Maker’s Mark Just Released A New Wheat Whiskey. Here's What Distillers Say About This Grain's Unique Flavor

American whiskey has long been shaped by corn and, more recently, by rye’s improbable comeback from near‑extinction. Wheat, by contrast, never had a dramatic rise or revival. It has mostly stayed in the background, filling out mashbills rather than defining them. But every year more distillers are beginning to treat wheat as a grain with its own unique character.

That’s the backstory for Maker’s Mark’s second edition of Star Hill Farm Wheat Whisky ($100), the follow‑up to last year’s debut of the brand’s first new mashbill since its founding. (The brand got its original recipe and yeast from Julian 'Pappy' Van Winkle when he ran the Old Fitzgerald Distillery.)

The inaugural release of Star Hill Farm focused on soft red winter wheat, the same grain that has shaped Maker’s bourbon for decades. The 2026 edition widens the lens: incorporating hard red and hard white wheat, leaning more heavily into malted wheat, and blending two wheat‑forward mashbills to create a whiskey that’s darker, deeper, and more layered than the 2025 release.

Wheat whiskey has existed for decades, but it has rarely been a headline category. Part of the confusion is that most drinkers know wheated bourbon—including brands like Maker’s Mark, Larceny, Weller, and, perhaps most famously, Pappy Van Winkle—far better than they know wheat whiskey itself. In a wheated bourbon, wheat replaces rye in the mashbill, but corn still makes up the majority of the recipe. Wheat whiskey flips that structure: wheat must be at least 51 percent of the mashbill, and is often far more. It’s a different category with a different flavor profile, even if the names sound similar.

Where Wheat Whiskey Started

Heaven Hill’s Bernheim Original ($85), which released a 20th anniversary limited-edition bottling this winter, is the longest‑running modern example of wheat whiskey. As the brand’s master distiller Conor O’Driscoll explains, its origin was more practical than visionary. “After running a campaign of the wheated bourbon recipe, there was leftover grain, and we needed the silo capacity,” O’Driscoll says. The master distiller at the time “Parker Beam said, ‘Let’s just make some wheat whiskey.’ And Bernheim was born.”

That pragmatic beginning shaped wheat whiskey’s reputation: soft, mellow, approachable. But that’s only one expression of the grain. O’Driscoll prefers a bread analogy: “Cornbread, rye bread, wheat bread—they’re all bread, but they’re distinct.” Wheat whiskey, he says, is softer and rounder, with bready notes and a different kind of sweetness.

Wheat also behaves differently in production. It ferments more predictably than rye—“We truly never have those issues with wheat,” O’Driscoll said—but it can be easily overpowered in the barrel by the flavor coming from the wood. But he recalls tasting a 15‑year‑old wheat whiskey shortly after joining Heaven Hill and expecting it to be too woody. Instead, he was stunned: “Holy crap. This is some of the most delicious, subtly flavored, well‑balanced whiskey I’ve ever tasted.” The key was where it aged: a cool, lower‑floor warehouse where the barrel didn’t dominate.

Maker’s Mark Pushes Wheat Into New Territory

Maker’s Mark has always been defined by wheat—but only as a flavor grain in its bourbon. With Star Hill Farm Wheat Whisky, Maker’s Mark is stepping beyond its familiar wheated‑bourbon profile and building a whiskey around wheat itself, drawing on years of work with different varieties of the grain grown on and around the distillery’s property.

The 2026 edition blends two mashbills, one made entirely from malted wheat and another composed of 70 percent wheat and 30 percent malted barley. The final blend leans heavily into malted character, which is where wheat becomes expressive, says master distiller Dr. Blake Layfield. “The malted wheat brings complexity, vibrancy, and mouthfeel,” he says. “Instead of the citrus‑cherry notes you get in Maker’s bourbon, the wheat expresses as pear—still in the same family, but different.”

The shift from soft red winter wheat to a mix that includes hard red and hard white varietals is equally intentional. Maker’s has spent more than a decade working with wheat breeders and regenerative farmers to understand how soil health and seed selection shape how whiskey tastes. “The way to achieve more flavor is to start with better ingredients,” says Rob Samuels, the brand’s managing director. “Sustainability isn’t separate from flavor—it’s the path to it.”

The result is a whiskey that’s recognizably Maker’s in its warmth and approachability, but is structurally different: denser aromatics, more fruit depth, and more spice.

Ross & Squibb Signal a Broader Curiosity

If Maker’s represents the agricultural and flavor‑driven end of the spectrum, Remus Master Distiller Experimental Series No. 2 ($70) represents something else: a major rye‑centric distillery deciding wheat is worth exploring.

