Blue Ridge Distilling Company Defiant Single Malt

Defiant Single Malt Whisky is the product of the Blue Ridge Distilling Company, located in Bostic, North Carolina. The people distilling this whisky are ocean salvage divers by prior and on-going profession. 'Defiant' is a name symbolising their break from malt traditions, and "...starting a whisky revolution...the Defiant way." This malt is not aged in barrels at all, but in tanks with new toasted white oak spirals inserted within them. There is no age statement on the bottle. The reviewed sample is from a newly opened bottle decanted one month ago

Nose: immediately spirity, new-makey, with a lot of new oak vanilla and caramel. The barley is hard to spot. First impression of this nose is no more than a 16/25 score. Giving this nose 30 minutes in the glass improves it a lot, but it remains spirity and immature-tasting with oak caramel and vanilla as the most prominent flavours. Score 20/25

Taste: young rather sharp-edged spirity flavours translate onto the palate. Barley remains in the background. I preferred the 20 minute nose

Finish: sour finish with the spirity quality remaining

Balance: if you love sour new-make you might like this. In my book Defiant Single Malt has a very long way to go

What would I do differently? This needs not merely wood for flavouring, which is adequately accomplished here, but also wood for mellowing. The palate, especially, needs much more wood time to mellow it out. The wood for mellowing could and maybe should be used wood. The barley is already overmatched here by the new wood. Used wood would allow the barley to come through more here, and would mellow out the sharp edges on the palate