Tasting notes

nose

overripe banana, peach and pear with honeyed apricot and dark toffee, over a faint vegetal edge of cut grass

palate

oily, opening on buttered popcorn and sugar cone, then candied pineapple, caramelized mango and dried apricot with rye spice and mint over milk chocolate

finish

medium; rye spice and herbal mint hold on while the fruit and sweetness fade, leaving a soft vanilla note

Mash bill

75% rye, 13% corn, 12% malted barley. The rye is a mix of Horton, an heirloom New York variety brought back from ten surviving seeds with Cornell University, and organic Field Race rye, both grown in the Finger Lakes, and the corn is New York grown as well. Horton is a smaller grain than the rye most whiskey is made from, and the distillery uses it for honeyed fruit flavors that go beyond rye's familiar spice.

Why it's craft

Jaywalk Straight Rye blends whiskey made from Horton, a rye New York Distilling Company revived from ten seeds, with straight rye made from Field Race rye, the grain behind the distillery's earlier Ragtime Rye. Both ryes come from Finger Lakes farms, and the six- to eight-year-old barrels were distilled at the company's own Brooklyn distillery. Allen Katz and Brooklyn Brewery founder Tom Potter started the distillery in 2011, and Scotch whisky producer Loch Lomond Group bought it in 2025.