Frosted Flakes cereal | Caramel | Candy corn | Rye spice

Caramel chews | Peppery oak | Slightly punchy | Full-flavored

Caramel sweetness intensifies | Rye spice | Allspice | Long

Located in Nashville, Indiana, Hard Truth Distilling Co. offers a broad range of spirits, from rum to in-house distilled whiskeys. Caramel Malt Rye Batch 002 is a 10 barrel batch that was dumped on September 14, 2023.

Hard Truth Distilling Co. is distilling their own products, and their use of different grain variations is producing interesting results. They’ve been rolling out a lot of new products, and some like this one, are entering their second batching, but most are aged a little over two years, and they’ve all been surprisingly good right out of the gate to varying degrees. Caramel Malt Batch 002, like Batch 001, maintains that consistent quality, though like some of the others there is a slight “rough around the edges” aspect to it, which is most accurately characterized by its slightly punchy palate. True to its name, caramel plays a role throughout, and there are some interesting notes of Frosted Flakes cereal, candy corn, and peppery oak that intermix at various points of the sip.

With this release, and countless others, it’s clear that Hard Truth Distilling Co. is a distillery worth taking note of and one that is beginning to develop its own unique, quality spin on American whiskeys.