Balcones Single Malt Texas Whisky Review

Balcones is a well respected craft brand in the whiskey industry and from what I can tell the Single Malt is their most recommend product. I don’t have a lot of experience with American malts but to be fair there aren’t that many out there. I’m not sure if this is how it is still produced but the Coopered Tot has an intricate writeup on how the first batches of this were made. The TLDR; version is this starts out in small 5 gallon yard-aged white oak barrels and is then later transferred to larger 53+ gallon barrels. The interesting thing to me about the yard-aged oak is that it is seasoned 2-3 years which is much longer than the standard ~6 months used for curing oak used in Bourbon barrels.

No Age Statement; 53% ABV; Batch SM 14.3 
(thanks to /u/tequilajunction for the samples)

Nose: Surprising amount of ethanol aroma - it breathes hotter than I expected even after about 30 minutes of air in a Canadian glencairn. When you get beyond the heat there are classic malt aromas as well as some toffee and dark raisin-like fruitiness. Adding water didn’t really seem to help tone down the heat.

Taste: The taste starts out less warm than the nose. On the front and mid palate wood sweets such as vanilla and some light honey come through. Throughout the whole experience a fruity sweet raisin note is very present. Towards the back palate and into the finish the toffee note takes on a deeper taste and develops more into a dark roast coffee flavor. The finish also has a little spice bite to it. My one complaint would be that the finish is hotter than it should be much like the initial nose. Adding water seemed to soften up the front to mid palate and didn’t really tame the heat on the back.

Thoughts: This reminds me a lot of Stranahan’s Colorado Whiskey in terms of taste. I really enjoy the dark fruit and roasted coffee flavors but I feel like this one breathes and tastes hotter than it should. I attribute that to what is young whiskey that has been subjected to a harsh Texas climate. Much like my impression of Stranahan’s I would love to taste this with quite a few more years in the wood to smooth out some of the rough edges and give it more wood depth though I am not sure how much longer it could survive in the dry, hot Texas climate. Overall, it’s interesting and worth trying once but I personally can’t justify the $70 cost.

Rating: C+ / B-