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Masterson's 12 Year Old Straight Wheat Whiskey

Happy (Belated) Bday Canada! 2 of 7

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@talexanderReview by @talexander

5th Jul 2015

0

Masterson's 12 Year Old Straight Wheat Whiskey
  • Nose
    21
  • Taste
    19
  • Finish
    20
  • Balance
    19
  • Overall
    79

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Distribution of ratings for this: brand user

Let's segue from an unaged wheat spirit to a 12 year old wheat whisky. This comes from Sonoma CA based 35 Maple Street, which imports Canadian whisky, bottles it and sells it back to us (grrrr). This is a straight 100% wheat whisky, matured for 12 years in used white oak barrels.

The colour is an extremely light pale yellow. Rather spirity on the nose with lemon curd, Mackintosh toffee and milk chocolate. Despite the pale colour, there is definitely some oak here. Water brings out marmalade and gives a bit more depth. A little bit too sweet-smelling for me though.

Very thin on the palate - there is very light caramel, some vanilla and a hint of milk chocolate, but there really isn't much there. Hold it in the mouth and a wee bit of orange comes out. Water adds some welcome spice. It is tasty but needs a lot more oomph.

The dry, almost smoky finish features more caramel and a bit of pepper, but it fades quickly. This isn't bad but not fully to my taste, especially compared to Bernheim's US wheat whisky. Nosing this and Toronto Distillery's wheat spirit side-by-side shows similar sweet citrus notes, and you get a sense of the cask influence - very interesting. Not terrible - and very smooth and drinkable - but just not my cup of tea. Next, we'll move on to two whiskies from the same craft distillery...

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7 comments

@Victor
Victor commented

Do you know the Canadian distillery at which this one was produced?

Also, do you know whether this whisky is imported by 35 Maple Street already aged? I would assume so, because what would be the value for a bottler/reseller to sit on a whisky for 12 years? (Nonetheless, Kentucky Bourbon Distillers does just that. Other than KBD, procuring and then aging your own stock is an uncommon practice in North America.)

9 years ago 0

@talexander
talexander commented

I know the Masterson's rye is from Alberta Distillers, this may also be from there as well - but I'm not sure. I am sure it is imported already aged - as you suggest, that's just good business sense and one can guess that the distiller probably knows more about maturation than the bottler. I looked this up at www.canadianwhisky.org to try to find an answer your questions, but didn't see anything, so I sent Davin de Kergommeaux a note and I'll let you know what he says.

9 years ago 0

@talexander
talexander commented

From Davin: It must be matured in Canada to be called Canadian whisky. Distillery is subject to a non-disclosure agreement. Not sure of the details, but sometimes distilleries don’t want their names on a private bottling in case it does not turn out as well as if they had bottled it themselves. Actually this is a very common practice in Canada, US, Scotland, Ireland and elsewhere.

9 years ago 0

@paddockjudge
paddockjudge commented

I've been told Masterson's Wheat expression comes from Highwood...who really knows?

9 years ago 0

@talexander
talexander commented

It's much more likely that it comes from Highwood than from Alberta Distillers, though Highwood is more known for corn than wheat.

9 years ago 0

@paddockjudge
paddockjudge commented

The Highwood corn has been acquired. Most, or all, of the aged corn whisky comes from the same source as your Cadenhead's Potter"s...which was sourced from the 'west coast CC distillery' and possibly the defunct Seagram's Saskatchewan facility. Potter's distilled very, very little corn whisky. Highwood has their 10 YO Centennial wheat whisky and that might be the good fit....who really knows?

9 years ago 0

A
Astroke commented

I pulled the trigger on this when it was discounted to $50. I did not care for it when I first tried it. I recently revisited after the bottle was open for about a month and found it much better the second time around. Not stellar, just better.

8 years ago 0