Best Creatively Smoked American Whiskeys

Arkansas's Rock Town Distillery produces this Hickory-Smoked Whiskey, a wheat whiskey with a 91% winter wheat and a 9% malted barley mashbill. They cold smoke the wheat in their own hickory smokers prior to the milling process. The whiskey is then aged in a combination of 15-gallon and 25-gallon ex-bourbon barrels and is bottled and 90 proof.

Seven Stills is a San Francisco-based micro-distillery specializing in distilling whiskey from beer and featuring bottle art from local designers. Chocasmoke is made by distilling a chocolate oatmeal stout and peat-smoked malted barley. It's then aged for a brief six months in small barrels.

Iron Smoke is a partnership between rocker Tommy Brunett and distiller Drew Wescott, based in Fairport, New York. Brunett sought to amplify the flavor of the whiskey by smoking the grains - corn, rye, wheat and already smoked barley - over applewood prior to the milling and mashing process. The whiskey is aged in new, triple-charred American oak and brought to proof with local spring water. As of 2018 this product is no longer in production.

Rimfire is a whiskey styled after peated Scottish single malt, but instead of peat smoke for the barley, Ranger Creek uses Texas mesquite wood. The mashbill used is actually Ranger Creek's Mesquite Smoked Porter beer, sans the hops, which is made from five different barley varietals. Rimfire is aged for 6 months in new, small American oak barrels. All whiskeys from their Small Caliber series are bottled in 375 ml sized bottles.

This release is from the grain-to-glass producer Sonoma County Distilling in Northern California. The mash bill includes 80% unmalted Canadian rye, 10% malted barley smoked with cherrywood (hence, the name), and 10% unmalted Canadian wheat. Double-distilled in traditional Alembic pot stills, the whiskey is aged for at least a year in oak from Minnesota and Missouri with a 3rd degree char before being bottled at 48% ABV.

Based in Tennessee, Corsair is constantly experimenting with alternative techniques and flavor profiles, but with well thought out approaches. In this case, they use three individually smoked malts as follows: cherrywood from Wisconsin, Beechwood from Germany, and peat from Scotland. Aged in 15 and 30 gallon new American oak barrels for an unspecified amount of time.

Whiskey Del Bac Dorado is the flagship whiskey of family-run Hamilton Distillers in Tucson, Arizona. It is made from malted barley which is smoked using native mesquite wood, rather than peat. It's distilled twice in a 500-gallon copper pot-still and aged in American white oak barrels.

An extremely limited edition, available only at the distillery, this is an aged version of their more widely available Black Dog whiskey. MB Roland is a small farm distillery in southwestern Kentucky that makes a variety of un-aged and flavored whiskey. The Black Patch Whiskey is made from a spirit that is "dark fire"-smoked much like tobacco leaves are in the region. This review is for Batch 8 and as this is bottled in batches, the proof will vary from 102-108 proof.

Brimstone is a smoked corn whiskey. But it doesn't get its smoke from the barrel or from peat, it gets its smoky flavor from Texas scrub oak which is used to smoke the distillate prior to aging. This is a 100% Hopi blue corn whiskey made from mash-to-bottle at the Balcones Distillery in Waco, Texas.

This New Mexico distillery takes a decidedly Scottish approach to their single malt whiskey, yet is unmistakably American in its use of mesquite smoking, rather than peat smoking a portion of their malted barley. The whiskey spends a minimum of 2 years in new and used American oak barrels.