5 Whiskey Brands You CAN’T MISS This Year

Today we’re breaking down 5 brands I keep trying absolute hitters from. These bourbon and rye producers aren’t getting nearly enough attention, but I suspect that’s about to change. Check out some of my favorite whiskey producers before the rest of the world catches on.

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A lot of people are focused on the Extremes in whiskey really you know the absolute best bottles you can buy and the absolute worst bottles you can buy folks are also mostly mostly obsessed with the most expensive and the best values but a question that I also get

That I think is a lot more fun to answer is really what are the upand cominging brands and who is currently sneaking under the radar that I think is destined for larger exposure uh today we’re talking about five brands that I think you can’t really miss if you’re into American whiskey right now Hey guys Jay here from whiskey Raiders better known as take thanks for joining me back here on the channel I’ve been on the road the past couple weeks which means we have a very cool series of travel videos coming up for you soon we’re visiting producers uh we’re visiting different landmarks of American

Whiskey across the country but today we are talking about whiskies that are under the radar and these are Brands you know that I I don’t think are unknown I don’t think they’re brands that I would call underrated but I think that they are brands that the people who know

About them love them and therefore I want to share them with folks who are just looking for new and interesting things to try and so today I’m covering five bottles uh which basically means five Brands I have a bottle from each of them here today but really I want to

Talk about the brand themselves but I’ve picked I’ve picked my favorite bottle from their catalog as well so let’s start off this is 15 Stars this is their Platinum this is a really cool release um they’ve been doing crazy highh dat they’ve been blending Indiana Kentucky ten see they’re kind of building their

Roots as a blender but they’ve also done some single casks they’ve done like a 15-year buron they’ve done uh finishes and I actually just had a box with a couple more bottles show up yesterday so we’re going to be doing another in-depth review about this brand specifically but

What I like is that the prices are good they’re very fair with what they put on the label they tell you where it’s from and most importantly it tastes really great this bottle uh is is really cool a lot of people do misconstrue the 15 stars as like a permanent age statement

And so obviously uh it I wouldn’t call that a trap don’t be fooled because they have all sorts of different age statements if you like young whiskey they have that you know like 6 S8 year if you really like old whisky uh the key though is that the value was really good

Across the board um and this Platinum is definitely one of my favorites it’s got Big Rich chewy notes with a lot of tobacco and kind of caramels and honey and and that really sits well with my palette my second favorite brand comes from none other than still Austin down

In Austin Texas this is a brand new release you’re going to hear a little bit more about it uh in the month of April if you’re in the whiskey bottle of the month C uh but all all kind of points aside still Austin is killing it they are down obviously in Austin Texas

As the name would imply uh Nancy freeley is involved she’s one of the uh more competent and storied and celebrated blenders of kind of the modern whiskey era she’s been doing really great stuff and despite the fact that their whiskey is a little bit on the younger side I

I’m not going to call it young whiskey because it’s not young whiskey uh you can see the color on this is crazy and it’s not in an over OED way like a lot of whiskies in Texas are both too young and too old at the same time due to how

Crazy maturation works in the Texas heat uh but still Austin does a little bit of slow water reduction they’re also masters of blending and the prices are fair I think that a lot of people are hesitant about Texas whiskey if you’re not from like the Texas area because a

Lot of people also just have a huge Pride for anything made in Texas if you’ve been wary it is definitely now time to check out still Austin they’ve started doing some rye barrels they’ve been doing lots of bourbon barrels each of their bottled and bond releases and some of their heritage grain releases

Are really cool as well so really a producer that I like a producer that I’ve been buying a lot of lately and a producer that you know every time they hit me up and they say hey we have this new whiskey it sounds crazy it sounds

New it sounds exciting and the best part is I know it’s always going to taste well because they’re batting they’re betting 100% so far even their gin is really good which is kind of an interesting thing to see from producers but I’m a huge gin lover love it both in

Cocktails and meat and just all that kind of fun stuff and with Summer coming up the Jin and tonic is definitely in the book so the still atin if you haven’t checked them out give them a look because they are definitely you know they’re number four in my top five

Uh kind of you know new distillers you to check out for a reason so this is your sign go check them out we’re moving on uh to this is really cool this is hard truth up in uh Indiana uh you know a lot of for a long time anytime you saw

Distilled in Indiana on a label you’re like oh it’s a dead giveaway that it’s you know it’s MGP uh which isn’t isn’t true here obviously we’ve got Starlight up in Indiana uh we’ve got Spirit of French Lick now we have hard truth they’re making both Bourbon and Rye my

