The Proofing Room

Update, November 3, 2026: We've updated this post. The Supreme Court has agreed to hear the McNutt case, the bill's cosponsor count is corrected to four, the description of what the McNutt ruling covers is corrected, and the equipment section now describes the bill's product standard without practical advice. Earlier this month we covered the Fifth Circuit ruling that found the federal home-distilling ban unconstitutional. The courts aren't the only branch moving now. On August 27, Rep. Diana Harshbarger of Tennessee introduced H.R. 10157, the Freedom to Home Distill Act . It would put home distillers in the same category home brewers and winemakers have been in since 1978. It's a bill, not a law. Here's what it says, what the numbers mean in real bottles, and what it leaves alone. Why it exists In 1978, Congress changed the tax code to let adults make beer and wine at home, tax-free, for personal use: up to 200 gallons a year per household. Distilled ...

Some whiskey events are a room full of tables and plastic cups. The Coeur d'Alene Resort's Whiskey Barrel Weekend , presented with Maker's Mark, is not that. We spent September 18 and 19 on the lake in North Idaho, and it was one of the best-run spirits weekends we've been to. Here's what it was like, and the one thing from the master class that changed how we taste. Friday: Fuego & Oak The weekend opened with Fuego & Oak at the Hagadone Event Center: tomahawk steaks hung over an open flame grill on the terrace with Lake Coeur d'Alene behind them, tacos, small bites and appetizers going around, and a 120-proof pour to match. It's the kind of evening that sets a high bar for the rest of a weekend, and the rest of the weekend cleared it. Saturday: the Whiskey Master Class The master class was the highlight. An hour, a four-glass flight served blind , a board of smoked provolone, gouda, and cheddar with whiskey cheese straws, an...

Portland's Westward Whiskey has opened pre-sale for Milestone Edition No. 4, its annual single malt release. One line in the announcement stopped us: the whiskey is "drawn from our Solera that can't be repeated." That's not marketing fluff. It's a real description of how a solera works, and the math behind it is one of the more interesting ideas in blending. Here's what's going on. What a solera is A solera is a blending system where the vessel is never emptied. Instead of filling a barrel, aging it, and bottling all of it, a producer draws off part of the aged spirit, then tops the vessel back up with younger spirit. Next time, they draw part again, and top up again. Forever. The technique comes from sherry, where it's run as tiers of barrels: wine is drawn from the oldest tier, which is refilled from the next-oldest, which is refilled from the one above it, with new wine going in at the top. Many whiskey and rum producers run simpler v...

This week's Breaking Bourbon Whiskey Wednesday newsletter called Old Overholt Cask Strength Rye "a rock of a rye" for Jim Beam, and pointed out something worth knowing: it often sits on shelves for months while people chase harder-to-find bottles. We haven't tasted this year's release ourselves, so we'll leave the tasting notes to them. What caught our attention is two words on the label: cask strength . Because a cask-strength bottle hands you a job most whiskey does for you before it ever leaves the distillery. What "cask strength" means Most whiskey is proofed down before bottling: water goes in until the spirit hits its target strength, often 40% to 50% ABV (80 to 100 proof). Cask strength skips that step. The whiskey goes into the bottle at or near the strength it came out of the barrel, which frequently lands somewhere around 55% to 65% ABV. That's why cask-strength releases carry a different proof every year. The strength...

Update, November 3, 2026: The Supreme Court agreed on October 19, 2026 to hear the government's appeal ( Department of Justice v. McNutt , No. 26-204), so the petition this post describes is no longer pending. We've also corrected this post. An earlier version said the federal ban "has been struck down" in Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi. That overstated it: the ruling protects the named plaintiffs and the Hobby Distillers Association's members through a court injunction, and binds federal courts in those states as precedent. It did not make home distilling legal there. For where things stand now, see The Supreme Court Will Hear a Challenge to the Federal Home-Distilling Ban . Six months ago, almost to the day, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals handed down a ruling that every home distiller should know about — and that almost nobody's explaining correctly. On April 10, 2026, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit decided McNutt v. U.S. Departme...