Whiskey Review: Republic Restoratives Rodham Rye

Most distilleries try to remain apolitical, appealing to a broad market. Garage Oil Spirits, for example, states its mission is to bring people together and build community among Americans. But one distillery in Washington, D.C. is steering firmly into the left leaning demographic, embracing their political beliefs and churning out some products targeted directly at Democrats. We’re going to review most of their product line in the next few weeks, starting with Republic Restorative’s Rodham Rye.

History

As you might expect for a distillery located in Washington, D.C., the history of Republic Restoratives starts with politicians.

Pia Carusone had built a successful career in politics, serving as Chief of Staff to Congresswoman Gabby Giffords and in 2011 was appointed as the Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs at the Department of Homeland Security. But by 2013, after experiencing the horror of watching her boss Gabby Giffords nearly be assassinated on stage and enduring the grueling world of federal politics, Carusone was burnt out and wanted to make a change.

In her own words, “[y]ou can’t help but ask yourself, ‘what has my life amounted to, what would I regret’ following an experience like that”. And like so many other burnt-out, high performing people before her, she decided to quit the rat race and open a distillery.

Carusone teamed up with lifelong friend Rachel Cole Gardner to realize this dream. Gardner had found her love for fermented drinks in college, starting with making her own beer and eventually moving into the world of distilling in Seattle, Washington. There she worked with Berle “Rusty” Figgins Jr., a consultant distiller and assisted him in building and opening a number of craft distilleries in the area, and also worked on immersing herself in the technical details of distilled spirits by earning a Craft Distilling Certificate from the Spirits Institute of Puget Sound and attending courses at Moonshine University.

Together, Carusone and Gardner had the expertise and the gumption to open a distillery, and a fortuitous change in the laws in the District of Columbia had encouraged new businesses to open there — but they lacked the funding to make that dream a reality. They turned to crowdfunding to get their distillery off the ground, appealing to the fact that this would be the first woman-owned distillery in the District with both founders being members of the LGBTQ+ community to drive excitement and interest in the project, and appealing to their audience with provocative titles for their proposed spirits.

The result was a huge success — the distillery would become the largest crowdfunded craft distillery in the world, with over $119,500 in funding, and opened its doors for the first time on Mother’s Day in 2016.

Product

• Learn More: What's the Difference Between Whiskey, Bourbon, Scotch, and Rye?

Rodham Rye was named in honor of Hillary Rodham Clinton, who was known to like an occasional glass of whiskey. It was originally planned for release after inauguration day in 2017 to celebrate the first female president… but the election however didn’t exactly go as the distillery had anticipated, and the project was shelved until March 25, 2017 when they finally decided to go ahead and release it.

This is a blend of 100% sourced rye whiskies from Tennessee that have been brought to the Republic Restoratives distillery, blended together, and bottled for sale. None of the whiskey in this bottle is actually produced at their facility.

As a rye whiskey, this starts with a mixture of grains at least 51% of which are rye (the remainder are undisclosed). Those grains are milled, cooked, fermented, and distilled to create a raw whiskey that is then placed into new charred oak barrels for a period of time. For this blend of whiskeys, the distillery selected a group of barrels that included rye that had been maturing for as little as one year and as long as three and a half years in Tennessee.

The one step in the process that the distillery does in-house is that they blend the whiskies together and cut them with water sourced from Gardner’s family maple syrup farm in the Adirondack Mountains in upstate New York. The finished whiskey is then bottled for sale.

According to the distillery, five percent of the proceeds from the sale of this product gets donated to EMILY’s List, an organization dedicated to helping pro-choice Democratic women running for office.

Packaging

(I do want to make one note here: the label on this bottle is a little damaged, and that’s on me — I had to bring this home as checked baggage, since offerings from this distillery aren’t available in North Carolina. During the transport, one of the bottles didn’t make it, resulting in some water damage to the survivors’ labels. But I think you still get the general idea of how this would look when factory fresh.)

Overall, the design of the bottle is somewhat familiar but with a novel twist. The general shape is that of a cylindrical body with a sharply angled shoulder and short neck, capped off with a plastic and synthetic stopper. It’s clean and modern, consistent with other craft distilleries out there.

What’s different (and not something I think I’ve seen elsewhere, actually) is that the base is chamfered — it isn’t a flat base with a hard edge, but instead there’s a bit of an angle sloping inwards from the straight wall to the flat base. It’s an interesting choice that does make this bottle stand out a bit more without being too flashy.

The label is tastefully done — large enough to be legible, but still small enough to let the whiskey show through and be the star of the show. It’s a simple design that almost looks like the seal you’d see on a government document or some other official product, which helps pull together that ‘D.C. political theme’ for the distillery.

