What we’re drinking: Garrison Brothers 2025 Cowboy Bourbon and Sonora
Where it’s from: Launched in 2006 by Dan and Nancy Garrison, Texas-based Garrison Brothers is the first and oldest legal whiskey distillery in Texas. Every drop of their whiskey is made from Texas-grown grain and proofed with Hill Country rainwater.
Why we’re drinking these: Garrison Brothers whiskeys consistently end up as some of my favorite whiskeys of the year. These are bold, heavily-proofed bottles that often feature inventive barrel maturations. And these expressions also tend to win a ton of awards (one recent example is GB’s annual Cowboy release, which won Best Whiskey at the 2025 Los Angeles Invitational Spirits Challenge).
“Our goal was always to make the best bourbon, and we just happen to be in Texas,” says Master Distiller Donnis Todd, who is celebrating his 18th year at the distillery this month. “And we wanted to make our own and not buy someone else’s juice.”
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The Lone Star State is making some really good stuff, and these pros agreeMaking whiskey in Texas presents some interesting opportunities and challenges. Because of the extreme weather, the distillery claims to lose up to 40% of the original liquid that entered their barrels from evaporation (AKA the angel’s share). For reference, in Kentucky, that’d be closer to 15%. They use only local grains (74% food-grade white corn, 15% red winter wheat, 11% malted barley), a proprietary yeast and, in a more traditional sense, a 100-gallon hand-run copper pot still originally built for Wild Turkey.
“We have nuances,” Todd says. “Terroir, a unique mash bill, our location, barrel char levels, how we store the barrels. Every distillery is a bit different, and this isn’t just us against Kentucky — it’s even a little different in distilleries within Texas. Our goal is to make a huge flavor bomb of a wheated bourbon.”
Everything’s bigger in Texas, right? Let’s dig in.
How they taste: An annual release, the 11th edition of Cowboy is bottled at cask strength (146.4 proof) and aged for six years. Crafted from barrels hand-selected by Todd, this dark amber bourbon is full of cinnamon, clove, pecans, oak spice, dried cherries and marshmallow. I found last year’s edition to essentially be pecan pie in a bottle. This one is a little more expansive and no less delicious.
Debuting last October, Sonora (crafted with the help of distillery team member Samantha Olvera) is a seven-year-old bourbon finished in rye whiskey barrels for the final three years and modestly-proofed (54% ABV). “Ryes are like yo-yos, they’re up and down,” Todd says. “We wanted to push the flavor profile here.” Amazingly, for a whiskey that has no actual rye in its mash bill, this tastes very much like a rye-heavy bourbon, with the bourbon sweetness tempered by dill, toasted rye and almonds.
Fun fact: Garrison Brothers has nine main expressions, and if you dig around, you’ll find some unique bottles (and a few limited-editions that might be harder to find). Honeydew is a bourbon infused with Burleson’s Texas Wildflower Honey. Guadalupe has a second maturation in ex-Port barrels. And Laguna Madre is aged eight years in American oak with a finish in French Limousin oak.
Where to buy: There are only 10,000 bottles of Cowboy available nationwide, so if you find one, it’s worth the $240. Sonora is available nationwide for $160 and limited to 6,000 bottles.
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