The World’s Best Bourbon – According to the 2023 Tasting Alliance World Championship

The Tasting Alliance is the world’s leading organization for judging spirits. Every year he holds three contests in San Francisco, Singapore and New York. Each competition takes place over several days, during which thousands of entries are evaluated by expert tastes from each host city. Tasters include industry leaders, bartenders, liquor writers, and more.

Near the end of 2023, for the first time in its six-year history, the Tasting Alliance brought together the winners of each of these contests to compete against each other in each category, creating a sort of “Spirits Olympics.” And for the past few weeks, they’ve been announcing the winner: the best player.

Today we will only report on the winning American whiskey. This brand is still unfamiliar to many people, even the biggest fans of bourbon and rye. But if you’ve been following our ongoing coverage of contest winners, you’ll almost certainly remember the name: Peg Leg Poker Tennessee Straight Bourbon White Label.

Indeed, it’s an unforgettable name, coined by its founder and award-winning pitmaster, Carrie Bringle. And he didn’t just come up with the name, he actually invented a new filtration process for liquids. Aged four to six years, each drop of sauce bourbon flows through hickory charcoal roasted in the pit of his legendary Nashville barbecue restaurant.

Somewhat inspired by the Lincoln County process unique to Tennessee Whiskey.However, the procedure will take place Before Aging the whiskey in barrels rather than afterwards. Of course, smoked meat is not included. The aim here was to create a whiskey that pairs perfectly with barbecue. So, as we pointed out in 2023 when our 90 proof bourbon won the World Spirits Competition in Singapore;

“On the nose you’ll notice strong caramel and honey, and on the palate you’ll notice smoky, tangy notes. All of which have a distinctly nutty mouthfeel, as each sip slowly fades to the end. You can think through a lot of flavors.”

Taking the top spot on the podium, Peg Leg Poker topped New York World Spirits’ best-in-class 15 Stars Sherry Cask and San Francisco World Spirits Competition’s top bourbon, Augusta Distillery’s Buckner 13 Year Old.

Although Bringle and his team won’t reveal the exact distillery responsible for producing Peg Leg, its signature mash bill of 84% corn, 8% rye, and 8% malted barley traces its origins to George Dickel. strongly suggested. No matter where it comes from, you can see where it’s going, to liquor store shelves in select markets like Tennessee, New York, and Florida. Currently, he can be purchased online for about $40 a bottle.

This is one of the many exciting brands that helped American whiskey sales continue their upward trajectory in the 2020s. In fact, sales of bourbon, rye and Tennessee whiskey rose 3.8% last year, although there was some stagnation across the spirits sector in 2023, according to the latest data from the Distilled Spirits Council. Domestic sales during this period increased to $5.3 billion for these categories combined.