Castle & Key Restoration Rye 2021 (Batch #1)

Nose- citrusy nose. I get lemongrass, almost like a bit of orange slice candy, and sweet tart. Very interesting nose for a rye. Palate- Lemon tart, floral bouquet- perhaps carnations? Powdered sugar and a slight bit of mint. Finish- quicker finish and if anything a sweet tart and perhaps green tea on the end. Overall- very interesting rye here. Not what you would expect. Usually younger ryes are spicy and have a good amount of dill and/or mint. This lends itself more toward citrus, almost like a pleasant lemongrass on the nose and continues with those floral notes. The finish is a bit ho- hum, but this grabbed my interest gaining points for being really unique.

I like this bottle more now than the first few initial pours. Shiny vanilla, warm oak. Hint of raisins. Herbal spice. Slightly tannic. A decent pour. Took a while to open up or my palette to adjust to it.

Oily, floral, berry. Not the best sipper but, amazing for rye cocktails

What I can say from memory is sipping this several days ago is that this outshines either of the 2020 batches, which isn’t saying much. This one was still youthful but at least slightly interesting and in no way unpleasant. The mouthfeel is borderline heavy, which was really nice. Plenty of soft rye grain, plenty of corn sweetness and a nice balance of barrel spices. Peanut shells, bit o mint. If I took a guess this would be a 51% rye but a little homework suggests a mashbill of 63% rye, 17% corn and a whopping 20% barley. This would be a great $25 bottle. At $30-35 I can defend a local micro-distiller (where others charge $50-70). Sadly this can’t compete with a $20 Rittenhouse although it is much softer and more likely to be a general crowd pleaser.