Gold Buckle Club Washington Rye

[cowdery]

Has anyone tried this product from The Ellensburg Distillery in Ellensburg, Washington? (It's near Yakima.) They call it Gold Buckle Club Washington Frontier-Style Whiskey.

[sku]

From the website, it looks like they are only selling futures right now, which makes sense since it says their distillery was just licensed last October.

[sku]

...and I like how they tout their whiskey as "celebrated as the finest whisky ever made in the west," even though it's not clear they've even made any yet.

When I was researching my whiskey list, I found a number of American craft distilleries that appeared to be little more than a guy with an idea and a website. This might be one of those.

[DeanSheen]

The futures club would make a nice group buy, assuming a trusted source could taste it first.

http://theellensburgdistillery.com/7.html

[cowdery]

Sorry, I only skimmed the site and didn't catch the fact that they just opened in October.

A newspaper article they reproduced on the site is enlightening. it is here:

http://theellensburgdistillery.com/10.html

The "futures" club is a form of investment, a way of supporting the enterprise, but it's a pig in a poke if there ever was one. I know some micro-distillers in other states who have looked into this and found it illegal in their jurisdictions.

Which raises an interesting point, especially in light of what is going on in Kentucky right now with the state sales tax controversy, which is the way Washington's state government is supporting its fledgling distilling industry.

[kickert]

I don't understand how they can guarantee the amount of "cask-strength" whisky available if they allow the owner to choose the age of the product. They obviously are not accounting for evaporation. There is no way a 4 month old product and a 4 year old product will yeild the same number of bottles.