While the label looks good, it’s also my biggest complaint. The label claims that this is “Produced & Bottled By” Republic Restoratives… but that’s a lie of omission. The whiskey is actually sourced from an undisclosed distillery in Tennessee, and the only thing that Republic Restoratives does is blend and bottle the spirit. Being more transparent about that distinction would have been a much better choice in my opinion.

Neat

There’s a good color to this whiskey, like you’d expect from a nicely matured spirit. Coming off the glass, I get something a little different from the norm: warm, baked apple pie. That apple aroma is pretty common for a rye (and it’s definitely a crisp apple here, like a granny smith) but it’s usually much sharper, and in this case I think there’s enough brown sugar, vanilla, and baking spices to turn this into a delicious dessert instead of a tart appetizer.

Most of those components translate into the actual flavor, but up first is a new entrant: dark chocolate. That sets the stage nicely and adds some needed depth to the flavor profile, which continues with sweet brown sugar, vanilla, and some baking spices. On the finish, there’s a hint of apple and some good black pepper spice, but much less than you might normally expect.

On Ice

I think what’s going on here is that the ice is reducing the impact of that dark chocolate on the flavor profile. Normally, ice has some interesting impacts on the flavors in a whiskey — and this seems to be no exception.

This is becoming a distinctly spicier sip of whiskey, with the baking spices and black pepper leading the charge. That’s backed by some fresh crisp apple and then the normal brown sugar and vanilla flavors, but those are more supporting of the spices than taking control.

What we’re left with is something that has less depth and complexity, but more spice… which might be interesting for cocktails.

Cocktail (Old Fashioned)

Well, what started off promising turned out disappointing. This isn’t really doing it for me.

What I like in an old fashioned are some richer and darker tones — which we saw initially in this rye with that dark chocolate note when tasted neat. But once the ice hits the spirit, that dark chocolate runs for the hills, leaving nothing to balance out the bitters in this cocktail.

The best way I can describe this is a spicy mix of aromatics. There isn’t enough sweetness or richness in the whiskey itself to make up for that bitterness in the bitters, and the one-two punch of baking spices and black pepper overwhelm just about everything else in this cocktail.

Fizz (Mule)

What I’m looking for in a good Kentucky Mule (or Tennessee Mule, in this case) is two factors specifically: that the whiskey balances the flavors in the ginger beer and lime juice, and that it brings some interesting texture to the cocktail. While there are some interesting textures, I wouldn’t call the drink balanced… or successful.

Texture is a nice added bonus, but the drink needs to be drinkable. In this case, there isn’t nearly enough dark chocolate or sweetness from the vanilla and brown sugar to put a dent in the ginger beer and lime juice. Those components are still loud and obnoxious, and make for a very different experience than the relaxed sipper I was hoping for.

Where this does work is the spicy texture on the finish… but even that is a bit off balance. Without any sweetness, the baking spices and black pepper just make this seem bitter and unappealing. I’d even be tempted to classify this as tasting “chalky”.

Overall Rating

When sipped neat, this is a pretty great rye whiskey. It has the depth, the spice, the traditional flavors, everything you’d want. It’s a little bit on the simple side and lacks some unique character but that could be overlooked for a product intended for mass market appeal.

But this whiskey has two big problems holding it back.

The first issue is that, the second any ice goes into the glass, this turns into a spicy mess. There’s no depth, no balance, and no sweetness to really make an enjoyable cocktail or even just sip on the rocks. That problem only gets worse with mixers, or when trying to turn it into an old fashioned. It’s fine for the spice and the alcohol content, but I’m expecting much more from a rye whiskey.

Which brings us to the second problem: the price tag. At this price point, I’m expecting some significant performance from a rye whiskey, and this just doesn’t have the chops to hang with the big boys. It’s got a great marketing gimmick, but I can pick up a bottle of Rittenhouse Rye and have a much better night for a third the price.

And that’s not even mentioning the somewhat deceptive labeling on this whiskey. It’s really a Tennessee whiskey that they just blend and bottle in-house, but the average person is going to read the label and think that this was actually made (as in distilled) in the District… which would be incorrect.

If you’re looking for a gimmick gift to give someone who is a rabid Democrat, this might be a good option. But if you are looking for something to actually drink, then there are many better options out there to try.

All reviews are evaluated within the context of their specific spirit classification as specified above. Click here to check out similar spirits we have reviewed.

Overall Rating: 1/5
A whiskey from an unabashedly outspoken distillery that is delicious (if simple) at first, but falls apart on the rocks.