By Richard Thomas Rating: A- Smoking grain has been a widely embraced practice in American craft whiskey for more than a decade now. Darek Bell, co-founder of Nashville’s Corsair Artisan Distillery, wrote an entire book on the subject. In the Southwest, smoking with mesquite has become a regional signature. Some distillers have taken to importing peated malt from Scotland, going ...

By Richard Thomas Rating: B Out this month is a new offering from Newport’s New Riff Distillery, part of the Northern Kentucky enclave of distilleries. This story starts when New Riff began mashing and distilling a 100% malted rye in 2014. The first batch of this was released a year ago, which was also when the idea for this expression ...

Lost Lantern, an independent bottler of American whiskey that launched less than 18 months ago, is pleased to announce their Summer 2022 collection, featuring seven limited edition single casks from six celebrated craft distilleries: McCarthy’s in Oregon, Frey Ranch in Nevada, Starlight in Indiana, Dad’s Hat in Pennsylvania, St. George in California, and Balcones in Texas. Beginning June 8, in time ...

New Riff Distilling announced the release of a limited-edition Sherry Finished Malted Rye Whiskey, bottled at barrel strength without chill filtration and secondarily-aged in oloroso and pedro ximenez sherry casks. Available in May, the release builds on the distillery’s exploration of malted rye whiskey. “Last year we released our Malted Rye Whiskey, and experiencing its remarkably elegant, sophisticated character gave ...

By Richard Thomas Rating: A- Laws Whiskey House got to my house, I thought “in a few years, I will need to stop talking about mature craft whiskey and start talking about middle-aged craft whiskeys!” That would be because this third batch of the Colorado distillery’s San Luis Bonded Rye is seven years old. Who knows how much more of ...