High West Bottled in Bond Rye

I’d like to thank High West for providing this review sample with no strings attached.

It has been a long damn time since we took a look at any products from High West around here. And it’s not because I didn’t like them when we last looked. No, this has to do with shelf placement.

The liquor store that I frequent most often is a small place packed to the gills with wonderful libations. It has narrow aisles and high shelves. High West sits on the top shelf at the end of the whiskey aisle. Below it are Wild Turkey and Russell’s Reserve, 1792, and Four Roses. Good company if you can get it—well, if you are a normal consumer.

I am far from normal.

I go in looking for things to write about, and, in my mind, that end of the aisle is filled with wonderful things to drink, but nothing to write about, so High West tends to get forgotten about on my local shopping trips. This is really too bad because they make some delicious whiskeys, and some of them are even decently priced at around $30 for a 750. So when their PR person reached out to me offering me a taste of their first ever Bottled in Bond Whiskey, I jumped at the opportunity to reexamine the offerings from this company that I had neglected. And boy, am I glad I did.

But before I get ahead of myself, let’s run down a few interesting items they included in their press release. This bottled-in-bond whiskey is four years old, having been barreled in the Fall 2018 distilling season. As a bonded whiskey, it is 100° proof. The mashbill is made up of 80% rye and 20% malted rye. It was distilled by High West in Wanship, UT. It was released in February 2024 and will be available “across the nation” for a suggested retail price of $79.99 (though at the time of writing this, it is currently sold out on the High West website).

So, onto the most important part: how does it taste?

High West Bottled in Bond Rye

Purchase Info: This was sent by the producer for review purposes. The suggested retail price is $79.99 for a 750 mL bottle.

Price per Drink (50 ml): $5.33

Details: 50% ABV. Batch: 23L19 H218. Mashbill: 80% rye, 20% malted rye.

Nose: Honey, vanilla, cedar, and mint.

Mouth: Cedar, allspice, vanilla, honey, mint, and oak.

Finish: Medium length and warmth with notes of cinnamon, mint, and oak.

Thoughts: Bright and vibrant with good spice. This is delicious. It reminds me of an MGP rye with depth and a nutty under current. And even though I’ve long thought that I didn’t like malted rye in my whiskey, I really like this one. It must be that I only disliked the ones that I tasted first. This is why I try not to write off an entire ingredient’s usage. It also makes a killer Sazerac cocktail. Though at $80 per bottle, this probably won’t be going into many cocktails in most peple’s homes. All in all, I really like this one.

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Bernheim Barrel Proof, A224

I’d like to thank Heaven Hill for providing this review sample with no strings attached.

I had my weekly allergy injection this afternoon, and it is knocking the shit out of me tonight. So, let’s jump right into the review, shall we? Luckily for all of us, tonight’s whiskey is another of Heaven Hill’s Barrel Proof series of whiskeys, and since we’ve covered the other two during the last couple of weeks, we should all be up to speed on them. Or at least close enough.

Bernheim Barrel Proof is, as the name suggests, a barrel-proof version of Heaven Hill’s Bernheim Wheat Whiskey. The mash bill is 51% wheat, 37% corn, and 12% malted barley. This batch was aged between seven and nine years before being bottled at 125.2° proof. The A224 designation means that this is the first batch (A) of 2024 (24), and it was released in February (2). The suggested retail price is $64.99.

Let’s see how it tastes.

Bernheim Barrel Proof, A224

Purchase Info: This bottle was provided by the producer for review purposes. The suggested retail price is $64.99.

Price per Drink (50 mL): $4.33

Details: 62.63 ABV. Mash bill: 51% wheat, 37% corn, 12% malted barley. Aged 7-9 years.

Nose: Nutty and floral with caramel and oak.

Mouth: Spicy, floral, and nutty with cinnamon, caramel, mint, cherry, and oak.

Finish: Hot, spicy, and on the longer side of medium length. Notes of toasted nuts, cinnamon, and cherry.

Thoughts: Hot, spicy, and nutty are the three words I would use to describe this. It's quite good, but not quite as good as the Larceny or Elijah Craig Barrel Proof whiskies. This doesn't have the same level of richness that they do. But if you like a nutty whiskey, then this is one for you.

