New whiskeys from Stranahan's, Rabbit Hole, Ezra Brooks, and More as Lady Bird Sets a Release Date

It's not quite ready to roll, but, there's an upcoming new release of an annual expression that's always an occasion for its distillery and its fans. Lady Bird, made by Texas distiller Garrison Brothers, is a honey-infused, cognac-finished bourbon made from a mashbill of 75% corn, 15% soft winter red wheat, and 10% barley. It’s released once a year at the distillery in the town of Hye, in the heart of the Texas Hill Country, west of Austin, and this year’s release date has just been revealed as May 11. Some 7,002 bottles of Lady Bird’s 2024 edition are being made available: the first 1,000 bottles will be sold on May 11 at the distillery, and the remainder will be released at retail nationwide. Lady Bird is bottled at 57% ABV and carries a retail price of $180. The waiting line at the distillery on selling day starts at around 5 a.m. and usually stretches for a couple of miles. In the meantime, there are plenty of new releases here to keep us occupied— finished American whiskeys, a second release from country music star Eric Church, luxury scotches, and a host of others, so read on.

American

Stranahan’s Diamond Peak Caribbean Rum Cask American Single Malt

ABV: 45%
SRP: $85
Availability: Available at the distillery starting April 15, with a nationwide retail rollout to follow.

For two decades, the Colorado-based Stranahan’s has been a leading figure in the American single malt scene. Like many others, Stranahan’s places a focus on using locally sourced grains, but it distinguishes itself by its favor of new oak casks—an uncommon move for the ASM sector, but one that’s caught on with large producers like Bulleit and Beam. Stranahan’s also has a history of experimenting with cask finishes, which are often spotlighted in its annual Diamond Peak releases. This year’s iteration, which has just been announced, features rum casks.

Diamond Peak 2024 is composed of 6–9 year old single malts, which were all copper pot-distilled from local grains. After blending, the whiskey was finished in a mix of rum casks sourced from across the Caribbean, including Barbados, Martinique, and The Dominican Republic. Each finish ranges between 6 and 18 months. The resulting whiskey was then cut to 45% ABV using Rocky Mountain spring water.

Rum casks are quite popular with distillers for the sweet and subtle spice notes they can impart on whisky. Stranahan’s itself notably had a brief tango with the style some years ago, with the release of a very similar 5–9 year old blend which was finished in Caribbean casks. While that bottling was a limited distillery exclusive, this one’s slated for a nationwide retail release. Fans who don’t want to wait can find bottles at the distillery in Denver and the Stranahan’s Whiskey Lodge in Aspen on April 15th.

Ezra Brooks 99 Port Wine Cask Finished Bourbon

ABV: 49.2%
SRP: $35
Availability: Nationwide

Made by the Kentucky-based Lux Row Distillers, Ezra Brooks is something of an overlooked gem in MGP’s branded family. While not as popular as its cousin Remus from Indiana, Ezra has the status of being the sole Luxco brand to appear in our Top 20 lists—once in 2019 with a great sourced barrel-proof bourbon, and again last year with an impressive 2 year old rye. Now Ezra is welcoming a new cask-finished bourbon into its portfolio.

Ezra Brooks 99 Port Wine Cask Finished is flagship Ezra Brooks 99 bourbon (78% corn, 10% rye, 12% malted barley) that undergoes an additional 6-month finish in port casks. According to master distiller John Rempe, the goal was to introduce a “unique flavor option” for Ezra fans by melding some of the bourbon’s signature spiciness with sweet fruity notes from the port casks. The finish is the sole difference between the two, with everything else from the age statement to the proof kept the same.

Though it introduced stave finishing to its barrel program some time ago, this is the first serious cask-finished expression we’ve seen from Ezra. It’s a bit surprising that it took this long, given how prevalent finishing is in Lux Row’s Daviess County and Blood Oath releases. This one will be a permanent offering, however, and it represents the first chapter in a new finishing-centric series which will see new expressions added annually.

Never Say Die Rye

ABV: 52.5%
SRP: $85
Availability: Kentucky and Illinois Retailers, and online at seelbachs.com

The concept for Never Say Die came about while longtime friends David Wild and Pat Madden were drinking whiskey at the 2017 Kentucky Derby. Pat told the story of the eponymous racehorse that was born on his family’s farm east of Lexington and went on to prominently race in England. The tale goes that the horse was born with a life-threatening breathing problem, but was cured overnight after being fed whiskey. That story became a template for the label’s first bourbon, which was sourced from Kentucky and set on a cross-Atlantic voyage to England, where it rested prior to bottling. They notably had help from Shane Baker and Pat Heist of Wilderness Trail, who helped both co-found the brand and develop the recipe.

