Review: Whiskey Acres Farm Crafted Vodka

Whiskey Acres Farm Crafted Vodka was released March 2016.  The vodka was previously only sold onsite at their DeKalb Illinois Distillery.  They also produce a corn whiskey, bourbon, and rye whiskey.  This is a true seed to spirit distillery with all of the grain needed to craft their spirits coming from the 2000 acres they farm.  The distillery is run by father and son farmers Jim and Jamie Walter, and their partner Nick Nagle.  Imagine if Pablo Picasso had been limited to painting with only a two color palette.  The results would have been very different.  That is the same logic used in crafting this vodka.  With dozens of corn varieties to experiment with, all grown according to their own strict standards, they were able to select the best corn variety to craft their vodka with.  They looked for disease resistance, natural in-field dry-down, test weight, starch content, and flavor of the final product, as only some of the criteria in selecting this variety.  If you thought I was going to mention the corn variety used to craft this vodka you would be wrong.  This is one of the magic pixie dust secrets that makes Whiskey Acres Vodka taste truly unique and special.  Most consumers think of corn as corn, and most corn vodka producers are at the mercy of using what ever corn their suppliers deliver.  Whiskey Acres Vodka is distilled in a custom made 500 gallon Vendome still.  After an initial stripping run on about 10 batches where the spirit is distilled to around 150-160 proof, enough spirit is available to put back in the still for a finishing run.  The vodka is very slowly distilled again for 40-60 consecutive hours.  The vodka is blended to proof with water from a naturally filtered limestone aquifer that sits below the distillery.  After being continuously carbon filtered for 24-48 hours the vodka is hand bottled onsite by the ownership team and volunteers. Read more