ABOUT · SUPERIOR WHISKEY
Three seats at the bar.
Every review starts with a work trip, a strange city, and one expensive pour.
Superior Whiskey is an independent whiskey review site run by three friends who travel for work. Every review begins the same way: land in a new city, find the best whiskey bar in walking distance, and order the pour you'd never talk yourself into at home. One of us tastes and scores it out of 100; all three of us argue about it before it's published.
AI-generated editorial illustrations of the bar, the pour and the ledger; not photographs of our team, its travels or tasting records.
THE THREE · ONE POUR PER CITY
Three travelers, three palates.
Pen names; real palates. The day jobs stay out of it.
Niall Connolly
THE ATLANTIC SEATdublin-born · ireland, scotland & europe
Believes single pot still is Ireland's greatest export and will produce a spreadsheet to prove it.
ROUTE·DUBLIN–EDINBURGH–LONDON
Everett Boone
THE AMERICAN SEATlouisville-raised · bourbon & rye
Works the American South and Midwest; mentions Louisville within the first ten minutes. Orders rye when nobody's watching.
ROUTE·LOUISVILLE–NASHVILLE–CHICAGO
Mae Sinclair
THE PACIFIC SEATpacific loop · japan, taiwan & the world
Found whisky through a Yamazaki highball in a Ginza basement bar and never looked back.
ROUTE·TOKYO–TAIPEI–SINGAPORE
HOW WE SCORE · THE LADDER
What a score means here.
one palate tastes · three argue · scored / 100
| Tier | Name | Note | Score | Price | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01 | The Unicorn Shelf95 – 100 / 100 | Order it. Cancel the meeting if you have to. | 95+SCORE | — | ORDER IT |
| 02 | Superior90 – 94 / 100 | The reason this site exists — we'd order it again at bar prices. | 90+SCORE | — | ORDER AGAIN |
| 03 | The Good Pour85 – 89 / 100 | Order with confidence; buy with a plan. | 85+SCORE | — | WITH A PLAN |
| 04 | House Pour80 – 84 / 100 | Fine. Nobody writes home. | 80+SCORE | — | IT'S FINE |
| 05 | Skip the Roundbelow 80 / 100 | We'll say so plainly — palates and wallets are on the line. | <80SCORE | — | SKIP |
COMING · THE SUPERIOR RATING
When all three of us taste it.
I
The bottles arrive
distillery-direct · two bottles
A distillery sends two bottles — one for three blind pours, one that stays sealed on file. Sending buys exactly nothing but three honest opinions.
STEP ONE
II
Three blind tastings
independent · no group chat
Each of us tastes and scores it alone. Nobody sees a number until all three are in.
STEP TWO
III
One rating
three scores, averaged
The average becomes the Superior Rating — a badge that outranks any individual review.
STEP THREE
IV
The rule
no previews · no edits
No distillery sees a score before you do. Retailers never touch a number.
HOUSE LAW
TRANSPARENCY · THE FINE PRINT
How the lights stay on.
Affiliates
rel=sponsored · always labeled
When you buy through our links we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. It pays for the pours — it never touches a score.
Samples
we buy our pours
Reviews come from bottles and bars we paid for. Distilleries are welcome to send theirs — two bottles, please: one for the blind pours, one sealed for the record. They get the Superior Rating treatment, and the page says so.
Anonymity
pen names · real palates
Niall, Everett and Mae are pen names. The tasting notes, receipts and arguments are real; the day jobs stay out of it.
Scores
100-point · panel-argued
Every score survives an argument with two other palates before it's published. The byline tells you whose pour it was.
THE ORIGIN STORY
The group chat became a ledger.
Three friends travel for work. Different industries, different routes, same ritual: land in a new city, drop the bags, and find the best whiskey bar in walking distance. Order the pour you'd never talk yourself into at home. Score it out of 100. Then defend that score to the other two, who weren't there and have opinions.
The group chat became a ledger. The ledger became an argument. The argument became Superior Whiskey. Someday distilleries will send us bottles and all three of us will score them blind — until then, every review is one seat's verdict, argued into shape by the other two.
— Niall, Everett & Mae
i.Why are you anonymous?
Day jobs. Niall, Everett and Mae are pen names; the tasting notes, receipts and arguments are real. The whiskey doesn't care what our business cards say.
ii.Do distilleries pay you?
No. We buy our own pours and bottles. If a distillery sends one, it gets the three-palate Superior Rating treatment and the page says so. Affiliate links pay the bills — never the scores.
iii.What does a 92 actually mean?
One of us tasted it, scored it out of 100, and defended that number to two skeptics before it was published. Anything 90 or above means all three of us would order it again at bar prices.
iv.How can I trust one person's palate?
You can't — that's the point of the panel. Every score survives an argument with the other two seats, and the byline always tells you whose pour it was.