Now, Never Say Die is doing the same thing with a rye whiskey. Like the bourbon, Never Say Die’s rye was sourced from the same distillery in Danville, Kentucky. They were also aged for 5 years in Kentucky before making the same six-week-long journey across the Atlantic to White Peak Distillery in England. Of course, the rye is made using a different mashbill: 56% rye, 33% corn, and 11% malted barley. There’s also a notable jump in proof, with the rye at 52.5% ABV compared to the bourbon’s 47.5%.

As far as ship-aged whiskies go, rye is a bit of a rare sight. The only other one we’ve seen is Jefferson’s Ocean Aged Voyage 26, which landed a few years ago. It’ll be interesting to see how well Never Say Die’s rye holds up to its nautical aging regimen.

High n’ Wicked Cask Strength Rye

ABV: 62%
SRP: $90
Availability: Nationwide

High n’ Wicked Cask Strength Bourbon

ABV: 61.6%
SRP: $90
Availability: Nationwide

High n’ Wicked launched in 2019 with straight bourbon and rye whiskeys. Now, the brand has released its first cask-strength iterations of those same whiskeys. The rye, a 5 year old sour mash whiskey, is made with a mashbill of 91% rye and 9% malted barley. High n’ Wicked is an independent bottler that sourced this whiskey from New Riff Distilling in Newport, Kentucky.

The barrel proof bourbon features a 5 year old sweet mash and is made with a high-rye mashbill of 51% corn, 39% rye, and 10% malted barley. While the rye’s distiller was disclosed, the bourbon’s is not specified beyond noting that it’s distilled, aged, and bottled in Kentucky. Both whiskeys are bottled without chill filtration.

High n’ Wicked is owned by Altamar Brands, which also counts Foursquare rum, Lágrimas Del Valle tequila, and other spirits among its holdings.

Chicken Cock Small Batch Bourbon (Batch 1)

ABV: 50%
SRP: $70
Availability: Nationwide

The newest Chicken Cock whiskey is the first in what will be a continuous series. Each batch will have a couple of key factors in common—first, master distiller Gregg Snyder will select Small Batch from less than 10 barrels, focusing on the finest inventory on hand. Once it’s gone, it’s gone forever, to be replaced by a new unique whiskey. Small Batch will also always be bottled-in-bond; from batch to batch, flavor differentiations will come from maturation and where the barrels are in the Bardstown-based rickhouses (the brand is made in partnership with Bardstown Bourbon Co., as part of its collaborative distillation program).

For this first release, Snyder pulled six 5 year old barrels from the second and fifth floors of Chicken Cock’s warehouses.

Rabbit Hole Founder’s Collection: Mizunara FInished Bourbon (2024 Edition)

ABV: 51.9%
SRP: $1,500
Availability: Select markets nationwide; Rabbit Hole’s Louisville distillery; rabbitholedistillery.com.

When Rabbit Hole launched its Founder’s Collection in 2020, it offered a glimpse into founder and whiskey maker Kaveh Zamanian’s creative side, emphasizing whiskeys that are limited edition, cask-strength, and often focused on unique finishes. The latest Founder’s Collection release, Mizunara, retreads familiar territory for the distillery—the whiskey was originally released in 2021, as the second-ever release in the Founder’s Collection.

Zamanian selected a small number of 15 year old bourbon barrels for the new edition and finished them for close to a year in Japanese mizunara oak. A rare oak, mizunara can add delicious, complex flavors to any whisky, which is why more distillers across the globe are turning to them for maturation (though usually, only small amounts of those whiskies are then available). Only 2,200 bottles of the new whiskey are available for purchase, with some available at the distillery, some allocated to the distillery’s website, and others in select markets nationwide.

Milam & Greene Wildlife Collection: Mockingbird Bourbon

ABV: 64.1%
SRP: $150
Availability: milamandgreenewhiskey.com; distillery tasting room

This is the second Milam & Greene Wildlife Collection of 2024. Following close on the heels of the year’s first Wildlife Collection whiskey, Mockingbird continues the series’ exploration of how extreme weather in the Texas Hill Country impacts whiskey.

This cask-strength, single barrel bourbon was pulled from cask #519, bearing just 173 bottles. The whiskey was distilled in Tennessee from a mashbill of 84% corn, 8% rye, and 8% malted barley. It was then barreled in Tennessee on March 8, 2016, and then aged in the state for 6 years and 7 months. Following this period, it was moved to Texas, where it spent an additional year and 4 months aging on the northside of Milam & Greene’s Rickhouse #2. During that time, the state experienced an extreme drought and an ice storm, both of which caused temperature swings that impacted the maturing whiskey.

