Top 20 Whiskies of 2017

#3 • Wild Turkey Master’s Keep Decades

  • Rank: 3
  • Year: 2017
  • Score: 94
  • Price: $150
  • ABV: 52%
  • Style: Straight Bourbon
  • Place of Origin: Kentucky

Wild Turkey often exhibits a delightful earthiness, and when earth meets sweet in whiskey, it’s a beautiful thing. Wild Turkey Master’s Keep Decades achieves a rich texture where deep-tilled soil, fresh-cut grass, and mushrooms meet leather and dark chocolate, followed by dill, oregano, and oak. Caramel and vanilla explode over a heavy dose of cinnamon. Master distiller Eddie Russell mingled barrels ranging from 10 to 20 years old in order to strike this balance and complexity. His method displays the potential of combining extremely old stocks into batches with younger barrels to build a great whiskey. —Fred Minnick