School of Wine & Spirits
All Reviews
340 curated reviews
Flor de Caña 12 Year Old
Compañía Licorera de Nicaragua (Flor de Caña, est. 1890)
Flor de Caña’s terroir is literal: the distillery sits at the base of the San Cristóbal volcano, Nicaragua’s tallest and most active. The sugarcane grows in soil enriched by centuries of volcanic ash deposits — mineral-rich, naturally fertile, and fundamentally different from Caribbean island soil. The water comes from the volcano’s natural aquifer, filtered through volcanic rock. Even the aging is shaped by geography: Nicaragua’s consistently warm tropical climate (averaging 30°C year-round) accelerates the interaction between rum and oak, meaning twelve years in Nicaragua extracts flavors that might take twenty years in cooler climates. The Pellas family was also among the first rum producers to commit to full transparency: Flor de Caña is certified Fair Trade, carbon neutral, and carries no added sugar — a rarity in a category where dosing is widespread. What you taste is the volcano.
Talisker 10 Year Old
Diageo (Talisker Distillery, est. 1830)
Talisker doesn’t just taste like Skye — it tastes like it was made by the island itself. The distillery’s unique setup includes swan-neck lyne arms that loop back on themselves, sending heavier flavor compounds back through the still for a second pass of copper contact. This creates a spirit that’s simultaneously smoky and sweet, peaty and peppery. The peat used to dry the malt is local, carrying Skye’s distinctive maritime character into the smoke. And then there’s the maturation: sea air penetrates the warehouses year-round, the casks breathing in salt and iodine with every expansion and contraction. Diageo named Talisker one of their Classic Malts in 1988, representing the Islands — and there is no whisky that more completely embodies its geography. At 45.8% ABV (higher than most standard bottlings), it has the strength to deliver every ounce of that Skye character.
Teeling Small Batch
Teeling Whiskey Company (est. 2012)
The Teelings’ terroir isn’t soil — it’s Dublin itself. Jack and Stephen Teeling built their distillery in the Liberties, a neighborhood that had been the beating heart of Irish whiskey for two centuries before the industry collapsed. The Liberties once held more distilleries per square mile than anywhere on earth. The Teelings’ bet was that Dublin’s whiskey DNA still mattered — that making whiskey in the city, near the original water sources and in the cultural context that shaped Irish whiskey, would produce something different from the industrial parks where most Irish whiskey is now made. The Small Batch expression showcases their innovation: finishing in Central American rum barrels adds a tropical sweetness that no other Irish whiskey offers, while bottling at 46% ABV (non-chill filtered) preserves the full texture. It’s a whiskey that tastes like a city reclaiming its birthright.
Elijah Craig Small Batch
Heaven Hill Distillery (Elijah Craig, est. 1986)
Elijah Craig Small Batch is the bourbon that punches so far above its price point that it makes you wonder what everyone else is doing with their money. Heaven Hill’s corn-heavy mash bill (78%) creates a sweet, approachable base, but the real story is the aging: barrels are drawn from multiple floors of Heaven Hill’s Bardstown rickhouses, where summer temperatures in the top floors can exceed 130°F while ground-floor barrels barely reach 80°F. This temperature differential means each barrel develops a different flavor profile — more caramel and char from the heat, more fruit and grain from the cool — and the blender’s job is to combine them into something greater than any single barrel. At 94 proof and 8–12 years old, the result is a bourbon with the complexity of bottles costing twice as much. The deep char (Heaven Hill uses a Number 3 char) gives it a distinctive smoky backbone that separates it from sweeter, lighter bourbons.
Siete Leguas Reposado
Casa Siete Leguas (est. 1952)
If El Tesoro is the tequila nerd’s tequila, Siete Leguas is the tequila maker’s tequila. This is the distillery where Don Julio González originally made his tequila before launching his own brand — yes, Don Julio tequila was born at Siete Leguas. The family has refused every shortcut the modern tequila industry has embraced: they still use brick ovens when autoclaves are faster, tahona stones when roller mills are cheaper, wooden fermentation tanks when stainless steel is easier to clean, and copper pot stills when column stills would be more efficient. The result is a tequila with a mineral complexity and savory depth that industrial methods simply cannot replicate. The Reposado’s eight months in American oak adds just enough vanilla and warmth without obscuring the agave and terroir. When tequila professionals talk about “the old way,” this is what they mean.
