Taste Test: This Kentucky Whiskey Proves Sherry Cask Finishes Work Great for Rye, Too

Welcome to Taste Test, where every week our critic Jonah Flicker explores the most buzzworthy and interesting whiskeys in the world. Check back each Sunday for his latest whiskey review.

Ex-bourbon barrels are the maturation backbone of single malt scotch, but this type of whisky is also frequently aged in sherry casks, and has been for decades. American whiskey is a different story—most of it must be initially aged in new charred oak, and while sherry casks are sometimes used for cask finishes, the practice is nowhere near as common. Some distilleries, however, have been giving their whiskey the single malt treatment in sherry-seasoned wood, proving that even a distinctly American whiskey can be turned into a thoroughly enjoyable sherry bomb.

New Riff’s latest release, Sherry Finish Malted Rye, is a perfect example of this. This independent distillery, located in northern Kentucky near the Ohio border, has only been around for a little more than a decade. During that time, it’s been producing really fantastic bottled-in-bond bourbon and rye whiskey (at least 4 years old, 100 proof, the product of one distillery and one distillation season), along with some of the best American single malt currently on the market. This new release pretty much lays out what it is in the name, but it does require some further explanation. Sherry Finish Malted Rye, which first came out in 2022, is a 100 percent malted rye whiskey, sort of an American version of a 100 percent malted barley whisky, albeit with a very different flavor (the brand even says that it considers it to be a malt whiskey first, and a rye whiskey second).

A version of this whiskey with no cask finish is part of the core lineup, providing a very different drinking experience from the flagship 95/5 rye that the distillery also makes. This new sherry-finished expression was aged for six years and bottled at barrel proof (not too strong at 111.9) without chill filtration. And, in the most important step, the whiskey was finished in Oloroso and Pedro Ximenez sherry casks, just like some of your favorite single malt scotches (the exact amount of time is not revealed, just that these casks were used “judiciously”).

The result is another fantastic whiskey from New Riff, a complex and luxurious sipper that unfolds in layers as you sip. The rye character is certainly present, with notes of black pepper, fruit, and vanilla bean on the palate, and the sherry cask finish brings new flavors to the experience without masking the whiskey’s core character. Dried fruits like fig, prune, and raisin are all present, along with a cabinet full of baking spices (clove, cardamom, cinnamon), and some savory oak and tannic notes.

Sherry Finish Malted Rye (SRP $70) comes out on Black Friday, along with another interesting bottle called Winter Whiskey (made from a mashbill of 65 percent corn, 20 percent malted oats, 7 percent pale ale malt, 5 percent steel cut raw oats, and 3 percent chocolate malt). The latter is certainly worth trying as well, as are all of the other expressions in the New Riff portfolio. But if you’re a fan of rye and sherry cask-matured malts alike, pick up a bottle of this superb new whiskey.

Score: 94