This 100% rye starts with pure, traditionally-grown rye cultivated exclusively for us on the Omlin family farm in Quincy, Washington. The grain is mashed, distilled & barreled in our Woodinville distillery- then trucked back over the Cascade Mountains to our private barrel houses, where Central Washington's extreme temperature cycles promote the extraction of natural flavors from the oak. Prior to being coopered, the barrel wood is seasoned in open air, rain, wind, sun and snow for eighteen months softening the wood's harsh tannins. They are then slowly toasted and heavily charred to further enrich the wood's desirable flavors. The result of this meticulous process yields a truly hand-crafted whiskey with aromas of cinnamon, clove, and fruit leather, and notes of caramel, wood spice, and honey on the palate with a long, memorable finish that will leave you anticipating your next sip.
What you smell and taste in a whisky is highly subjective.
Even the pros do not always agree on the tasting notes. Therefore, we have combined the tasting notes from several sources into a cross-section Nose, Palate, and Finish to find the commonalities between two whiskies. We use the Aroma Wheel with its concentric circles of increasingly specific tastes and smells (general in the center; more specific the further out you go) to find Exact, Secondary, and General matches between two whiskies. We also take into account other important factors like mash bill, barrel type(s), ABV, region, ratings, price and more. We then weight each factor based on what we believe to be the approximate importance it has in determining whether two whiskies are similar.
We're all different.
Again, we cannot stress enough that what you smell and taste in a whisky is likely going to be different than the person you're drinking it with. Whisky Mates is meant to be a guide to help you find what you like drinking, using the best methodologies available. In the end, rely on your own palate to tell you what you like and don't like.