Antinori Tignanello 2021
Marchesi Antinori (est. 1385, 26th generation)
Tignanello is the wine that proved terroir could be revolutionary. When Piero Antinori released the 1971 vintage — a Sangiovese-Cabernet blend aged in French barriques, made outside every regulation that governed Chianti — the Italian wine establishment was outraged. The wine was declassified to “Vino da Tavola,” Italy’s lowest designation. Antinori didn’t care. He believed the Tignanello vineyard’s galestro and albarese soils (a mix of calcium-rich marl and hard limestone found only in central Tuscany) could produce wines that rivaled Bordeaux — if freed from rules requiring white grapes in a red wine. History proved him right. The 2021 vintage benefits from a warm but balanced growing season, with the Sangiovese delivering its characteristic sour cherry and herbal complexity while the Cabernet adds structure and depth. At 26 generations and 640 years, Antinori is the oldest family-owned wine company on earth — and Tignanello remains their most radical creation.
Plymouth Gin
Pernod Ricard (Plymouth Gin Distillery, est. 1793)
Plymouth Gin holds one of only three geographic indications for a spirit in the UK: it can only be made in Plymouth. But the real terroir is in the water. Dartmoor’s extremely soft water creates a gin with a rounder, fuller mouthfeel than London Dry gins made with harder water — the low mineral content lets the botanicals express themselves without interference. The recipe uses only seven botanicals (compared to Monkey 47’s forty-seven), and the restraint is the point: each botanical is individually perceptible, and none dominates. This is the gin the Royal Navy chose for its officers’ daily ration, the gin that was specified in the original recipe for a Pink Gin, and the gin that appeared in the earliest known recipe for a dry martini. At 41.2% ABV, it’s slightly gentler than most gins — a conscious choice that lets the Dartmoor water’s softness come through.
Domaine William Fèvre Chablis 2022
Domaine William Fèvre / Henriôt Group (est. 1959)
If any wine on earth proves that terroir is real, it is Chablis. The appellation sits on Kimmeridgian limestone — a geological formation laid down during the Late Jurassic period when this part of Burgundy was a tropical sea. Dig into a Chablis vineyard and you’ll find fossilized oyster shells (Exogyra virgula) embedded in the marl. William Fèvre understood this better than anyone: he was among the first vignerons to map the precise soil differences between Chablis parcels and to vinify accordingly. The domaine’s village-level Chablis is fermented and aged entirely in stainless steel — a deliberate choice to let the limestone speak without oak interference. The result is a Chardonnay stripped of everything except what the soil and climate put there: mineral tension, razor-sharp acidity, and a saline quality you can taste with your eyes closed. For readers of The Definitive Pocket Guide to Chablis, this is the benchmark.
Jermann Vintage Tunina 2022
Jermann (est. 1881, fourth generation)
Vintage Tunina is Silvio Jermann’s obsessive masterpiece — a white wine assembled from five grapes, each harvested at a different moment of optimal ripeness, fermented separately, and blended only when Jermann decides each component has found its voice. Sauvignon Blanc brings aromatics and acidity. Chardonnay adds body and structure. Ribolla Gialla contributes mineral tension. Malvasía Istriana lends waxy texture and floral perfume. And Picolit — Friuli’s rare native dessert grape, used here in tiny proportion — adds a honeyed complexity that ties everything together. Most winemakers would simplify this into two or three varieties. Jermann insists on five because he believes the wine isn’t complete without all of them. At $38–48, this is one of Italy’s great white wines and a masterclass in the art of the blend.
Catena Zapata Malbec High Mountain Vines 2021
Bodega Catena Zapata (est. 1902, fourth generation)
Nicolás Catena’s obsession was altitude. When he visited Napa in the 1980s, he returned to Argentina with a radical question: what if Malbec — a grape Bordeaux had largely abandoned — was being planted too low? He spent the next three decades pushing vineyards higher into the Andes foothills, from 920 to 1,450 meters, discovering that extreme altitude produced wines with deeper color, more complex aromatics, and a bright acidity that lower vineyards couldn’t match. The High Mountain Vines bottling blends fruit from four altitude-specific sites: 80-year-old vines in Lunlunta for texture, Agrelo for spice, Altamira for acidity, and Gualtallary for explosive floral aromatics. At $22–28, this is Argentina’s answer to the question of whether great wine has to be expensive.
El Dorado 12 Year Old
Demerara Distillers Limited (El Dorado)
El Dorado 12 is distilled from history. The Diamond Distillery in Guyana houses wooden stills that exist nowhere else in the world — including the Port Mourant double wooden pot still, built from Guyanese greenheart hardwood in 1732, and the Enmore wooden Coffey still from 1880, the last wooden continuous still on earth. These stills produce “marques” — distinct rum styles named for the now-closed sugar estates where the stills originated. The obsession is in the preservation: Demerara Distillers has maintained these irreplaceable stills for centuries, blending their outputs into El Dorado’s remarkably complex range. The 12 Year Old marries pot still richness with column still elegance, delivering a rum that tastes like three hundred years of accumulated knowledge. At $35–42, it’s one of the great bargains in aged spirits.
