Forty Creek Foxheart

Forty Creek Foxheart 40% alc/vol

With Foxheart, another ground-breaking whisky from Forty Creek, Master Blender, Bill Ashburn tips his hat to his prize-winning Wire Fox Terrier kennel and its eight generations of North American champion show dogs. 

Ashburn has been with the distillery since the early 1980s, when it was still Rieder Distillery. He likes to reminisce that when Canadian whisky icon, John Hall bought the distillery in 1992, Ashburn came with the furniture. 

Hall, of course, changed the name to Forty Creek and turned what is really Canada’s first craft distillery, into a powerhouse whisky producer with landmark sales far beyond Canada’s borders. When Hall, in turn, sold Forty Creek in 2014, new owners, Italy’s Gruppo Campari found that the furnishings still include Bill Ashburn. What good fortune.

Pushing Boundaries

With Campari’s support, Ashburn has begun experiments that use his whisky flavour palette in new ways. “The whole pleasure of making whisky is trying to push the boundaries,” he says. 

One way to tweak flavours is to use Canada’s much misunderstood 9.09% rule. This permits blenders to include up to 9.09% of other mature spirits or wine (but nothing else) in a blend. Any controversy that stems from this practice is largely based on misunderstanding. For example, even the most strident critics seem unaware that American whisky regulations clearly state that blenders in the US may add up to 2.5% of any flavouring agent, of any kind, to their whisky, as long as that flavourant is not harmful. This is common practice in the US, but no one ever talks about it. Scotch makers also commonly add wine to single malts by “finishing” them in wine-soaked barrels. 

In the case of Foxheart, Ashburn has blended in a small amount (less than 9.09%) of 12-year-old Caribbean rum. Foxheart still tastes well within the wheelhouse of Forty Creek whisky, even as the dash of rum brings in top notes of tropical fruits, sweet floral tones and molasses. These are subtle at first just broadening the nose and palate in wonderful new directions. Once the truth is revealed, however – there’s a tad of rum in there – it all makes sense. 

Great to taste, sip, or mix in a whisky-forward cocktail.

A Taste of Foxheart

Sweet and peppery with tropical fruit and dark molasses. Citrus notes underlie creamy banana while hot spices add a glowing ember of zip. Red wine, burly tobacco, fragrant floral notes and dark fruits meld into slightly tannic barrel tones with sweet spicy toasted oak on a longish, sweetish finish.