Get adventurous in 2023 with some Arizona whiskey
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It's a new year, and I decided that the first bottle of whiskey I opened in 2023 should have some local flavor.
Details: I sipped on a recently purchased bottle of Cherry Bomb, a rye whiskey from Tempe's Adventurous Stills.
- It gets its name from the mash bill — the mixture of grains used to distill it — which is 90% rye and 10% malted barley that's smoked over cherrywood.
- The wood imparts some cherry-tasting notes to the whiskey.
- Cherry Bomb was the Adventurous Stills Explorer's Club special release for the third quarter of 2022.
The big picture: I was impressed. The cherrywood brings a unique flavor.
- It's bottled at about 60% alcohol, so this is a whiskey for drinkers who like a high proof point.
What they're saying: "It's our classic MO. We go off and we try some weird stuff and we see what happens," Adventurous Stills owner Kelly Lattig tells Axios Phoenix. "It was a bit of a revelation to me, this notion of using small amounts of smoked malt. It doesn't make it super-smoky, but it sure adds an interesting taste. So that's a path I'm going to spend some years going down."
Meanwhile: If you want to grab the fourth-quarter special release, its Einkorn wheat whiskey, you'd better hurry. Lattig says there are only a few bottles left.
- The whiskey is 72% Sonoran white wheat and 28% Einkorn, an ancient grain that lends a peppery spice to the traditional smoothness of wheat whiskey, giving the spirit a unique character.
What's next: Lattig says Adventurous Stills has a full slate of special releases coming up this year.
- The first quarter will see an oat whiskey. A new version of its Peralta Bourbon will be out in the second or third quarter, along with a millet-based bourbon, and the fourth quarter will feature a blue corn whiskey with a to-be-determined finish.