The Hilhaven Lodge Straight American Whisky is named after a Beverly Hills estate owned by director Brett Ratner. Produced in partnership with Diageo at Stitzel-Weller in Kentucky, it is a blend of straight bourbon from the 2000s, American rye from the 1980s and Tennessee whiskey from the 1990s.
This blend of Tennessee Whiskey (George Dickel), Rye (MGP) and Bourbon (either OGD or an Orphan) is well executed and pleasing. It has a decent complexity to it across the senses and I’ve enjoyed every minute of drinking through this sample.
The palate offers up hors d'oeuvre-scale treats, too--hints of nougat, a soupçon of wood--all to be forgotten by the time the indistinct finish trails away like so many promises to meet again soon.
More critically, this whiskey isn’t the most distinctive, but it has enough going on that this bottle could easily disappear from my shelf in no time while taking in an old Chris Tucker/Jackie Chan buddy-cop movie and dreaming of stumbling into a star studded chill-out party in LA.
