Woodford Reserve Is Releasing the New Double Oaked Rye Whiskey

Woodford Reserve might specialize in bourbon, but the Kentucky distillery is no stranger to rye whiskey, with a solid core expression and some special limited releases in its expansive lineup. The latest release is a companion to the popular Double Oaked Bourbon, giving the same secondary maturation treatment to the distillery’s rye whiskey that the bourbon undergoes—but with very different results.

Woodford Reserve, which is located in the town of Versailles, has been making whiskey since the mid-’90s. Some of the liquid in the bottle comes from the distillery there, and some from Brown-Forman’s much larger Shively Distillery, but all of it carries the distinctive character that marks the brand and has made it a success over the past 30 years. Whiskey making at Woodford is overseen by master distiller Elizabeth McCall, who took over from longtime master distiller Chris Morris in 2023. Double Oaked was first released in 2012 under Morris’s supervision, a bourbon that was aged in a second set of new charred oak barrels for about a year after initial maturation to infuse the whiskey with richer flavor. Then in 2015, Woodford introduced Double Double Oaked, which spends twice that amount of time in a new set of charred oak barrels. That expression, which was initially part of the very limited Distillery Series, was eventually made into an annual, less limited release (the most recent launch arrived last January).

Enter Double Oaked Rye. This whiskey was made from Woodford’s rye whiskey mashbill of 53 percent rye, 33 percent corn, and 14 percent malted barley, putting it into the “just legal” style in which so many Kentucky rye whiskeys are made. After initial maturation of somewhere between five and seven years, the whiskey was put into a second set of new, heavily toasted, lightly charred barrels for up to a year.

“Woodford Reserve Double Oaked Rye is where rye meets the richness of Double Oaked,” said McCall in a statement. “We are bringing that same meticulous attention to barrel finishing that defined our bourbon over to the rye category, creating an unexpected, complex, and incredibly flavorful whiskey.”

We got to try a sample of the new release, and the core Woodford banana and fruit notes are present, along with ample flavors of maple, black pepper, dried fig, and tons of oak, leather, and dark chocolate. Like virtually all of Woodford’s core expressions, this rye was bottled at 90.4 proof (45.2 percent ABV).

Woodford Reserve Double Oaked Rye will be available at select retailers around the country starting this month (SRP $55).