Beacon Bourbon Small Batch Bourbon

Mike Rosen

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Bourbon | Featured Craft Distilleries

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April 3, 2022

Denning’s Point Distillery is a small craft distillery located in Beacon New York, established in 2014 by Karl and Susan Johnson. Karl has a chemistry background creating rocket fuel in the space industry and Susan a successful corporate product designer. Denning’s Point is the 55th licensed craft distillery to take advantage of the landmark 2014 New York Craft Act. This major change in legislation allowed craft distilleries to operate under similar regulations that made New York farm wineries the booming industry it is today. Currently there are over 400 small craft distilleries in New York licensed under the Craft Act law. As with all their products, Beacon Bourbon is made with locally sourced grains supplied by farms 50 miles from the distillery in the Hudson Valley. Denning’s Point offers tastings of all their products and a bar with reasonably priced cocktails using their spirits. It’s a very popular place for locals (like me) and for the “city folk” visiting Beacon on the weekends. On Saturday afternoon this place is buzzing!

Lead Blender, Dan Fenyo creates the small batch using single casks using a #2 and #3 level char. Denning’s rickhouse is in an offsite location not far from where they make the distillate (rent in Beacon is expensive). This part of Hudson Valley is known for its extreme seasons that do a good job for whiskey maturation. There are 4 other whiskey distillers within a 50 mile radius. Beacon Bourbon is non-chill filtered which is something they should say on the label as a plus for the product, not to mention as a good selling point. FYI, other bourbons that Denning’s Point offers is a cask strength single barrel and a cold brew coffee bourbon using a “Samatran Roast” blend from Trax, a local Beacon coffee shop/bean roaster. Beacon Bourbon (and their other spirits) is available in local stores or their website. They use a network of retailers that can deliver Beacon Bourbon to 40 states. Let’s get to it!

Taken: Neat in a Glencairn glass, rested about 10 minutes.

Distillery: Denning’s Point Distillery.

Proof: 100.

Age: NAS (website says 4 years, but was told they are using 6 year barrels since 2022).

Mash bill: 77% Corn, 13% Rye, 10% Malted Barley.

Price: $57.99 published price. Seen in local stores from around $45.

Appearance: Dark golden caramel.

Nose

Right off the bat this nose has a unique character that’s very interesting, in a good way. There are sweet notes of toffee, butterscotch and heavy on the pecans, with vanilla bean, apple, peaches, banana rind and rich oak. Then there’s herbal notes of sage, dill and green tea blended with subtle allspice. There’s also some oak char throughout that creates a hint of dark chocolate and a bit if earthiness.

Palate

Palate is very similar to the nose with sweet notes of toffee and butterscotch and a burst of pecan, followed by peaches, banana rind with sage and green tea. The allspice enters the sip in a very balanced way, covering the whole palate despite the mouthfeel being on the thin side. There is a healthy amount of tasty oak all over this sip but never gets in the way. This is a very tasty, easy sipper.

Finish

Oak and allspice linger in this finish until tannins of leather and soft tobacco arrive. Herbal notes of dill and sage come back around with caramel, pecans, vanilla and stone fruit. This is an oaky, long, and impressive finish. Especially for a 50% ABV, 6-ish year bourbon.

Conclusion

I’ve re-written this review for Mostly Bourbon since I first posted it in r/bourbon about a year ago. I found that I enjoyed Beacon Bourbon’s Small Batch even more than I did back then. I’m fairly certain I’d pick it out in a blind due to its unique profile. It’s rare for a very small craft distillery like Denning’s Point Distillery to create a bourbon that has its own distinct character, that also happens to this good. I hope that they continue to expand their lineup and get the word out.

Rating: 6.5/10.