Tasting notes

nose

Orange cream and jasmine tea over cinnamon roll, with currant jam, raw sugarcane and a savory hint of fenugreek

palate

Spun sugar and rum-soaked raisin give way to grape, orange peel and marzipan, then a nutty sherry note, caraway and roasted cacao

finish

Long and heavy; macerated strawberry and dark molasses linger before settling into tobacco leaf

Mash bill

73% white corn, 10% winter wheat, 17% malted barley. The white corn is locally grown and non-GMO, and soft winter wheat stands where rye would otherwise be in the mash. Castle & Key says the wheat gives this bourbon a round, honeyed warmth in place of rye's fire, a base it chose to pair with the sweetness of Tokaji casks.

Why it's craft

Tokaji is a Hungarian dessert wine made from grapes left on the vine until noble rot concentrates them, and this release puts Castle & Key's wheated bourbon in its casks for more than a year. It belongs to the Experimental Series, which master distiller Brett Connors uses to test new barrel finishes, blends and mash bills in small batches, and it is sold only by the distillery itself. Castle & Key distills on the grounds of the Old Taylor Distillery, built in 1887, which had fallen to ruin before Will Arvin began restoring it in 2014.