The Story Behind Our Two Double Golds 🏅

This summer, two of our whiskeys took Double Gold at the 2026 SIP Awards: Bearproof Huckleberry Whiskey and Logan Pass American Single Malt. Two different whiskeys, two different styles, one competition.

Here's what that award actually means, and what went into each bottle.

Two Double Gold winners, one bundle. Pair Bearproof Huckleberry Whiskey with Logan Pass American Single Malt and taste what the judges did.

Who Judges the SIP Awards

Most spirits competitions are judged by industry insiders: bartenders, buyers, writers. The SIP Awards works the other way. Founded in 2009, it describes itself as a competition judged entirely by consumers, people who drink spirits because they like them, not because it's their job.

The tasting is double blind. The judges don't know who made what, and the people running the tasting don't tell them. Our whiskeys went up against everyone else's in their categories with no label, no backstory, and no Montana mystique to lean on. Judges score on aroma, taste, and finish. That's it.

What Double Gold Means

SIP medals run from Bronze up through Silver, Gold, Double Gold, and Platinum. By SIP's own description, Double Gold is reserved for spirits that consumer judges placed in the top percentile of their categories, strong enough to justify a recommendation.

Earning one is good. Earning two in the same year, with two very different whiskeys, tells us something about the whole lineup, not just one bottle.

Bearproof Huckleberry Whiskey: Years of Trials, One Wild Berry

Glacier country has one of the largest bear populations in the lower 48, and the bears have a weakness for huckleberries. So do we.

Bearproof starts with a single malt whiskey, barrel aged, and the whiskey itself took real work. It took many years of trials to land on a malt whiskey light and delicate enough to let huckleberry come through instead of getting buried. Too heavy and the fruit disappears. Too thin and you have a flavored spirit with no backbone.

Then there's the berry. There are several kinds of huckleberry, and we prefer the mountain huckleberry for its intense, tart flavor. The catch is that it only grows wild. It can't be farmed, which means we gather enough during the summer months to last the entire year. Over the winter, we macerate the fresh berries and blend the juice into the whiskey. No shortcuts, no added flavors, just whiskey and the fruit it's named for.

It bottles at 70 proof, so it's easy to sip, and it works as well in a lemonade cocktail or over ginger beer as it does on its own.

Logan Pass American Single Malt: Montana Barley, Start to Finish

Logan Pass is named for the highest point on Going-to-the-Sun Road, an alpine meadow of wildflowers and the occasional mountain goat. The whiskey is a single malt in the style people usually associate with Scotland, built from Montana.

The grain. 100% Montana Craft Malt 2-Row barley, malted in Butte. Nothing else goes into the mash bill.

The brewing. We made it in partnership with Flathead Lake Brewing, fermenting off the grain under controlled temperatures. In plain terms: the sweet liquid is separated from the grain before fermentation, which keeps the flavor clean and crisp and lets the honey and cereal notes of the barley come forward.

The barrels. Ex-rye whiskey barrels, aged a minimum of three years, with some components up to five years old in the blend.

The blend. Each batch is built from 15 to 20 barrels, selected by taste to hit the profile we're after, and limited to 300 gallons. That's small enough that no two batches are guaranteed to be identical, and it's the reason we blend by flavor, not by calendar.

The result, at 90 proof, is wildflower honey, gently toasted grain, and warming wood spice.

Why It Matters to Us

We're a small distillery in Coram, just outside the west entrance of Glacier National Park. When strangers pour your whiskey blind and pick it out of a crowd, that's feedback that counts, and it doesn't come from people who already know us.

Taste Both Side by Side

For October, we've put the two together in The Double Gold Sale: Bearproof and Logan Pass, bundled for $99. If you want to see what the judges saw, this is the easiest way to do it.

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About Glacier Distilling

Glacier Distilling is a small-batch craft distillery in Coram, Montana, just outside Glacier National Park. We make whiskey and spirits the Montana way—with local grains, real fruit, pure glacial water from the Northern Rockies, and a hands-on approach from start to finish. Every bottle is crafted right here in Coram, with a focus on where it comes from and what goes into it.

Come see us: Visit our tasting room near Glacier National Park to taste our spirits, enjoy a cocktail, and discover bottles you won’t always find anywhere else.

Shop online: Can’t make it to Montana? Select Glacier Distilling spirits are available to order online and ship to eligible states through our licensed partners at Big Thirst. Shop our Online Store >