Tasting notes

nose

roasted oak and caramel, dried orange peel, apricot, honey and nutty notes, with a hint of fennel

palate

velvety; brown sugar, tobacco and cigar box, prune, red apple and tart cranberry over charred oak and graham cracker

finish

long; a burst of cinnamon gives way to burnt caramel and dried apple peel, then clove and oak tannin dry it down

Mash bill

72% corn, 13% rye, 15% malted barley. This is the Willett family's original bourbon recipe, the lower-rye of its two bourbon mash bills, so corn sweetness and the large malt share carry more of the weight here than rye spice. Willett mashes and ferments it in Bardstown and runs it through a column still and a Vendome copper pot still.

Why it's craft

Noah's Mill once carried a 15-year statement on bourbon bought from other distilleries; around 2020 it moved to whiskey Willett distills itself in Bardstown, where the family has made whiskey since 1936. Each batch is put together from barrels of four to ten years and bottled at 114.3 proof, close to the 125 proof the spirit goes into the barrel at. It is the highest-strength bottle in Willett's small-batch collection.