Review: Elijah Craig Small Batch PGA Championship Edition (Updated 2026)

Elijah Craig sure loves golf — or rather, getting people to drink while they’re playing or watching golf. Anything to liven things up, amirite?

In 2024 the brand launched its second golf-inspired limited release as a follow-up to its recent Ryder Cup edition. By 2026, Elijah Craig PGA Edition had expanded to a second edition. And here’s the shocker: It turns out these are not just novelty whiskeys to give your dad for Christmas, they’re well-designed spirits that are, shockingly, available for a song.

We presume more are coming, and we’ll cover each one in turn here.

Elijah Craig Small Batch 2024 PGA Championship Edition Review

Now this is what I call a gimmick: This limited release was made with barrels from rickhouse P (25%), 1G (61%) and A (14%). P-G-A. Get it? You got it! That’s the catch, so let’s see where it takes us. Slightly grassy on the nose — intentional? — with a stronger spice bill than usual, predominantly featuring cloves and powdered ginger. Soothing brown sugar notes open up with some airtime, but it takes a while to get there.

The palate is warming but not hot, offering an immediate slug of bright cherry fruit, backed up by plenty of wood. Black pepper come into focus in time, giving the brown sugar notes at the core of the spirit some oomph. More toasty oak on the finish, followed finally by a spoonful of crunchy peanut butter and a touch more clove. Well-rounded but not overwhelmingly complex, this is a fine, versatile bourbon at a surprisingly affordable price — gimmick or no. 94 proof. A- / $37 [BUY IT NOW FROM FROOTBAT]

Elijah Craig Small Batch 2026 PGA Championship Edition Review

A much different whiskey, with a far higher proof and drawn from different rickhouses: Heaven Hill Distillery’s N and S rickhouses, honoring the Championship’s 108th edition (with its 108 proof) and its return to Aronimink Golf Club in Newtown Square, Pennsylvania. (Hence, N and S.)

A bold chocolate character kicks things off on the nose, with layers of cinnamon giving the aromatics a Mexican chocolate quality. A light green herb character and more baking spices, particularly ginger, build from there, the more forceful abv finally showing its face, at least for a moment.

The chocolate is entirely dominant on the palate — I don’t know that I’ve tasted anything quite this expressive of cocoa in recent memory. It is, however, surprisingly tame on the tongue, the 54% abv not really making the impact telegraphed by the nose. Perhaps all that chocolate sauce has an appropriately tempering effect, the whiskey fading into wholly complementary notes of vanilla, more cinnamon, and crumbled graham crackers. The baking spice gets a bit hotter as the finish heats up, but things never spiral into anything unapproachable; this is a whiskey designed for sipping on the golf course, after all. Gentle touches of cedar wood and fresh tobacco — both wholly golf-appropriate, by the way — linger on a tidy but immersive finish. Like the 2024, this is a great value offering. 108 proof. A- / $38

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