Tasting notes

nose

orchard fruit, honey and malt with heather, butterscotch and spearmint

palate

dried fruit and floral spice, birch beer and maple candy, with a light nuttiness

finish

long and herbal; mint and forest floor give way to vanilla cola, custard and berries

Mash bill

100% malted barley. The wash is Westward's usual barley ale; the change is at the still, where this batch took a third pass through the copper pot stills in place of the usual two, a practice borrowed from Irish whiskey that lightens the spirit's texture.

Why it's craft

Westward normally double distills its single malt; for this release it ran the spirit through its copper pot stills a third time, in the manner of Irish whiskey, to see what a lighter, more aromatic spirit would become after six and a half years in oak. It is the distillery's first triple-distilled whiskey, made from its own brewed barley ale in Portland and released at cask strength to the whiskey club.