Milk and Honey Distillery – Tasting Cask 003 and an Update

Milk and Honey is rapidly moving toward the beginning of commercial production, with the last piece of the puzzle, the mash tun, set to be installed at the distillery by the end of this month, right as the new visitor center should be opening under the management of Keren Mosessco Kariel.

At that point, the real distillation is set to begin. Some 50 beautifully charred ex bourbon casks have already made their way to Tel Aviv, after traveling all the way from the US, each with some barrel strength bourbon sloshing inside it to prevent it from drying out on the way (yes, I did taste it…). You can see the lovely video the distillery made of the barrels on their Facebook account here.

Photo Credit: Tomer Goren on Instagram (@to14go)

You’ll surely recall my previous distillery visit and progress report on this cask, if not, you can read it here before you move on to my notes on cask 003.

(c) Malt and Oak

Milk and Honey, Cask 003, 8 Months Old, Distilled 4 May 2015, Sampled 6 January 2016 (ABV Unknown)

Appearance: Coppery gold, complete with the red hue. Necklace releasing a beautiful set of thin droplets.

Nose: Malt with a deep milk chocolate and stewed peaches. It’s young age is still very much on the nose, but warm wood spices are beginning to develop with cinnamon and clove.
Directly drawn from the cask, this dram needs water, which brings out a winey quality over creamy malt.

Palate: Viscous and a tad winey, with more of the new make coming through with a bit of water added. Malt, white and black pepper and a certain tart note are very distinct with water. There’s also a hint of sweetness there, just beyond actually featuring on the palate.

Linger: Wine tartness and peppery spice remain in the mouth, with sweetish spice notes down the gullet. That elusive sweet note from the palate shows up on the tongue with water, and a creamy milk chocolate remains.

Conclusion

At eight months, this work in progress is coming along nicely. This was distilled from a different mash than the actual commercial whisky will come from and fermented off site, so I assume that the actual Milk and Honey product will be different, but as a proof of concept, this is coming along quite nicely.

If you do make it to Tel Aviv, be sure to visit the distillery and let me know, maybe I can join you there for a dram or two…