Comparison to B923: A224 is much more vibrant on the nose. A224 is nuttier and hotter in the mouth, but B923 is much sweeter. I'd personally pick B923 if given the choice because it is a little gentler if such a thing can be said about something that is over 120° proof.

If you want to support our work at BourbonGuy.com, please consider a one-time donation at ko-fi.com/bourbonguy or paypal.me/BourbonGuy. Or you could buy some merch that I’ve designed and/or built (tasting journals, t-shirts, stickers, pins, signs, posters, and more) at BourbonGuyGifts.com. Use code BOURBONGUYREADER at checkout for 5% off any order of $50 or more.

Penelope Tokaji Cask Finish Rye

I’d like to thank ByrnePR and Penelope Bourbon for providing this review sample with no strings attached.

Fun story. Until I sat down to write this, I had no idea tonight’s whiskey was a rye whiskey. I hadn’t read the press release yet when I did the tasting on Saturday afternoon, the bottle was in another room, and the company is referred to as Penelope Bourbon. Toss in a healthy dose of not paying attention, and in my small, smooth brain, that meant that the whiskey I was tasting was a bourbon.

My original thoughts on this were weird. I liked it but felt that the “bourbon” would be divisive among people who were expecting typical bourbon flavors. I really gave a lot of credit to the influence of the finishing cask in the flavor profile. All in all, it made me feel like a real dumbass when I started reading the press release at the start of my research tonight. Especially when I read, “Distilled in Lawrenceburg, Indiana, aged eight years and bottled at 106 proof, its two-grain mash bill consists of 95% rye and 5% malted barley. The rye whiskey features…”

That was a pretty big hint that I had no idea what was going on. So, let’s start over and learn together, shall we?

The Penelope Bourbon Tokaji Cask Finish Rye Whiskey (see why I was confused?) is an eight-year-old version of MGP’s 95% rye recipe. According to Whisky Advocate, after aging for eight years, it was then finished in Hungarian tokaji wine barrels for an additional eight and a half weeks before being bottled at 106° proof.

So you might be asking, what the heck is tokaji wine? I know I was. Based only on the name, I thought it was a Japanese drink. The spelling looks very Japanese. But no, it is Hungarian. The style is named for the Tokaj wine region, which is spread across the border of Slovakia and Hungary. The region is known for its sweet wines, primarily those made from grapes that have been infected by the Botrytis cinerea fungus. If the infected grapes are treated correctly after infection, they can produce a sweet wine with very concentrated flavors.

Ok. Now that we know what this is (for real this time in my case), let’s get on to how it tastes, shall we?

Penelope Tokaji Cask Finish

Purchase Info: This sample was provided by the producer for review purposes. The suggested retail price is $89.99.

Price per Drink (50 mL): $6.00

Details: 8 years old. 53% ABV. Tokaji Cask finished. Mash bill: 95% rye, 5% malted barley.

Nose: Honey, spearmint, oak, sandalwood, and a faint bubblegum note.

Mouth: Sweet and spicy with floral sandalwood, cinnamon, honey, and oak.

Finish: Sweet, warm, and of medium length. Notes of honey, oak, spearmint, and cinnamon.

Thoughts: This is a really nice twist on the traditional MGP 95% rye flavor profile. It is much sweeter, but still spicy and delicious. We all know by now that the 95% rye from MGP is one of my favorite styles of rye whiskey, so it is not surprising that I really am enjoying this. The cask finish seems to amplify the sweetness, add a very nice mouthfeel and bring out even more cinnamon and sandalwood notes than are normally in the base rye. Bottle that at over 100° proof and, well, “chef’s kiss” is all I can say about it. It’s quite tasty.

If you want to support our work at BourbonGuy.com, please consider a one-time donation at ko-fi.com/bourbonguy or paypal.me/BourbonGuy. Or you could buy some merch that I’ve designed and/or built (tasting journals, t-shirts, stickers, pins, signs, posters, and more) at BourbonGuyGifts.com. Use code BOURBONGUYREADER at checkout for 5% off any order of $50 or more.