Heaven Hill Distillery announced its third annual Grain to Glass series of whiskeys. While 2024 and 2025 each featured a variety of mash bills, this year’s lineup focuses on a single whiskey style: wheated bourbon. 

To celebrate the distillery’s self-proclaimed “Year of Wheat,” all three 2026 releases are wheated bourbons, including an expression matured in French oak and an “Extra Aged” whiskey with a 9-year age statement.

Heaven Hill introduced its annual Grain to Glass series in 2024 with bourbon, wheated bourbon, and rye whiskeys, each featuring a specific, locally grown corn variety (Beck’s 6158).

The series returned in 2025 with a similar lineup made using Beck’s 62bo25. Later that year, the distillery released Specialty Barrel versions of those same three whiskeys, aged in chinquapin oak rather than the more standard American white oak.

While Grain to Glass remains an annual series, 2026 shifts the rhythm quite a bit, eschewing both traditional rye bourbon and rye whiskey. Instead, all three of this year’s releases are wheated Kentucky straight bourbon whiskeys.

“We’ve worked with wheat for a long time across our whiskeys, but this allows us to explore it more intentionally, how it softens, how it builds complexity over time, and how it ultimately shapes the character in the glass,” Molly Vincent, Heaven Hill’s associate director of luxury whiskey,  said in a news release. “The ‘Year of Wheat’ is about bringing that deeper understanding forward.” 

Two were made with Beck’s 6269, and the third spotlights Beck’s 6158. Here are details:

• Grain to Glass Kentucky Straight Wheated Bourbon (3rd Edition): This whiskey was distilled in 2019 from the standard Grain to Glass wheated bourbon mash bill of 52% corn (Beck’s 6269), 35% wheat, and 13% malted barley. After entering the barrel at 107 proof, it aged for 6 years on the third, fourth, and fifth floors of Heaven Hill Warehouses W5 and W6. A total of 170 barrels were batched and then bottled at cask strength, 107.8 proof. Bottles arrive on shelves starting in June, with an MSRP of $100 for 700 milliliters.
• Grain to Glass Specialty Barrel Kentucky Straight Wheated Bourbon, Aged in French Oak: Distilled in 2019 from the same 52/35/13 mash bill and using Beck’s 6269, this whiskey was aged entirely in French oak barrels on the fourth floor of Heaven Hill Warehouse W9. A total of 170 barrels were batched, and the whiskey is bottled at a cask strength of 109.2 proof. Each 700-milliliter bottle carries a suggested retail price of $130 and is expected to enter distribution in October 2026.
• Grain to Glass Extra-Aged 9-Year-Old Kentucky Straight Wheated Bourbon: As the oldest-ever whiskey in the Grain to Glass line, this bourbon was distilled in 2017 from a mash bill featuring Beck’s 6158. It entered the barrel at 125 proof and was aged for 9 years on the third, fourth, and fifth floors of Warehouse W3. The batch comes from 150 barrels and will be bottled at cask strength, though the final proof hasn’t yet been announced. Bottles are expected to hit shelves in December with an MSRP of $150.

As with prior Grain to Glass releases, corn varieties were selected by Heaven Hill master distiller Conor O’Driscoll and seed producer Beck’s Hybrids. All corn was grown in Nelson County, Kentucky, within miles of where Heaven Hill began operations in 1935. 

The new trio of wheated bourbons arrives amid Heaven Hill’s broader focus on wheat and its impact on whiskey.

Read more: Heaven Hill Releases Heritage Collection 22-Year Bourbon

ABOUT HEAVEN HILL DISTILLERY

Founded in Kentucky by the Shapira family in 1935, Heaven Hill Distillery continues its legacy as one of the foremost American Whiskey producers. Today, Heaven Hill Distillery maintains over 2 million barrels aging in more than 70 warehouses throughout Nelson and Jefferson Counties. For more information, please visit www.heavenhilldistillery.com.