Tasting notes

nose

peach, red apple and banana cream with mulled cider, brown sugar, clove, a little honey and baked bread

palate

stewed peach and toffee, then cream soda, manuka honey, red grape, caramelized sugar, chestnut and hazelnut over soft oak

finish

long; cinnamon and clove stay with honey and dried fruit, drying to oak char with a faint herbal edge

Mash bill

100% malted barley: Simpsons Golden Promise from Scotland and barley grown and malted in Texas, in a split that is not published. Golden Promise is a Scottish heritage variety, malted by Simpsons, a Scottish maltster; the Texas barley comes from the High Plains. Balcones put the two side by side on purpose: head distiller Jared Himstedt describes Lineage as a joining of old-world and new-world ingredients and methods.

Awards

• Gold — San Francisco World Spirits Competition 2024

Why it's craft

Balcones, founded in Waco in 2008, makes its malt whisky itself on copper pot stills built by Forsyths in Scotland. Lineage borrows from both traditions: Scottish and Texas barley in one mash, and maturation first in new oak, as American whiskey does, then in refill barrels, as Scotch malt does. It matures in the Texas heat. Diageo has owned Balcones since 2022.