Hidden Barn Small Batch Bourbon Whiskey (Series #002)

When former Old Forester Master Taster Jackie Zykan jumped ship to start her own whiskey brand earlier this year, and that brand was unveiled as Hidden Barn, it’s safe to say I would have been expecting something a bit more conventional. Standard operating procedure, as it were, would be for someone with Zykan’s visibility and clout to join another established distillery, or find a group of well-heeled investors buying product from major producers such as MGP, and become the face of the franchise as master blender. That’s not what Zykan did.

Instead, Zykan found a relatively unknown source in the form of Sparta, Kentucky’s Neeley Family Distillery, a company in operation since 2015. And nor were these guys producing conventional bourbon by any means—the distillery runs exclusively on pot stills, something that is almost entirely absent in modern bourbon production. In fact, practically everything that Neeley Family Distillery does is nouveau or reflective of modern tinkering, from the low barrel entry proof to the low, #2 char on the barrels. Those kinds of unusual methods yielded a quite odd, individualistic first batch of Hidden Barn Small Batch, which I found head-scratching but also intriguing. And now, the company has released their second batch in the flagship Hidden Barn Small Batch expression, dubbed Series #002. And after tasting it, it seems more clear than ever that Hidden Barn is exploring almost entirely new territory here—they’re making some weird bourbon, a distillate that I’m still having a hard time wrapping my head around. Is it good? Is it mostly perplexing? It’s really hard to decide, though I’m confident that this will be a divisive bottle. I honestly think some drinkers will love it, and some will hate it.

Like the first batch, this distillate from Neeley Family Distillery is 70% corn, 20% rye and 10% malted barley, aged for somewhere between 4-5 years. It’s a bit stronger than the first expression, with my sample weighing in at 56% ABV (112 proof). And that’s pretty much where comparisons to most bourbons end. I suspect that most of this whiskey’s unique nature is owed to its pot distillation, which has left aromatic and flavor compounds in play that you just aren’t getting from most column stills, but I lack the distilling expertise to say for sure. All I can say is that this batch is even more vivaciously out there than the first one was. Let’s get to tasting.

On the nose, Series #002 leads off with sweet malt syrup and huge grainy impressions, along with honey and cherry syrup—almost medicinal-like cherry. I’m getting big impressions of something like toasted oats or cereal, along with caramel, molasses and charred oak. Delicate spearmint is also there, if you can get past the sweetness and slightly stinging ethanol. It’s so malty sweet, in fact, that what it really evokes to me is American single malt. It makes me wonder, do they use malted rye in these recipes, perhaps? It’s an extremely grain-forward profile, and I really think this is part of the pot still process—it has left some of those malt/grain congeners in play, and they’ve become arguably the stars of the show.