Seagram's old distillery in Indiana, which for a long time was called MGP and is now Ross & Squibb, is practically synonymous with rye. The distillery’s signature 95 percent rye mashbill is the backbone of dozens of brands. Wheat whiskey has never been part of its identity. That’s why Ross & Squibb’s master distiller Ian Stirsman’s decision to build its second Experimental Series release around a 95 percent wheat mashbill is notable. “Most people don’t even know we’ve ever distilled a wheat whiskey,” he said. “That’s exactly why I wanted to do it.”

Stirsman found wheat’s neutrality to be an advantage. Because the grain doesn’t dominate, it becomes a clean canvas for aging the whiskey in barrels that previously held a number of other types of liquor. His 2017 distillate was divided among tawny port, white port, oloroso sherry, and ruby port casks, each adding its own layer of texture and flavor. The result is a whiskey with notes of chocolate, almond, and subtle earthiness—signaling that wheat can carry nuance without overwhelming the cask or being overwhelmed by it.

When Wheat Isn’t the Star—the Barrel Is

Todd Leopold, co-founder and distiller at Leopold Bros. in Denver, has built a reputation for his historical deep dives and technical obsessiveness. His recreation of a three‑chamber still, a 19th‑century design that widely used for making rye and bourbon across the United States, is the clearest example. It took years of archival research, engineering work, and collaboration with historians David Wondrich and Noah Rothbaum (who is also Men’s Journal's Spirits Editor) to bring it back to life. The still now sits at the center of the Leopold Bros. distillery, producing rye with a weight and aromatic density that modern column stills can’t replicate.

That same curiosity shapes the rest of Leopold Bros.’ production. The distillery runs its own malting floor, cultivates its own strains of yeast, and maintains a distillation program that extends well beyond whiskey.

Wheat fits into that broader exploration, but it isn’t where Leopold spends most of his attention. His view of the grain is characteristically blunt. “The main flavor you get from wheat is vanillin,” he says. “And you’re already getting vanillin from the barrel. So basically what you’re saying is, ‘I want more barrel.’”

He has distilled wheat whiskey — an 80 percent wheat, 20 percent malted barley mashbill — and he has wheat‑based projects aging in the warehouse. But he’s candid about why it hasn’t been a priority. Wheat, in his experience, doesn’t offer the same structural or aromatic complexity as the grains he’s more drawn to. “It’s awful tough to evoke flavors specifically from the wheat,” he said, unless you’re working with unusually complex heirloom varieties.

His work gravitates toward processes and grains that create weight, unctuousness, and layered aromatics — the kinds of things the three‑chamber still is designed to amplify. Wheat simply behaves differently. And in his view, that’s fine. “Is that a bad thing? No, it’s not a bad thing,” he said. “But to me, it’s really more showcasing the work of the cooper more than anything else.”

Is Wheat Whiskey “Having a Moment”?

Not exactly — and that’s part of what makes this shift interesting. This isn’t rye’s early‑2000s resurgence, when bartenders rediscovered pre‑Prohibition cocktails and their demand spurred distillers to make the historic whiskey. Wheat whiskey is expanding more slowly, driven by distillers who see room to explore the grain.

What’s changing is the intent behind the releases. Maker’s Mark is using wheat to probe questions of terroir, varietals, and regenerative agriculture. Ross & Squibb is treating wheat as a neutral canvas for finishing, letting port and sherry casks do the talking. Heaven Hill continues to refine one of the category’s longest‑running examples. Buffalo Trace has also begun exploring heritage wheat varietals in its Daniel Weller series—first emmer, and most recently spelt—though those releases remain wheated bourbons rather than wheat whiskey. And smaller distillers, like Colby Frey at Frey Ranch are experimenting with 100 percent wheat mashbills, heirloom varieties, and malted expressions.

Few people articulate wheat’s potential as clearly as Nicole Austin, the general manager and distiller at George Dickel in Tullahoma, Tennessee. Austin has earned a reputation for technical precision and for challenging assumptions about what American whiskey can be. During her tenure at Dickel, she distilled a 100 percent wheat whiskey—a rarity in the category and something she remembers vividly. “You can make a wheat whiskey that’s fruity, peppery, oily, huge,” she says. “It depends on how you treat it.” That whiskey was sold to Lost Lantern, an award-winning independent bottler, who will release it this fall.

“There’s no reason wheat has to be quiet,” Austin says. “It’s only quiet if you make it that way.”