Tasting notes

nose

Fresh dill, mint, fennel and pine needle with floral notes and brown sugar

palate

Caramel and oak, then pepper, clove, cinnamon bubblegum and star anise, with apricot and mint

finish

Cooling mint and menthol with cedarwood, citrus, pumpernickel and tobacco

Mash bill

Rye and malted barley, from the distillery's rye recipes: 80% rye and 20% malted barley, and 90% rye and 10% malted barley. Neither uses corn, so the rye grain sets the flavor, and one reviewed barrel was the 90% rye recipe. The Huber family grows the rye on its own farm and buys the malted barley locally.

Why it's craft

Each bottle is a single barrel of rye from the Old Rickhouse, bottled at cask strength with no filtering, so each one tastes a little different. The rye is grown on the Huber family farm in southern Indiana, fermented as a sweet mash and distilled on copper pot stills, and the barrels age on the same land. The family has farmed at Starlight since Simon Huber settled there in 1843.