BOTTLE DETAILS

• DISTILLER: New Riff Distillery
• MASH BILL: Not fully disclosed, though honey-roasted malt is mentioned.
• AGE: 6 years
• YEAR: 2024
• PROOF: 112 (56% ABV)
• MSRP: $300
• BUY ONLINE: Safai Bottle Shop

STEVE’S NOTES

SHARE WITH: Any whiskey fan who likes weighty, slightly woody bourbon.

WORTH THE PRICE: No. Sorry, but $300 is way too much to spend on 6-year-old sourced bourbon.

BOTTLE, BAR OR BUST: Bar to see if you really want to spend $300 on a young-ish bourbon.

OVERALL: I live in Louisville and know the good Mike Safai has done for our business community. That said, I still recoil over a 6-year-old bourbon offered at $300 a bottle. Here’s a good point of reference:

Fans of Heaven Hill’s 6-year bottled-in-bond bourbon (green on white label for those who hadn’t had it) loved it not only because it was quite good, they really loved its $13 retail price. Those same fans, however, got audibly uptight when HH stopped making it for a while in order to release it anew at 7 years old for $49. Once everyone calmed down and surveyed evolving market prices for comparably old bourbon, they saw that HH deserved to “take price” for a whiskey whose quality and age had earned it.

And yet we have Safai bourbon entering the market at roughly six times that price. That’s tough to reconcile even in these days of absurdly overpriced market entries, not to mention an overall market slump for American whiskey. Nothing personal against Safai, who’s clearly made a better living at excellent coffee and property investments here than I have reporting about them. It’s said often and fairly, to the bold often go the rewards, and that price is bold.

So what’s it like, you ask? The nose is loaded with roasted coffee and dark toffee, aromas likely born of malt and yeast selection; two ingredients New Riff is known to manipulate to good measure. You know the whiskey is weighty just by swirling it in the glass: it’s silent and coats the vessel’s inside. Don’t go looking for flowers or candy here, just wait for the oak, fresh wood mulch and tobacco boldness to climb out and say, “C’mon, enough of that swirling. Just taste me.”

By appeasing it, you get a good dose of oak–as if the spirit were double oaked–followed by bitter chocolate, dark-fired tobacco, some flamed citrus and vanilla. Were I tasting this blindly, the medium dryness would lead me to guess it’s older than 6 years, but its soft and cherry pipe tobacco finish claims otherwise.

Make no mistake, this is a solid whiskey, one I’d love to sip along with a fatty steak or smoked beef ribs. It’s got a lot of backbone and respectable structure for a juvenile in bourbon years. But $300 for a bottle of it … I can’t go there when there are far better whiskies out there for much less.

BRAND NOTES

Distilled at New Riff Distillery in Newport, Ky., the whiskey entered the barrels at 110 proof. The two barrels of this Single Barrel Safai Bourbon were aged at New Riff for six yeas. Safai kept the barrels in storage for an additional two years after moving them to Left Bank Spirits in Louisville. The whiskey matured to 122 proof and was bottled at 112 proof. It retails at $300 and is available at retail and safaibourbon.com. Each Safai Bourbon will be a once-in-a-lifetime marker of distinction for whiskey collectors. Those aficionados of Safai will have early access to subsequent releases.

Disclaimer: Bourbon & Banter received a sample of this product from the brand for review. We appreciate their willingness to allow us to review their products with no strings attached. Thank you.