Abasolo Distillery was built in 2019 in the town of Jilotepec de Abasolo. Why this place, situated at 7,800 feet, for the first whisky distillery in Mexico, a country more popularly known for tequila and mezcal? Because the town is known as the birthplace of corn (also known as maize), and corn is what this whisky is all about. Abasolo uses 100% cacahuazintle, a Mexican heritage corn, through an ancient cooking technique called nixtamalization, which is often used in food preparation for corn in Mexico but has not been used before in the distilling process. The Abasolo Ancestral Corn is the inaugural offering.
Liberty Pole Peated Rye
Mingo Creek Craft Distillers, better known by their brand name Liberty Pole, are a craft distillery in southwestern Pennsylvania who deftly weave the line between history and imagination. Their whiskey-focused portfolio includes offerings made using heritage grains like bloody butcher corn and Pennsylvania rye. But they’re not afraid to get creative, as seen by their Peated Bourbon. After seeing what peat could do with with corn, they wondered…why not rye? A few years later, the Liberty Pole Peated Rye was born. The result was so successful, it has become a staple of their portfolio and is released about once a year.