Westland Reverie fig. 1 Whiskey Review

By Richard Thomas

Rating: B+

In November 2018, Seattle’s Westland Distillery launched a new annual, limited edition series billed as an exploration of blending. What Matt Hofmann and his crew say they are up to is taking a looser approach to bringing together different strains of whisky, as opposed to moving along a course that brings them to a set destination.

This first thing to realize about such a statement is that Westland has a considerable palette of malts to draw from. Unlike a Scottish distillery, which will make a single type of distillate, Westland draws upon multiple malted barleys and yeasts. In that respect, what is going on under their roof resembles a Japanese distillery more than a Scottish one.

In terms of this approach to Reverie, I would like to know more about what “intentionally loose” means in practice before next autumn, when fig 2 is set of come out. The implication is that they didn’t start with a preconceived notion of where to take that first batch of Reverie, which would certainly be interesting if that was the case. It would be akin to Jackson Pollack making a whisky.

This installment brought together distillates from three different types of malted barley, these three new make spirits aged in a total of six different types of cask for up to 49 months. The whiskey was bottled at 100 proof.

The Whiskey
In the glass, Reverie 2018 has a coppered look. Coating the inside of the glass yielded a few, skinny legs.

The nose gave me a generous portion of apples and raisins, with plenty of cinnamon stirred in and caramel drizzled on top, as if it were like a serving of baked apples. In fact, the key differences between the scent on Reverie and a dish of baked apples is that the whisky’s fruity aspect is fresher and crisper, while the rest is more candied.

A taste shows a liquid with a silken texture, while the flavor runs with pears and toffee in the main. This is accented by a bit of rosewater, but takes a sharp turn towards pepperiness on the back of the palate. The finish returns to the fruity, rosy side, but only briefly, going back to pepper. There is stays for a long, lingering spell.

The Price
This first installment was sold at $125 a bottle.