What is a wheated bourbon?
That’s a good question. I’m glad you asked. A wheated bourbon is a bourbon that has a mash bill where the portion that is normally rye has been replaced with wheat. Bourbon has to be at least 51% corn. The remaining 49% can be just about any grain combo, though most joints use barley and rye.
But bourbon is a sipping whiskey, so a high rye mash ticket makes whiskey, then leans toward the spicier end of the palate. Swapping wheat for the rye brings all the tasting notes of that grain to the nose and the tongue. Tasting notes for rye use descriptors like black pepper, spice cake, and cinnamon. Some distillers finish their rye in wine or port casks to mitigate the spicy profile. Bourbon descriptors are vanilla, caramel, and honey. It’s a smoother taste, with the distillers often finishing in charred oak with no extra flavor components.
Adding the wheat for rye just makes the bourbon tasting notes softer and sweeter. So, where a regular bourbon may have a powerful initial blast, a wheat forward bourbon comes on more gently, more subtly.
What are the top wheated bourbons?
Weller Wheated Bourbon
The first three wheaty bourbons are by Weller. Weller Antique 107 has wheat right up front, but the mash bill is a big secret. It’s bottled at 107 proof, and it is a favorite of bourbonites for its amazing pedigree. The whiskey comes straight from W.L. Weller himself who worked with John “Pappy” Van Winkle for years during prohibition distilling under a medicinal license. William Larue Weller is barrel-proof wheat-on-top bourbon. W.L. Weller, the original wheatish bourbon, leads their collection and is one of the best known and most hunted wheatcentric bourbons because my god.
Redemption Wheated Bourbon
Maybe it’s the winter wheat. Could be the Connecticut climate. Maybe it’s something about where their source barrels are kept at the MGP facilities. For whatever reason, Redemption’s whiskey has people stalking the bourbon aisles. Their mash bill is the same as Old Elk and some other wheateriffic bourbons, but . . . something about this whiskey is different.
Old Elk Straight Wheated Bourbon
I mean, Colorado, right? They just do everything differently. Old Elk Straight Wheated Bourbon keeps the corn mash to the minimum allowable for bourbon labeling—51%. Then they dial up the wheat to 45% with the last 4% all malted barley, and the result is a weird wheat-heavy bourbon whose flavor finds that pocket of toffee and caramel some bourbons keep in the background.
Larceny is the best wheated bourbon
What is wheated bourbon?
Legally, a bourbon mash bill is at least 51% corn with the remaining 49% comprised of barley and rye. However, there’s an unofficial subcategory of bourbon called wheated. Wheat replaces rye in wheated bourbon. This gives the whiskey a sweeter, softer profile.
Which bourbons are wheated?
- Larceny
- Redemption
- Garrison Brothers Small Batch
- W.L. Weller Antique
- Weller
- William Larue Bourbon
- Old Elk
