Stranahan's Releases Its First Bottled in Bond

A quick look at the American whiskey landscape and you’d be hard-pressed to find many bottled in bond releases that stretch past the double-digit mark in the craft whiskey world. The majority of the older bonded whiskeys hail from well-established distilleries; think Heaven Hill, which has produced countless ultra-aged Old Fitzgerald bottled in bond bourbons in its day, not to mention a 10 year old Henry McKenna and 11 and 13 year old William Heavenhills, among others. Also, somewhat unusual are bottled in bond whiskeys that aren’t bourbons—the Old Overholt and Rittenhouse bonded ryes are ubiquitous, yes, and George Dickel has a number of age-stated bottled in bond Tennessee whiskeys, but the style is by and large dominated by bourbon. Denver, Colorado-based distillery Stranahan’s has now gone against the grain on both counts with the debut of its first-ever bottled in bond whiskey, an 11 year old American single malt.

This isn’t the first bottled in bond American single malt; others include Portland, Oregon’s Westward 7 year old, Baltimore-based Old Line Spirits 5 years old, and one from Town Branch, which lays claim to being the oldest-ever released at 15 years old. But as one of the country’s most prolific American single malt makers, Stranahan’s take on the style carries its own kind of weight.

For starters, this is the oldest unfinished whiskey from Stranahan’s hitherto—it’s bookended by 10 and 12 year old Mountain Angel single malts, the latter of which is finished in port casks (the 10 year old spends the entirety of its maturation in new charred oak, just like the bottled in bond). While Stranahan's got its start back in 2004, it hadn't before released a bottled in bond whiskey by virtue of its penchant for blending (bonded whiskeys are made in a single distilling season). In making the whiskey, master blender Justin Aden turned to barrels distilled in the spring of 2015. He tasted about 212 of them; of those, he selected just 35 barrels for the final blend, with many coming from either January or June. “There’s this soft round note that comes through really well in the finished blend, and a sort of caramel texture and flavor that all came out of January,” he explains. “And alongside that, there’s this mustiness—I say that with love—that I found in the June barrels; it evoked a lot of notes from childhood, like dusty camping gear and a cottage coat closet. The harmony of those two things just seemed to hit the right, very American note for this occasion.”

The “occasion” he speaks of is two-pronged, referencing both the country’s 250^th anniversary and Colorado’s own 150^th anniversary of statehood, celebrated on August 1^st (the same day the whiskey made its debut). Aden’s notes—well-worn camping gear, cottage closet—are certainly present in the whiskey and evocative of Americana in their own way, but there are more broadly American flavors to latch onto as well, including apple pie, vanilla soft serve, and a touch of root beer sweetness. The palate is silky, with mouth-coating wood spice joined by swirls of caramel syrup, baked apple, butterscotch, a little chocolate truffle, and a crack of black pepper. A lengthy finish, where more silken spice meets chocolate and baked stone fruit, makes for a deeply enjoyable sipping experience.

While there are no concrete plans for additional bottled in bond whiskeys at this time, Aden isn’t without ideas. “What’s so fun about bottled in bond is you have the opportunity to create a series from two different perspectives; we could either do an 11 year old next year using 2016 barrels, or we could follow these 2015 barrels as they became 12, 13, 14 year old, and so on,” he says. With any luck, such future bottlings will come to fruition, as the new whiskey is a bit scarce outside of Colorado—you’ll have the best luck finding a bottle ($150) at either the distillery in Denver or the Stranahan’s Aspen Whiskey Lodge, though retailers in Florida, Texas, and California have also received distribution. In the meantime, Aden teases that there will be other exciting releases coming down the pike later this year, including the distillery’s oldest single malt yet.