If you’re a whiskey fan, you’ve probably heard of spirits experts Fred Minnick and Michael Veach. This duo of noted authors, speakers and tasters recently shared their year-end lists of the best whiskeys of 2023, and Middle Tennessee spirits really stood out.
Minnick has livestreamed the annual tasting of his top 100 American whiskeys for a few years now, and this edition was a five-hour marathon of sipping, spitting and ranking, a task that not many mere mortals could possibly manage. To qualify for his final grading, a whiskey had to have ranked as one of his favorites throughout the year. Minnick also excluded single barrels from the competition by requiring that at least 500 bottles have been released.
While Minnick tasted blind, a running list of each entrant was shown on the screen as he made his way through flights of 25 whiskeys at a time. So I was able to tell when he sampled Nashville Barrel Co.’s new Cask Batch, which was labeled H4 and came across his tasting table at about the two-hour mark of the proceedings. Bottled at 123.7 proof and available at NBC’s two locations plus select liquor stores for about $70 a bottle, this is the least expensive barrel-strength product that Michael Hinds and company have ever released.
It’s also the debut of their new packaging design, which includes a rendering of the Nashville skyline printed on the back of the bottle label so that it emerges into view as the whiskey level drops. Pretty darned clever marketing, I’d say!
Minnick was quite impressed by his first tasting of the Cask Batch. Among his comments while contemplating what he had just sipped were: “Wow!”, “This is a major contender.”, and “Absolutely delicious!” He also commented on the whiskey’s “big notes of nutmeg,” and that he enjoyed the notes of marzipan and honey.
Almost an hour later, Minnick brought sample F5 to his nose, which viewers could see was Nelson’s Green Brier Distilliery’s 15-year Rye Whiskey, bottled at 108.4 proof and retailing for $300. Minnick was even more effusive about this extraordinary rye whiskey.
“Smellin’ quite nice,” he commented, “got some age on it.” He noted molasses, marzipan and crème brûlée on the nose and then dipped in for a taste. “Oh! My! God! Inflate my tires and butter my biscuits!” he gushed. “This is delicious. I’m at a loss for words!” (Despite all the words he had just shared, including “fuckin’ good!”) Minnick even sampled it twice, something he rarely does during a marathon tasting session.
After making his way through all 100 finalists, Minnick took a short break to recalibrate his palate with some cheese and lots of water and returned to rank the Top 25. At the end of the process, he pulled out his top five. NGB’s rye came in at No. 5, and NBC’s Cask Batch was named the No. 4 American whiskey for 2023. “Holy shit!” Minnick remarked when the names of the Nashville whiskeys were revealed. “Good for Nashville Barrel Co.!”
Green Brier’s rye is certainly a luxury product if you can still find a bottle anywhere, but the Cask Batch from Nashville Barrel Co. is a real bargain and should be readily available going forward since the company maintains a stock of the source barrels and blends them in four-barrel lots as they need more. So be on the lookout for this extraordinary whiskey if you want to try something special. I happened to have a bottle of each of the winners squirreled away in my personal collection, so I revisited them as a Christmas treat to myself. I definitely concur with Minnick’s assessments!
FYI, the top three whiskeys in Minnick’s tasting turned out to be Buffalo Trace Prohibition Old Stagg at the top and two different iterations of Heaven Hills Larceny, with the C923 lot and A123 lot placing second and third, respectively.
Lee Kennedy, Leiper's Fork Distillery
Michael Veach’s end-of-year tasting wasn’t nearly as exhaustive (or exhausting), as he and his fellow taster and podcast co-host Matt Kohorst blind-tasted their 12 “whiskeys of the month” from their periodic tastings in 2023. In the end, Veach came up with Leiper’s Fork Bottled-in-Bond Rye as his absolute favorite sip of 2023.
In a blog post describing the tasting, Veach noted that “it has a distinctive fruitiness that I really like,” and in an earlier post about his visit to the distillery he called the rye “almost brandy-like with lots of dark fruits and caramel sweetness.” Retailing for around $90, Leiper’s Fork Bottled-in-Bond Rye is available at the distillery and in select Middle Tennessee liquor stores, so you should be able to grab a bottle of this award-winning whiskey.
Congrats to all the honorees! It’s been a good year for local whiskey.
