Redemption Straight Rye

Smokey, great sip

This will cap off my run through the basic Redemption lineup. This is one of the old school cylindrical bottles; they’ve changed it a couple times since then. This bottle points out that this whiskey is less than 4 years old. 95% rye mash bill, doesn’t specify the rest. I appreciate the transparency, which I don’t recall seeing on the bottle of the Bourbon from a year ago. Batch No: 186, Bottle No. 1951. Nose: Sourdough. Black pepper. Lemon citrus. Peppermint. Almond slices and macadamia nuts. Vanilla and toffee. After getting into the palate a couple times, I detedt the peach sweet tea note that is so prominent in the palate. Palate: Caramel and vanilla. Mint chocolate. Pistachio. Some apple. Dill. Black licorice. Sourdough. A lot of the standby rye notes. Peach sweet tea. Strong honey note. It’s very sweet for a rye, if you aren’t getting that impression from the notes. Finish: Mint chocolate. Pistachio. Black pepper, clove, and nutmeg. Cinnamon Apple Jack’s. Caramel, toffee, and vanilla. More black pepper. There’s a lot of that. Moderate length. This first entered appeared on my radar because a friend of mine told me it was one of the worst whiskies he has ever had. Not to be deterred, I gave this a crack anyway. And I must say, I really have no idea what he was talking about. And this is a guy who is usually on the money—but not here. Before I bought this, my opinion of Redemption was really informed by my experiences with the rest of their line. The core range is respectable—that High Rye Bourbon BP is fantastic. As for the whiskey at hand, it’s surprisingly good. Some exotic notes mixed into a standard but clean, bready rye whiskey profile. At $28, this is a fine deal. I have this at a 3.5, boosted to 3.75 when factoring in VFM. Solid stuff. Looking forward to hunting down the High Rye Bourbon next.