El Tesoro Reposado
Camarena Family / Beam Suntory (El Tesoro, est. 1937)
El Tesoro is the tequila nerd’s tequila. The Camarena family’s obsession starts with the tahona — a two-ton volcanic stone wheel that slowly crushes roasted agave hearts, extracting sugars along with fibers that go into the fermentation tank, adding savory complexity that roller mills strip away. Then there’s the distillation: El Tesoro is one of the only tequilas distilled to proof, meaning no water is added after distillation. What comes out of the still is what goes in the barrel. The Reposado spends 9–11 months in ex-bourbon barrels — long enough to add vanilla and caramel, short enough to let the agave and tahona character remain front and center. This is tequila that tastes like the earth it came from.
Oban 14 Year Old
Diageo (Oban Distillery, est. 1794)
Oban’s obsession is constraint. The distillery sits wedged between the harbor and a cliff — physically unable to expand — with just two of the smallest pot stills in Scotland. Where other distilleries chase scale, Oban has embraced its limitations: the tiny stills force a slow, careful distillation that produces a spirit with remarkable concentration. The lantern shape of those stills creates more copper contact, stripping away harsh sulfur compounds and leaving behind a whisky that bridges two worlds — the gentle honey and fruit of the Highlands with the maritime salt and smoke of the western coast. Diageo named it one of their six “Classic Malts” in 1988 for a reason: at 14 years old, it’s one of the most perfectly balanced whiskies in Scotland.
Four Roses Single Barrel
Kirin Brewery Company (Four Roses Distillery, est. 1888)
Four Roses Single Barrel is the product of the most obsessive production system in bourbon. While every other distillery works from a single mash bill and a single yeast strain, Four Roses developed two distinct mash bills and five proprietary yeast strains — creating ten unique recipes, each with its own flavor fingerprint. The standard Single Barrel uses recipe OBSV: the high-rye mash bill (35% rye — among the highest in Kentucky) paired with the V yeast strain, which contributes delicate fruit and cream. At 100 proof, it has the structure to showcase every layer of that complexity. The result is a bourbon that tastes like it was engineered by someone who couldn’t stop asking “what if?” — because it was.
Monkey 47 Schwarzwald Dry Gin
Pernod Ricard (Monkey 47, est. 2010)
Monkey 47 is what happens when obsession meets the Black Forest. Alexander Stein, the founder, wasn’t content with the standard gin playbook of six to ten botanicals. He sourced forty-seven — roughly a third from the forest surrounding his distillery — including lingonberries, spruce shoots, bramble leaves, and acacia flowers. The result is aged three months in traditional earthenware crocks before bottling, a resting step almost no other gin producer bothers with. At 47% ABV (of course), it has the structure to support all that botanical complexity without collapsing into confusion. The fact that it comes in a 375 mL bottle at a premium price has done nothing to slow demand — proof that obsessive quality creates its own market.
Powers Three Swallow Release
Irish Distillers / Pernod Ricard (Powers, est. 1791)
Powers’ obsession is pot still whiskey — the uniquely Irish style made from a mash of both malted and unmalted barley that produces a heavier, spicier, more characterful spirit than any other whiskey tradition on earth. When Irish whiskey collapsed in the twentieth century and blends took over, Powers never abandoned the pot still. The Three Swallow release takes its name from the quality mark that Powers’ tasters once stamped on approved casks — three swallows of whiskey, three stamps of approval. The 3% sherry component adds just enough dried fruit complexity to round the edges without softening the muscular pot still character. At $35–42, this is one of the most underpriced whiskeys in the world for what it delivers.
Laphroaig 10 Year Old
Suntory Global Spirits (Laphroaig Distillery, est. 1815)
Laphroaig 10 is the whisky that people either love or hate — and that’s exactly the point. While most Scotch distilleries have softened their profiles to broaden appeal, Laphroaig has doubled down on everything that makes it divisive: the medicinal peat smoke, the seaweed, the iodine. They still floor-malt roughly 20% of their barley on-site, drying it over local Islay peat — a labor-intensive practice almost every other distillery abandoned decades ago. The result is a whisky with a sense of place so vivid you can taste the Atlantic. Prince Charles liked it so much he granted it a Royal Warrant in 1994. You’ll either get it or you won’t, and Laphroaig is perfectly fine with that.
