Marianne Eaves forges forward

Master distiller and blender Marianne Eaves has added a new expression, Forbidden, to her portfolio of whiskeys.

Once a rising star at Woodford Reserve, and the master distiller at Castle & Key, Marianne Eaves has charted her own path in whiskey. Heralded as the first female master distiller in Kentucky since Prohibition, she has spent the past few years developing a portfolio of clients as both a consultant and a blender. She helped launch Sweetens Cove, backed by Hall of Fame quarterback Peyton Manning and others, and continues to blend annual releases. She also introduced Eaves Blind, a blind-tasting programme that spotlights craft distillers across the US.

But her latest endeavor, Forbidden, has her particularly excited, as she played a role in the entire whiskey making process. “Being back behind a brand that I made from scratch is giving me a boost of energy right now,” she said. “There was a pretty long stretch of time between when I left Castle & Key and now, and having this brand has revived my reputation as a technical distiller.”

The first batch of Forbidden was released in May, distilled at Castle & Key, and bottled at five years old and 47.6% ABV. The project first started in 2016, when Eaves was approached by a group from South Carolina, which included Daniel Rickenmann, who is now the mayor of Columbia, SC. The group wanted a whiskey that was different, so Eaves turned to white corn and white wheat when creating the mash bill.

“It’s not unfamiliar as a |Bourbon and definitely still tastes like Kentucky Bourbon, but there’s something about it, it’s the nuance, the complexity, the softness, it’s creamy, and it is a new approach, I think, in the way that you can experience Bourbon,” Eaves said. So far, sales have exceeded expectations, with nearly 10,000 bottles sold in the first two months of release. “We’re way ahead of where we thought it would be as far as depleting the stocks that we made.”

Eaves estimates there are about 8,000 barrels of the core recipe remaining, and said that they will release additional expressions in the years to come, particularly now that she’s moved distillation to Bardstown Bourbon Company, where she plans to experiment with fermentation, distillation proof, and other variables.

With loyal followers, and as she tells it, haters as well, Eaves continues to blaze her own whiskey trail. As a pioneer for women in whiskey, she is making it a priority to help those walking through the door behind her, and references a distillery project in Montana that she’s working on that has her particularly enthused.

“I’ve always wanted to have the opportunity to be involved in mentoring and developing the next generation of female talent and diverse talent,” she said. “So this feels like my first opportunity to build a space and really start making that our reality.”

As Eaves marches forward, she is thankful for the clients she has that grant her flexibility as a mother and entrepreneur. Forbidden represents a big piece in her still-developing story, and she said the team there hopes to one day build a distillery, which she would have a hand in shaping. Either way, Eaves is enjoying this moment, and her forward momentum.

“I am loving this part of my journey, and I think that there’s something even bigger beyond this,” she said. “It is intense, but the security and the teams that I have to do these projects with, give me a lot of hope. If everything else fell off, and I had Forbidden to work on into the future, I would still be ecstatic.”