Very Olde St. Nick Immaculata Is a Great New Bourbon

Welcome to Taste Test, where every week our critic Jonah Flicker explores the most buzzworthy and interesting whiskeys in the world. Check back each Sunday for his latest whiskey review.

There is bourbon, and then there is bourbon for the bourbon bros, the whiskey nerds, the—dare I say it—tater crowd. If you’re unfamiliar with that reference, congratulations, you’re much better off. But in bourbon circles, it’s a snotty term for someone who is constantly on the hunt for limited-edition, allocated releases, despite the fact that they might be overhyped and ridiculously priced. That’s kind of what I thought the new 2026 edition of Very Olde St. Nick Immaculata from Preservation Distillery might be, especially after seeing the praise heaped upon it from the eternally online whiskey world. As it turns out, it’s actually a fantastic bourbon that far surpassed my expectations.

The Very Olde St. Nick brand has been around since 1986, but Preservation Distillery was founded by Marci Palatella just over a decade ago in 2015. She has been in the whiskey industry since the early ’80s, and created VOSN as a brand focused on blending together well-aged, sourced stocks of whiskey. Over the years, there has been much speculation as to where the whiskey comes from, as we’ve covered before, with names like Stitzel-Weller, Diageo, and Willett all popping up as possible sources—but the distillery does not reveal this information. In the case of the 2026 release, the blend comes from 300 casks which are as follows: 10-year-old and 19-year-old bourbon, both of which were distilled at an unnamed distillery, and 8.5-year-old wheated bourbon distilled at Preservation on its pot stills. The exact proportions of the whiskeys were not revealed, although the oldest is probably used most sparingly, and the final blend was bottled at 118.2 proof.

This differs significantly from first VOSN release from 2023 (we reviewed it here), which did not contain any in-house produced whiskey. For those who are interested, according to a recent Whisky Advocate article the 18-year-old bourbon was previously used in a release called Notorious, and the in-house eight-year bourbon was released on its own in 2024 and appeared in the Christmas Dream blend in 2025. Another difference is that this new version of VOSN is just much, much better than the 2023 release. At a smidge over 118 proof, there’s some heat as you sip, but nothing that burns or overpowers, and the blend of these three clearly high-quality whiskeys has created something that is luxuriously rich and deep. There are notes of toasted nuts, dark roast espresso, crème brûlée, Maraschino cherry syrup, dried blueberries, pipe tobacco, and praline on the palate, and the finish lingers and tingles.

So the good news for the taters is that the 2026 Very Olde St. Nick is going to be hard to get ahold of—the first lot was initially released at the distillery with a price tag of $260, but I’m sure you’ll be able to find bottles for way more than that on the secondary market very soon. Future lots will be released in smaller amounts over the summer, so you can always wait until then to snag a bottle. The bottom line is that it might actually be worth it, depending on how much you’re willing to sacrifice in time and treasure for really good whiskey.

Score: 94