Willett Family Estate Four Year Small Batch Rye Review

Willett is a brand I've covered many times with most those reviews having been of their earlier, well aged sourced products which is how they made a name for themselves. Those products are now mostly long gone or super expensive and hard to get when they do occasionally release them at the gift shop. What we have been seeing more of lately though is their in house distilled products which are finally starting to get some decent age.

I've had a mixed bag with Willett's self distilled products thus far. I liked the Old Bardstown Bottled in Bond, really liked a 4 Year Family Estate Single Barrel, was okay on the 3 Year Small Batch Rye but hated the 2 year small batch rye and the 80th Anniversary release. Fortunately I got to try this one before buying and liked it enough to bring some home.

Aged 4 Years; 74% rye; 57.5% ABV; Purchased in the Willett Gift Shop for $55 04/06/18

Nose: Wood sweets like vanilla/caramel and dry cinnamon powder spice. The nose leans more towards sweet than spicy which is surprising given that this is the their high rye mashbill. It's not hot at all for the proof and is rather nice.

Taste: A lot more intense than the nose. Lots of great typical bourbon sweet flavors up front but then a wallop of spearmint and baking powder spice in the middle and finish which lingers with a spicy tingle for quite a while. The intensity that you'd expect for 115 proof comes through loud and clear but is not overly hot. There's a lot of wood influence here and almost no real young grainy notes that you might expect in a 4 year old whiskey. The only real knock I can give is a little bit of artificial sweetener like splenda lingers once the spice dies down.

Thoughts: Color me impressed, this is good. Previous commentary on these small batch ryes have typically come with the disclaimer of "it's good for a young rye" or "it shows a lot of promise". I'm going to go beyond that and say this is already good right now with no caveats. I can't wait to see what this will taste like when it becomes a teenager but for now I'm very happy with where it is at.

Rating: B

Note that price is not considered when assigning a rating.