This release is named for the mockingbird, which is also the state bird of Texas. Northern mockingbirds are found throughout Texas year-round (and are frequent visitors at Milam & Greene’s Blanco, Texas distillery) and are known for their ability to adapt to a diverse array of habitats, be they urban or rural. They’re also especially resilient, able to survive in harsh environmental conditions.

Whiskey JYPSI 6 year old Explorer Series (Batch 001) Bourbon

ABV: 51.5%
SRP: $70
Availability: Tennessee retailers, and online at whiskeyjypsi.com

Last May, country music singer Eric Church joined the long and ever-growing list of celebrities with a whisky label with the launch of Whiskey JYPSI and its parent company Outsider Spirits. The initial offering, Journey, was an eclectic blend of Indiana bourbons, ultra-aged Canadian rye, and American single malt. Now, Church is rolling out the first new expression since the launch.

Similar to Journey, Explorer Series Batch 1 is a blend of sourced whiskey. Explorer is a little more straightforward, comprising just two 6 year old bourbons from Indiana. The combined mashbill is 66% corn, 33% rye, and 4% malted barley. The blend was finished using both French and American white oak staves for an undisclosed length of time. After finishing, it was cut to 51.5% ABV.

The Explorer series is JYPSI’s space for showcasing woods from around the world. Future expressions will follow the same outline as this one: using a sourced base, which is aged for at least 6 years, and landing on a final proof in the 50%–53.5% range. The French oak used to make Batch 1 was sourced from the Forest of Tronçais, a historic region that has long supplied wood for Bordeaux casks, and was chosen for its spicier and leathery profile. The American wood comes from the Appalachian Mountains in North Carolina, where the cold climate slows growth and leads to tighter grain, which is claimed to give it a rich and deep sweetness. Eric Church also grew up not too far from that region, which influenced the selection.

Scotch

Royal Salute 21 year old Miami Polo Edition Blended Scotch

ABV: 40%
SRP: $250
Availability: Global limited release available at specialist retailers

Inspired by the glitz and glam of Miami, Royal Salute has given its latest luxury scotch release an all-American spin. The sixth release in the Polo Collection, which connects the blend with important international locations to the sport of polo, was finished in first-fill rye and bourbon barrels. Blended by Royal Salute master blender Sandy Hyslop, the new expression is presented in a pink flagon. The whisky will be launched in a two-day event in Palm Beach, Florida including a charity match at the Grand Champions Polo Club in Wellington. Proceeds will benefit Sentebale, a charity founded by Prince Harry, The Duke of Sussex and Prince Seeiso of Lesotho in 2006.

Previous releases in the Royal Salute Polo Collection include 21 year old Polo Edition (91 points), 21 year old Beach Polo Edition (90 points), 21 year old Snow Polo blended grain (91 points), a malbec-finished 21 year old Polo Estancia (91 points), and last year’s virgin oak cask -finished blended malt 21 year old Jodhpur Edition (91 points).

The Dalmore Luminary No. 2 49 year old The Rare (2024 Edition) Scotch Single Malt

ABV: 40.6%
Availability: To be auctioned at Sotheby’s in May 2024

The Dalmore Luminary No. 2 16 year old The Collectible (2024 Edition) Scotch Single Malt

ABV: 48.6%
SRP: $350
Availability: Global limited release available in specialist retailers and global Travel Retail

The Dalmore has announced the second chapter of its three-part Luminary Series with two new expressions created in partnership with V&A Dundee, Scotland’s design museum. Celebrating whisky and architecture, The Dalmore team collaborated with Melodie Leung, the director at Zaha Hadid Architects. She created a dramatic amber glass sculpture that captures the swirling, ever-changing nature of scotch whisky. This work of art will house a bottle of The Rare edition, a 49 year old composition of The Dalmore by master distiller Richard Paterson and master whisky maker Gregg Glass. The whisky was initially matured in bourbon casks and finished in a variety of casks including a 1963 colheita port cask, apostoles sherry cask, bourbon, and a unique 1951/virgin oak hybrid cask. Only three bottles have been created, but only one bottle with the sculpture will be available to buy at auction for now, with proceeds benefitting V&A Dundee. Another bottle with the sculpture will go on display at the distillery, while the final bottle will be reserved for auction once the series is complete. The first edition of The Rare, a 48 year old Highland single malt, was auctioned at Sotheby’s in 2022 for a hammer price of $112,933 in November 2022.

In a global release of 20,000 bottles, The Collectible is a 16 year old expression that includes some rare peated Dalmore. The final whisky was initially matured in bourbon casks and finished in Graham’s tawny port pipes and apostoles sherry casks and includes a small proportion of the whisky finished in peated casks.