Wood’s Barrel Rested Treeline Gin

Flavor Profile

Wood’s Treeline Barrel Rested Gin took a silver medal in 2013 at the ADI’s craft spirits judging.*

Wood’s Barrel Rested Treeline Gin is simply a barrel rested version of their main Treeline Gin offering in terms of botanicals. However, while the main offering is bottled at 40%, the barrel rested is bottled at 45% and therefore has a slight amount more kick. It has a pronounced, bronze/golden huge. Looks fairly darker than probably 2/3 of the aged gins out there, but nowhere near as dark as say Few’s.

Tasting Notes

Nose is classic aged gin to me. Juniper, a hint of char. Woodsy, hints of cedar and smoky grain. A touch of heat on the nose too. The gin parts of the nose still come through but it has a note of smokey cedar which hints that this might not be your standard unaged gin.

The taste is a bit tangy and gin-like at first, lemon, licorice, and juniper up front.  Then you get the woodsy touch in the front while heat builds strongly from the corners. It tastes very hot, quite intense. This roar of heat isn’t deafening but it is pronounced and might be enough to invite some to add a dash or two of water to sipping it neat. The closing notes as heat diminishes, gradually we get a hint of licorice and freshly ground black peppercorns. The closing notes in the back of the mouth, a woodsy, smoke and char sort of note on the very back of the palate, clinging through- at first charred wood then an almost bitter burnt black toast note sliding into subtle bitterness. Loud the entire way through, and it leaves a hot touch of fire in the mouth even as the taste subsides.

Cocktails

I overwhelmingly drink my aged gin neat, or with a single ice cube on a hot summer day. But one cocktail of the gin canon where aged gin surely deserves a mention is the Negroni. Wood’s Treeline Barrel Rested Gin acquits itself nicely, although the notes you get the most of are really the charred and woodsy notes, not so much the juniper and licorice that came across so clearly when sipped neat.

Perhaps my personal favorite take was Wood’s Barrel Rested Treeline Gin dashed with a couple of bitters in an Aged Gin Old Fashioned.

Overall, Wood’s Barrel Rested Treeline Gin

Well made, but bold statement-making aged gin. It has a point of view. A tad more wood and char than most aged gins, but I think it comes across nicely and I really enjoy sipping Wood’s Barrel Rested Treeline Gin neat.

Footnotes

* In the interest of full disclosure, I judge on the ADI panels— however, my judging here has nothing to do with my work with ADI.