Editor’s Note: These bottled cocktails were provided to us as review samples by the party behind them. This in no way, per our editorial policies, influenced the final outcome of this review.
If you are plugged into the spirits world then you know that RTDs (ready to drink) are having their moment. Every distillery seems to be jumping on the bandwagon and creating premixed cocktails with their own spirits.
Typically, I’m not the biggest fan of RTDs because it seems as though a lot of the complex flavors that you love in a cocktail get lost when companies create them in such large batches. I’ll often find that companies will create caricatures of cocktails, overdoing certain elements and then totally forgetting about other flavors.
Despite my bias on RTDs I tried to go into this review with an open mind, especially since I’ve been a fan of WhistlePig’s rye and bourbon for a while. In this collaboration Sunkist and Whistle Pig have given us two versions of their “orange fashioned” cocktail, one non-alcoholic and the other mixed with WhistlePig’s rye whiskey. Both are also sweetened with barrel aged maple syrup, which is aged in used whiskey barrels from WhistlePig.
I tried the non-alcoholic version first, fully expecting to be overpowered by a super-sweet orange juice flavor. Instead, I was met with almost no flavor at all. It’s a completely bland, watered down orange-drink with little hints of smoky syrup that wilt away in your mouth.
Not great…
For the alcoholic version you are at least gifted the bold flavors from WhistlePig’s amazing rye whiskey, but the orange cocktail basis is the exact same as the non-alcoholic version. The final result is essentially a bunch of blah that interrupts a great glass of whiskey.
Tasting Notes: WhistlePig X Sunkist Dry
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Appearance: Dark orange
Nose: The ghost of an orange you might have smelled once but forgot about.
Palate: A watered down glass of orange juice (in a bad way).
Tasting Notes: WhistlePig X Sunkist
Appearance: Dark Orange
Nose: An orange juice box that got squirted into a glass of whiskey.
Palate: Like you took your watered-down orange juice and used it to water down your whiskey.
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