If you’re not up to speed with all of Kentucky’s new Bourbon distilleries, one of the most talked about producers of the last few years has been Castle & Key, mostly because of its decision to revamp the Old Taylor Distillery (the same trademark owned and bottled as E.H. Taylor by Buffalo Trace). This past Friday, I finally got my hands on some of the juice, albeit as part of a special mash bill contracted by the team at Pinhook.

For those of you who who tend to avoid MGP whiskies, I’d recommend taking another look at Pinhook. Run by the team of Sean Josephs and Alice Peterson, the single casks are always well chosen, but Sean’s blends are above and beyond. In my opinion, the Vertical Series is annually one of the best things going right now in American whiskey because Sean is able to marry the best parts of each barrel into something greater than the sum of its parts for a price that’s more than reasonable and with fantastic packaging.

Roughly five years ago, Pinhook signed a deal with Castle & Key to have all its subsequent whiskies produced at the Kentucky facility under Sean’s direction with a custom mash bill of 75% corn, 15% rye, and 10% barley. In working on an exclusive project for MIssion, I not only wanted the C&K recipe, I wanted a blend of various barrels done by Sean himself because that’s the draw for me. Sean sent out a variety of three barrel marriages for me to choose from and I found one that was definitely to my liking—full of fruit, brown sugar, sweet baking spices, and a bold finish. It’s NOT the bottle in the photo, but it does have Barrel #1 in the mix, which Sean thinks may be the first ever barrel filled at Castle & Key, so that’s something to look forward to this June.

For those of you wondering why they called it Castle & Key, the old Taylor distillery is literally a fairy tale castle in its design, albeit I haven’t been there since the remodel. This is an old photo from 2013 when my friends and I would annually jump the gate at the abandoned facility and go roaming around the grounds in search of whiskey memorabilia. Back in those days, there were TWO ghost distilleries practically next door to each other: Old Taylor and Old Crow. It was creepy enough in the day time, so I can only imagine what it looked like at night! It was like a horror movie plot waiting to happen.

In other news, our Pasadena store is closed today for inventory, so if you were planning to pick up a bottle, better wait until tomorrow.

I’ve got Jasmine Hirsch on the Instagram Live schedule this week, so I’m very excited about that. We’ll be talking Pinot Noir and terroir, but on Thursday rather than the standard Wednesday time slot to accommodate Jasmine’s schedule.

Still looking for the new 2021 limited edition high proof, special stave release of Maker’s 46 to land this week, along with a few other new faces.

Should be a good week!

-David Driscoll