Favorite stuff from them so far has been their Rye whiskies but kind of like I mentioned with 15 Stars a big box of bourbon just showed up from hard truth as well so I’m really curious you know to see what they’re doing there their rye whiskey is freaking incredible it’s

Also on the younger side which this isn’t supposed to be a video about young whiskey but I do want to say like these guys whatever they’re doing with maturation is actually really competent um I like it it some of the Expressions have just a touch of you to them um but

For four-year-old whiskey like I expect that to wash out in the fifth you know and sixth year of Aging they’ve been doing a lot of Cask finishing this particularly is a favorite of mine this is a saw Tern Cask finish you can kind of see it here on the label um saw Tern

Is a sweet French wine it’s one of my favorite finishing casks and it works so well with Ry whiskey uh these guys are a few dollars more than what you’re probably looking to pay for like a craft brand but you know take my word for it it’s totally worth it I’ve been enjoying

Everything that I’ve been trying from them uh which is really exciting stuff now they have Bourbon and Ry I’m also told that they have a really cool facility so if you ever get up there for a tour it’s a good time but hard truth coming at number three uh I love these

Guys everything I’ve had from them has been interesting uh the newer releases are getting better and better and better which is great when the Whiskey’s already good uh so good stuff coming out of there the fourth brand here today is probably the most under the radar of all

Of these producers uh this is high Bank Distillery today I have their newest whiskey in front of me I haven’t tried it yet uh but the best endorsement I have from this whiskey is really the the fact that you know all of the bottles that I have are gone so I’m relying on

Kind of the newest to come on in they’ve done a double Oak before they’ve done single barrels uh they’ve done you know High proof low proof they are really competent blenders and I like seeing you know kind of new faces on that scene as well especially out of Ohio which isn’t

The you know isn’t the most bourbon Centric area although we have a lot of great producers out there as well so high bank I’ll throw pictures of their bottles I’ve done quite a few of them in the past I’ve always been impressed and they’re you know it’s just a cool

Producer to see I think you’re going to see a lot more of them especially in the next couple years they’ve been coming a little bit more onto the internet and doing a little more social media so if you haven’t seen them yet I bet that you

Will soon and to cap it off uh kind of my number one brand that you need to watch these guys are absolutely releasing Banger whiskey this is kuk this is their batch seven but I’m told that the batch eight has just come out they’ve also uh released a toasted

Bourbon and later in the works this year is possibly a toasted Rye so lots of cool stuff and this is run by Jonathan mesano who used to run you know a very storyed liquor store called msos uh he is known for picking lots of barrels

Which is you know isn’t the end all be all of being like a good pallette but when you pick a lot of barrels you learn very quickly what people like and what they don’t like and you learn how to taste lots of whiskey and be very critical and you know very constructive

In finding you know the good things you want and separating the bad things you want but with that also comes the ability to know what you want to buy and if you’re going to blend it you have a really good idea of kind of you know

What the public is going to enjoy joy and I think that that stands really true for K Luke’s newest batches so this is batch 7 this is my second bottle uh this stuff is absolutely crazy good it’s a little on the expensive side but I don’t

Think it’s expensive for what it is and let me break that down for you whiskey can be expensive this is over $100 but I think for what you’re getting in the bottle you know a lot of other producers would run it a lot higher they’d be like

Oh you know instead of 109 I think we could charge 129 or 149 and so I’m really happy that these are always barrel prooof uh this has incredible depth to it and a lot of complexity so I am told I should be tasting the newest batches soon uh but they’re just a great

Blender and so a lot of these Brands all wrap up kind of a spirit of innovation and an interest in not copying the Heritage producers which I see really commonly folks like to compare new things and be like oh it’s just as good as a Heritage producer and that is a

Cool you know Milestone because for so long it was basically impossible for craft whiskies to compete with Heritage producers but uh The Innovation that these brands are all showing is really important and showing that like you don’t have to copy the people who are already successful in business there are

Plenty of ways to do crazy cool things out on your own whether it’s crazy Barrels in in hi with r whiskey uh whether you’re blending different sources as we seen the kuk and the 15 stars like high bank with this double double oaked and really uh still Austin

Takes the Cake for just making the best Texas whiskey that I’ve had so far and they consistently take that Crown so across all these whiskies is a big Trend they’re brands that I think that you should be paying attention to and they’re also Brands I know they have new

Stuff coming soon in the future that I’m looking forward to doing individual B videos here on the channel as well if you’ve had these Brands I would love to know if you have a favorite expression or if you didn’t like them at all let me know in the comments as well uh but

Today guys my name is Jay better known as take and as always I will see you back here on the whiskey Raiders YouTube channel uh for another video Soon