Marqués de Riscal Reserva 2019
Herederos del Marqués de Riscal (est. 1858)
Marqués de Riscal went against the grain before “going against the grain” was even a concept in Spanish wine. When Camilo Hurtado de Amézaga founded the winery in 1858, he did something heretical: he brought a French cellar master from Château Lanessan in the Médoc to teach Rioja producers Bordeaux techniques. He imported French grape varieties alongside the native Tempranillo. The result was Spain’s first modern winery, and in 1895, Marqués de Riscal became the first non-French wine to receive an Honorific Diploma at the International Wine Exposition of Bordeaux. The 2019 Reserva — 94% Tempranillo, 21 months in American oak — is a masterclass in Rioja’s unique marriage of Spanish soul and Bordelais discipline. At $20–$25, it’s one of the great values in European wine.
Tullamore D.E.W. Original
William Grant & Sons (Tullamore D.E.W., est. 1829)
Tullamore D.E.W. went against the grain in the most dramatic way possible: it came back from the dead. When the old Tullamore distillery closed in 1954, the brand survived as a label without a home, its whiskey sourced from other distilleries for sixty years. Then in 2014, William Grant & Sons built a brand-new €35 million distillery in Tullamore — the first new greenfield distillery in Ireland in over a century — bringing whiskey-making back to the town whose name is literally on the bottle. The triple blend of pot still, malt, and grain — triple distilled and triple cask matured — delivers surprising complexity at a price point that makes it one of the best introductions to Irish whiskey on the market.
Ron Zacapa Centenario 23 Solera
Industrias Licoreras de Guatemala / Diageo (Ron Zacapa)
Ron Zacapa broke nearly every rule in rum-making. Start with the raw material: virgin sugarcane honey instead of the molasses most rum producers use. Then defy tropical aging conventions by aging at 2,300 meters above sea level, where cool mountain temperatures and higher humidity slow evaporation to a fraction of what it would be at sea level. Finally, use a solera blending system — borrowed from the sherry houses of Jerez — to marry rums aged 6 to 23 years across four different barrel types. The result tastes like no other rum on earth: rich enough to sip like Cognac, complex enough to hold your attention glass after glass. Voted the world’s number one premium rum at the International Rum Festival for five consecutive years.
Tanqueray No. Ten
Diageo (Tanqueray, est. 1830)
Tanqueray No. Ten broke the gin rules by asking a simple question: what if we used fresh whole citrus fruits instead of dried peels? The answer came from a 1950s-era 500-liter pot still that the team nicknamed “Tiny Ten” — small enough for careful, small-batch distillation of fresh grapefruit, lime, orange, and chamomile flowers. The result created a new category: citrus-forward, cocktail-ready gin at a time when gin was considered your grandmother’s drink. At 47.3% ABV, it has the backbone to stand up in any cocktail without disappearing. The San Francisco World Spirits Competition put it in their Hall of Fame — the only gin to earn that distinction.
Don Julio Reposado
Diageo (Don Julio, est. 1942)
Don Julio invented the luxury tequila category. Before Don Julio, tequila was a commodity — cheap, harsh, and destined for margarita mixes. Julio González changed the rules by treating agave like fine wine grapes: planting further apart for full maturity, slow-roasting in 72-hour brick oven cycles, and aging in fine oak. When his sons created a tequila to honor his 60th birthday in 1985, it became the first tequila marketed as a premium sipping spirit. The Reposado expression — eight months in American white oak — strikes the ideal balance: enough barrel time to add complexity without masking the highland agave character that made the brand famous.
Trimbach Riesling 2021
Maison Trimbach (est. 1626)
Trimbach has been going against the grain since 1626 — they just don’t make a fuss about it. While Alsace became increasingly known for off-dry and sweet Rieslings, Trimbach committed to bone-dry wines with razor-sharp acidity and mineral precision. No malolactic fermentation, no residual sugar, no new oak — just pure expression of grape and terroir. The family has been making wine in Ribeauvillé for twelve generations and counting, and their philosophy hasn’t changed: balance, balance, balance. Their Clos Sainte Hune is one of the most legendary white wines on earth, but the entry-level Riesling — at $23–$28 — is where the value proposition is impossible to ignore. This is Riesling for people who think they don’t like Riesling.
Wild Turkey 101
Campari Group (Wild Turkey, est. 1940)
Wild Turkey 101 is the bourbon that refuses to compromise. When the industry trend moved toward lower proofs and smoother profiles designed to offend no one, master distillers Jimmy and Eddie Russell held the line at 101 proof — the same proof the brand has bottled since the beginning. The secret is their unusually low barrel entry proof of 110°, compared to the legal maximum of 125°. That means less water added before barreling, which means more of the distillate’s character survives the aging process. At $22–$28, this is arguably the greatest value in American whiskey. It makes the case that boldness and drinkability aren’t opposites.