This Small-Batch Brooklyn Bourbon Is Made From Heirloom Corn
“It is thought to be the first nationally-available bourbon made using a proprietary heirloom corn.”
Patience is often the mark of a great whiskey, particularly when it comes to weathering the seasons and in the case of Widow Jane’s latest bourbon, temperamental crop cycles.
The boutique Brooklyn whiskey maker‘s newest release, dubbed Baby Jane Bourbon, goes all-in on the small-batch process, using heirloom corn for a distinctive, carefully crafted final product more than deserving of place of pride in your bar cart. The whiskey maker notes that “it is thought to be the first nationally-available bourbon made using a proprietary heirloom corn,” the result of a labor of love that began long before the spirit could even be barreled or bottled.
Distillery operations lead Michele Clark and Widow Jane Head Distiller Sienna Jevremov set out in 2013 to work with local farmer John Gill, a fitting connection given that Gill’s property rests not far north from the namesake Widow Jane Mines in tranquil upstate New York. Gill and co. planted heirloom corn seeds, of which Bloody Butcher Red and Wapsie Valley Yellow made the cut.
What happened across the four years after that initial planting was a fusion of science and good, old-fashioned elbow grease: Both strains of corn cross-pollinated over time. As Widow Jane notes, Jevremov and Clark harvested this curious hybrid corn, looking for kernels “with just the right medium-tone coloration.” The final product is now comprised of whiskies between four and six years old, and drives home the point that (as Jevremov notes) Widow Jane was “obsessed from start to finish” with what ended up in the bottle.
A “low and slow” cooking process, followed by fermentation and distillation in Widow Jane’s 1000-liter pot and column hybrid single pass still back in Brooklyn (and elsewhere in Kentucky), yielded a whiskey with a characteristic stone fruit profile and a long-lasting finish.
“There are certainly easier ways to make whiskey that don’t involve actually developing and perfecting an entirely original strain of corn,” Clark said. “Tasting the results of all that painstakingly detailed work — trial after trial after trial until we got the liquid where we wanted it before laying it down in barrels — is incredibly gratifying.”
It’s a departure in aging process from, say, the Widow Jane Vaults series, which features a blend of whiskies with a double-digit age statement, but this round yields what the distiller calls a spirit with an “intense whiskey flavor and incredibly creamy mouthfeel.” The distiller notes that, whether enjoyed neat or over a large cube of ice, the whiskey itself “sets a new standard for your everyday sipping bourbon,” and can be found nationwide for $50 per bottle.