Chuckanut Bay Distillery bourbon Batch 16

A true Bellingham Bourbon, made entirely from locally grown grains and aged to perfection in American White Oak barrels.

No question about it – making a high-quality bourbon from scratch is a challenging project, which is why most "craft" distilleries don't even attempt it. They cut corners by outsourcing the grind, mash, and fermentation process to a brewery, or worse yet, by simply purchasing pre-aged bourbon in barrels from an industrial supplier out of state which they then bottle and bring to market under their own label.

The alternative? Bite the bullet and do it from the ground up – sourcing and mashing grains, fermenting and distilling on site, then putting it in barrels… and waiting patiently for years for it to mature. You can guess which route we took.

Chuckanut Bay Distillery Bourbon is proud to call itself a true Pacific Northwest representation of this quintessential American spirit, made in our customary “slow crafted” fashion. We source the corn, wheat, and rye from a farm located within just 30 miles of our distillery and grind the grains all right here on site. We mash and ferment the ingredients in small batches in our traditional wooden fermenters before transferring them to the pot still for distillation. Once at proof, we place the hearts of the resulting distillate into the highest quality 53 gallon charred American White Oak barrels sourced from the Independent Stave Company in Kentucky and load them into our barrel room. And then we wait.

Fortunately, all that waiting is worth it. The result is a highly nuanced bourbon that’s a bit less sweet than some others, complex with a touch of rye character, and a bit higher in alcohol percentage at 96 proof.

"Tastes like walking into a forest after its first rain. Bright and vivacious" - Tasting notes from the 2020 USA Spirits Competition, Gold Medal, 94 points

Awards

Chuckanut Bay Distillery Bourbon took the silver medal at the 2022 USA Spirits Competition, a bronze medal at the 2022 New York International Spirits Competition, a silver medal at the Bartender Spirit Awards in 2022, the gold medal at the 2020 USA Spirits Ratings Competition, the gold medal at the 2016 MicroLiquor Spirits Competition, the silver medal at the 2016 San Francisco World Spirits Competition, and the silver medal at the 2016 New York World Wine & Spirits Competition.