Bulleit bottles its oldest straight rye
Diageo-owned Bulleit Frontier Whiskey has released a limited edition 20-year-old straight rye, the brand’s oldest of its kind to date.
The expression uses Bulleit’s signature 95% rye mashbill, distilled in Lawrenceburg, Indiana, and aged in Kentucky.
It was developed by the team at Bulleit Distilling Co, with a blend created by Nicole Austin, the director of American whiskey liquid development at Diageo.
Austin oversaw the barrel selection and blending process with the Bulleit team, selecting barrels capable of ageing for 20 years while maintaining the whiskey’s characteristics.
Bottled at 68.5% ABV, the rye offers aromas of seasoned oak, warm baking spice, and dried fruit, with notes of caramelised sweetness, dark fruit, and spice on the palate.
“With a rye this mature, the challenge is finding barrels where age adds depth without overwhelming the grain,” she explained. “We wanted the spice and structure that define Bulleit Rye to stay front and centre, while allowing twenty years of maturation to reveal new layers of complexity.
“The final whiskey has the spice people expect from Bulleit, with a depth that could only come from time.”
Bulleit 20-Year-Old Straight Rye is limited to 1,776 individually numbered bottles as a nod to the 250th anniversary of the United States.
It is available at the Bulleit Distillery in Shelbyville, Kentucky, and select cities in the US starting in July, with a suggested retail price of US$299.
Bulleit Distilling Co was founded in 1987, and its headquarters are located in Louisville, Kentucky.
Brian Blackiston, brand manager for Bulleit Frontier Whiskey at Diageo, said: “Rye has always had a certain edge to it, which is exactly why it made sense for Bulleit from the brand’s inception.
“In the earliest days of American whiskey, rye brought structure, spice and resilience to the glass in a way that helped distinguish it from other grains. When the category was still working its way back into the spotlight, Bulleit leaned in with a style that gave bartenders and whiskey drinkers more bite and more dimension.
“Bulleit 20-Year-Old Rye pays homage to that history while building on our own, showing what our signature rye character can become after two decades in barrel.”
Earlier this year, Bulleit launched a limited edition Bourbon made with an experimental mashbill that replaces rye with mesquite wood-smoked malt.
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