Bahnbrëcker Releases Slow River Blend Hefeweizen-Style Whiskey

Central Texas is no stranger to craft distilling or craft beer. Brewers often age beers in liquor barrels and create beers with cocktail flavors but distillers rarely look to beer for new ideas. However, New Braunfels’ Bahnbrëcker is changing this by making a Hefeweizen-inspired whiskey. Slow River Blend is the first release for the distillery, which counts country star Randy Rogers as a co-founder.

Bahnbrëcker means “Trailblazer” in German, a tribute to the original settlers of New Braunfels. Most of the settlers came from the Rhineland-Palatinate region of southeast Germany in the 1840s. Slow River Blend draws on a southwest German tradition: the Bavarian Hefeweizen. Brewed for more than a thousand years, hefeweizen is a cloudy wheat beer with a unique clove, banana, and bubble gum flavor. It was one of the first popular styles in American craft brewing and is a Texas Oktoberfest staple.

For their spin on Hefeweizen flavor, Bahnbrëcker starts with Texas and midwestern straight wheat whiskeys. After landing on a blend, they macerate the whiskey with lemon peel and clove. The final product mixes notes of caramel and vanilla with a hint of clove and citrus. The quintessential New Braunfels summer activity of floating the Comal River also inspired the distillers to make the whiskey as smooth, easy-drinking, and unpretentious as possible. Slow River Blend can be enjoyed straight, on the rocks, or with a mixer. Made with real ingredients, the whiskey is also WONF (With Other Natural Flavors)-free. A 750mL bottle costs $37.99 on Bahnbrëcker’s website. You can also find Slow River Blend at bars, restaurants, and liquor stores across Texas.