Texas Whiskey Festival Blend X

The 10th Texas Whiskey Festival is coming, and we’ve been working on something special for it.

If you’ve been following along on social media, you may have noticed a few whiskey picks lately. They’re connected.

For more than a year, we’ve been working in the background on a whiskey for Year 10. Not a barrel pick from a single distillery, but a whiskey built from selections across multiple Texas distilleries—each with a deep connection to the Texas Whiskey Festival.

We know what we’re making.

What we don’t know yet is exactly what it will become.

Instead of beginning with a finished flavor profile and searching for whiskies to fit it, we’re doing almost the opposite. We’re choosing individual whiskies we find interesting—whiskies with distinctly different flavors and personalities—and figuring out where they take us.

And we aren’t choosing them alone.

The distillers involved in Blend X are invited to join us for each selection. With schedules, production and the realities of running a distillery, not everyone can make every stop. But those who can, show up.

That means every selection brings a slightly different group of people—and palates—to the table. We taste together, talk through what we’re finding and decide which whiskies deserve to keep moving forward.

It makes the process a little less predictable, but it also makes the whiskey a little more special. Blend X isn’t simply being made with whiskey from several Texas distilleries. The people behind those distilleries are helping shape it along the way.

And a selection doesn’t necessarily mean every decision gets made that day. Some whiskies may earn their place immediately. Others will have to come with us to the blending table, where we can see how they interact with everything else we’ve selected.

That has already happened twice.

Selection No. 1 — Andalusia Whiskey Co.

Our first stop was Andalusia Whiskey Co., where we tasted through a range of single malts spanning different ages and flavor profiles.

We couldn’t settle on just one.

So we didn’t.

Two very different single malts are moving forward to the blending table. Both earned the chance to be part of Blend X, but ultimately only one will make the final whiskey.

Which one? We need the rest of the whiskey on the table before we can answer that.

Selection No. 2 — Still Austin Whiskey Co.

Next up was Still Austin Whiskey Co., and they pulled out the stops.

We tasted bourbons and ryes with dramatically different personalities, looking for the whiskey that should represent Still Austin in Blend X.

Once again, there wasn’t a single answer.

A bourbon and a rye are both coming with us to the blending table. They offer very different possibilities for the finished whiskey, and I’m excited to see which direction wins once we start putting all of these pieces together.

For now, both are still in the running.

The first selections have been made. More are coming.

Eventually, they all have to find a way to work together.