New Riff Duet American Whiskey in Harmony with Rhinegeist Review
I’ll admit up front that Rhinegeist was homework for me.
New Riff, I know. New Riff has been one of the producers I keep coming back to because they seem genuinely curious about grain, especially malt and malted grains. Bourbon and rye built the foundation, but the way they’ve worked with malted rye, heirloom grains, single malt, and Kentucky malt whiskey has kept them from becoming another “great bottle-in-bond bourbon and goodnight” distillery. They have a point of view, and a lot of that point of view starts before the barrel ever gets involved. I talked with Brian Sprance about that evolution back on Whiskey Ring Podcast Episode 138, and New Riff Duet feels like another branch from that same grain-first tree: technical, curious, and just weird enough to make the glass more interesting.
Rhinegeist, though, was more or less a blank space in my Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky map. I knew the name, maybe the logo, and not a whole lot else. Once I started digging, New Riff Duet began to click, not because the whiskey suddenly became less strange, but because the strangeness had a place to stand.
Rhinegeist is based in Over-the-Rhine, Cincinnati’s historic German brewing neighborhood, in the former packaging hall of Christian Moerlein, one of the city’s major pre-Prohibition brewing names. Even the name Rhinegeist is a little history lesson: “Rhine” for Over-the-Rhine, and “geist” for the ghost of brewing culture returning to the neighborhood. Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky were once beer country on a massive scale, with lager cellars, German breweries, and a brewing identity that stretched across both sides of the Ohio River. Rhinegeist is not an old brand resurrected from a dusty label book. It is a modern brewery operating inside the bones of that older city.
That makes New Riff Duet feel more natural than it looks on paper. New Riff is in Newport, Kentucky. Rhinegeist is across the river in Cincinnati. One works in whiskey, one in beer, and this release sits between them with barley as the shared language.
New Riff Duet leans hard into that idea. The whiskey is made from 57% malted barley, 37% raw barley, and 6% rye. Most of the whiskey aged in new American oak, with select oloroso and Pedro Ximénez sherry casks folded into the blend. Then the whiskey spent time in Rhinegeist’s foeder, a large oak vessel normally used for beer maturation, before going back into used American oak to settle down and harmonize.
That is a lot of process. On paper, it could easily read like the spirits equivalent of liner notes for a prog album. In the glass, though, the concept shows up.
New Riff Duet pours the color of pennies, with medium rims, thin legs, and drooping drops.
The nose starts right where I hoped it would, somewhere between whiskey and brewery. I get light-to-red ales, a little yeastiness, and a big malt presence that still feels like New Riff, only bent through a different lens. There’s an oily quality, a touch of bitterness, charred lemon, and savory baking spices. Then there’s beer-spiked caramel, which is a new note for me and one I kept coming back to. It is not caramel with beer poured over it. It is caramel that somehow picked up grain husks, foam, and a little brewhouse air on the way to the glass.
The palate opens with one of those “wait, what?” moments.
Lemon malt?
The proof hits the front third of my tongue quickly, numbing it before the flavors fully unpack. At 111.2 proof, New Riff Duet is hot, and it stays hot even after a few sips. This is not one of those barrel-proof whiskeys that hides behind silk curtains and polite manners. It walks in carrying cymbals.
Then grilled lemon and caramel malt overflow. There’s some tropical or exotic fruit through the middle, maybe from the sherry casks, though I like that the sherry never tries to take over the room. A touch of smoke appears too, closer to charred citrus peel and dark toast than anything peated or ashy. The mouthfeel is oily, but it dries in the corners of my mouth while the center stays numbing and dense. Dried berry fruit leather shows up, followed by darker malts, coffee grounds, and Raisinettes.
This is where New Riff Duet really starts to work for me. It pushed me into new descriptors, and I mean that as praise. Whiskey can be excellent and still taste comfortably familiar. New Riff Duet is excellent while also being a little sideways. It is barley-forward, beer-adjacent, sherry-accented, citrusy, savory, sweet, tart, and bitter around the edges. Somehow, it does not collapse into novelty.
The finish brings dark chocolate Raisinettes tucked into a malt loaf, with lemon drizzle catching along the edge. The savory-sweet-tart dance is dynamic, and the finish runs medium in length. Bavarian pretzels open late, followed by more PX, though again, the sherry influence stays measured. That restraint helps the whiskey. The barley varieties remain clear for more of the pour, and the beer maturation adds a different kind of malt depth instead of turning the whiskey into a brewery gimmick.
My main critique is the heat. New Riff Duet is hot on the palate, and not only on the first sip. The proof smacks, numbs, and lingers. Still, the flavor is intense enough to keep pace. The heat does not hide the whiskey, and the whiskey does not vanish behind the heat. It keeps inviting another sip because there always seems to be another note waiting just past the last one.
For me, this is New Riff doing what New Riff does best: taking grain seriously, treating collaboration as more than a label swap, and letting a whiskey be unusual without apologizing for it. Rhinegeist’s role gives the pour a sense of place I would have missed if I had not done the reading. It connects Newport and Cincinnati, whiskey and beer, malted barley and brewing history, old buildings and new liquid.
New Riff Duet American Whiskey in Harmony with Rhinegeist earns a Gold Medal from me at 8.0/10. It is hot, strange, intense, and rewarding, with enough lemon malt, beer caramel, dark chocolate, pretzel, and dried fruit to keep the glass muttering long after the first sip.
Slainte!
Thank you to New Riff and Estes PR for the opportunity to taste this for review. All opinions are my own.
New Riff Duet American Whiskey in Harmony with Rhinegeist: Specs
Classification: American Whiskey
Producer: New Riff Distillery
Mash Bill: 57% Malted Barley, 37% Raw Barley, 6% Rye
Proof: 111.2º (55.6% ABV)
Age: 6 Years Old
Location: Kentucky
New Riff Duet American Whiskey in Harmony with Rhinegeist Price: $79.99
New Riff Duet American Whiskey in Harmony with Rhinegeist: Tasting Notes
Eye: Pennies. Medium rims, thin legs, drooping drops.
Nose: Light-to-red ales, a bit yeasty and quite malty. New Riff malt character with a twist. Oily, a touch bitter, charred lemon and savory baking spices. Beer-spiked caramels, a new note for me.
Palate: What the…lemon malt? Proof smacks the front third of my tongue, numbing it, then grilled lemon and caramel malt overflow. Some tropical/exotic fruit, maybe from the sherry? Touch of smoke, too. Mouthfeel dries in the corners of my mouth, stays numbing, oily, dried berry fruit leather, darker malts emerging late with coffee ground and raisinettes.
Finish: Dark chocolate raisinettes in a malt loaf, lemon drizzle catching on the edge. Savory-sweet-tart dance is dynamic. Medium length, Bavarian pretzels open late as does more of the PX.
Overall: Hot on the palate, even on subsequent sips, but the overall flavor is so intense that the proof doesn’t hide it. This invites you for sip after sip. This had me searching for new flavor descriptions, in a good way. The sherry influence is minimal, and I think that’s a good thing, as it lets the barley varieties shine through more clearly for more of the pour.
Final Rating: 8.0
10 | Insurpassable | Nothing Else Comes Close
9 | Incredible | Extraordinary
8 | Excellent | Exceptional
7 | Great | Well above average
6 | Very Good | Better than average
5 | Good | Good, solid, ordinary
4 | Has promise but needs work
1-3 | Let’s have a conversation
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