WESTWARD SMOKED CASK
Exclusive Club Release (May 2025)MASH BILL – 100% malted barley
PROOF – 90
AGE – ~7 years
DISTILLERY – Westward Whiskey Co.
PRICE – $104
WORTH BUYING? – Oh yes!
I’ve written up notes on so many Westward releases at this point. Westward is easily among my favorite American distilleries. They exemplify a seemingly contradictory dichotomy of expectations met and surprised. The pursuits of balance and of experimentation are in ongoing conversation. Their barley is always at the center of things, its core nutty fruity notes anchoring whatever accents are particular from release to release. Westward’s founder, Christian Krogstad, puts a significant emphasis on whiskey as hospitality. Perhaps this guiding principle accounts for the distillery’s knack for combining approachability with curve-ball creativity.
Though I may prefer one release to another, the whiskeys always taste good, whether finished in various wine casks, utilizing an alternative yeast from a local bakery, or purposely mashing the wrong malt because it was shipped to them by accident and they thought why not? I find Westward so consistently enjoyable, lately I’ve wondered if they can surprise me anymore.
But sure enough, Westward managed to raise my eyebrow yet again. Now they’ve ventured into the divisive realm of peat, a means of drying malted barley originating in Scotland and most associated with the Islay scotch region—think Ardbeg, Kilchoman, Laphroaig, Lagavulin. However, rather than using peat smoked malted barley as scotch does, they took some barrels of whiskey, aged them 5 to 6 years in new American oak as per usual, then aged them another 11 to 18 months in custom-made casks that had themselves been smoked over a peat fire. Needless to say I was very curious.
So here we are, less than 24 hours after uncorking it late last night, and I’m already three pours into the bottle. These brief notes were taken using a traditional Glencairn.
COLOR – vibrant but easygoing orange
NOSE – thick with coffee, cream, caramel sauce, baked prune, oak, all on a subtle background of woodland and charcoal smoke
TASTE – a creamy texture to match the creamy taste, the various sweet and bitter notes in harmony, emphasizing cream, coffee, oak, and smoke, with some chocolate and a dollop of fruity sweetness from the baked prune
FINISH – an initial flare up of that Westward nutty-fruity barley, then a nice bitterness from the oak, coffee, and smoke notes, and a dark variation on the baked prune and cream notes
OVERALL – one of my favorite Westwards in recent memory, with a lovely balance of sweet and bitter
There is a restrained decadence to this whiskey that I really dig. It doesn’t go too far in any direction, maintaining exceptional balance from nose to finish. Given the smoke aspect is the namesake differentiator for this release, one might assume smoke notes would be the main event. Instead they serve as a kind of backdrop for other more prominent and familiar Westward aromas and flavors.
The combined coffee and creamy aspects conjure cozy mornings at cafes. The chocolate aspects in turn conjure cozy late nights at cafes. So either way, as I’m sipping this I’m time traveling to memories of San Francisco, Berlin, Paris, New York, cities where cafe culture is truly embraced. Places where you can linger with a book or your wandering thoughts. Or enjoy leisurely conversations with friends with whom gaps of silence are comfortable not awkward. Cozy. Easygoing. Sensory. Slow.
Part of me wants to break my no-bunkering rule and back this bottle up. I felt that way about Westward’s Sourdough release, waited too long, and now it’s sold out. At the same time, I trust Westward is going to keep coming out with new twists on their proven formula. Even as I write that, in fact, across the room a bottle of Westward’s other May club release, finished in Slovakian Tokaji casks, is already staring me down…!
In any case, if you’re a Westward fan or an American single malt fan in general, it’s worth joining Westward’s club to get your hands on this one.
Cheers!
The Right Spirit 