since opening its doors and introducing its brand with a sourced bourbon. They got a relatively late start for a craft distillery in New York, and that matters more than in most parts of the U.S., because New York State is one of the places where craft whiskey and micro-distilling got its start. It’s a crowded field in the Empire State now, so standing out isn’t easy. Nonetheless, Taconic was the official bourbon of the Culinary Institute of America’s Beefsteak last year.

Seriously. Putting the bourbon into bourbon and steak from one of the nation’s leading cooking schools. ‘Nuff said.

They keep busy at Taconic with a variety of limited offerings, beyond their core line. This most recent example is a 90 proof bourbon finished in Cabernet Sauvignon casks.

The Bourbon
This wine-finished bourbon has a totally solid, middle amber appearance in the glass. The swish and coat dropped a curtain of leaf-vein style legs over the inside of the glass.

The nose was outside the box, showing little of the sweet side of bourbon, but plenty of dry, toasted wood and a surprising nuttiness. The flavor followed from there: vanilla and wood spice, but more of the latter than the former, while also being quite dry and quite nutty. The finish was a touch sweeter, but spicy in the main.

This is a light bodied bourbon, and I believe the Cabernet finish endowed it with a quite wood and nuts-driven character. Having not actually tried the original Dutchess Reserve that is the base for this expression, I can’t say whether that finish overwrote some of the more usual bourbon flavors or not, but it definitely went outside the usual box.

The Price
A bottle of this will set you back about $47.50.