Tasting notes

nose

toasted wheat and bran with toffee and vanilla, lemon cake and tangerine, a little licorice and dark wood

palate

soft and almost oily, with bread and biscuit, pound cake, lemon candy, treacle and caramel, then an herbal edge and oak tannin

finish

long; oak and black pepper dry it out while vanilla wafer and citrus peel linger, with a sourdough tang and a last smoky, treacly note

Mash bill

100% soft white wheat. Dry Fly buys it from family farms within about 30 miles of its Spokane distillery. The mash holds no corn, rye or barley, so the wheat carries the whiskey alone.

Awards

• 91 points — Tasting Panel Magazine 2018
• Gold — Whiskies of the World 2018

Why it's craft

Dry Fly launched in Spokane in 2007, and on 1 July 2008 it received Washington's first craft distillery license, making it the first distillery licensed in the state since Prohibition. It buys its grain from family farms within about 30 miles and distills it on 450-liter Christian Carl copper pot stills built in Germany. This wheat whiskey was the first whiskey Dry Fly made, and it ages in full-size barrels; the distillery has never used small ones. In 2024 a group led by Caymus Vineyards winemaker Charlie Wagner bought a majority stake.