The story behind Big Blaze Bourbon is as remarkable as what's inside the bottle
Most award-winning bourbons come with a backstory about heritage, family recipes, or some remote grain source. Big Blaze Bourbon from Denver-based Locke + Co. Distillery comes with something entirely different — the charred remnants of one of the most destructive wildfires in Colorado history.
Image credit: Locke + Co.
The second release of this limited-edition bourbon just picked up two of the most respected honors in the spirits world: a Double Gold at the 2026 Denver International Spirits Competition and a Gold medal at the 2026 Ascot Awards. The Double Gold didn't come easy — it required a unanimous score from a blind-judging panel of industry professionals, meaning every single judge tasted it without knowing what it was and still gave it top marks.
That's a serious achievement for any distillery. For a small-batch operation in Denver that's finishing its whiskey with wood sourced from a burned-out stretch of the Rocky Mountains, it's something else entirely.
What the East Troublesome Fire Left Behind
To understand what makes this bourbon different, you have to go back to October 14, 2020. That's the day the East Troublesome Fire ignited in the central Rocky Mountains of Grand County, Colorado. Pushed by extreme winds, it didn't grow slowly — it exploded. Within a short period, what started as a manageable blaze tore into a 10,000-acre inferno that pushed into Grand Lake and ultimately reached Rocky Mountain National Park.
By the time snow, rain, and the efforts of firefighters finally brought it under control later that month, the East Troublesome Fire had scorched more than 193,000 acres and destroyed over 400 homes. It is now the second-largest wildfire in Colorado history.
The land it left behind was covered in the charred remains of aspen trees — the kind of tall, white-barked trees that light up gold every fall across the Colorado high country. Most people would see that as nothing but loss. Locke + Co. saw something worth saving.
Five Years in the Making
Big Blaze Bourbon starts with a base spirit aged for more than five years in new American oak barrels. That alone puts it in respectable company — five-plus years of aging is not something most small producers do with limited-edition releases. But what sets it apart is the finishing process.
After those years in oak, the bourbon is finished using aspen wood discs sourced directly from the East Troublesome Fire area. The aspen used isn't just any wood — it comes from the actual burn zone, pulled from land that was reshaped by that October 2020 catastrophe. The wood is hand-charred before being used, a process that draws out specific flavors and gives the spirit its distinctive character.
Locke + Co. describes their philosophy as creating "A Taste Like None Other™," and the tasting notes on Big Blaze Bourbon support that claim without any stretch of the imagination.
What's Actually in the Glass
At 95 proof (47.5% ABV), this isn't a shy bourbon. But the way it's built, it doesn't drink like something trying to knock you over.
On the nose, it leads with honey and vanilla — familiar, inviting territory for anyone who drinks bourbon regularly. But spend a little more time with it and the profile opens up with dried berries, maple syrup, walnuts, cherry toffee, toasted caramel, and something that reads like crème brûlée alongside a brightness of ripe nectarine. It's a layered aroma that rewards patience.
On the palate, the chocolate-forward richness hits first, followed by smooth maple. Then the spice comes in — cinnamon, white pepper, and a touch of orange peel that keeps the whole experience from feeling heavy. It's balanced in the way that well-made bourbons are, where nothing feels out of place or forced.
The finish is where Big Blaze earns its keep. Caramel and black pepper lead the way, layered with toffee and light brown sugar, and a trail of cinnamon that sticks around well after the glass is empty. That kind of long, lingering finish is what separates a serious bourbon from something that just tastes good for a moment and disappears.
At a suggested retail price of $58.99 a bottle, it sits in the range where you're paying for quality without being asked to treat it like a museum piece.
The Money Goes Somewhere That Matters
Ten percent of every bottle of Big Blaze Bourbon sold goes directly to the Grand Fire Protection District No. 1 — the organization that represents the firefighters and first responders of Grand County who put their lives on the line to fight the East Troublesome Fire.
This isn't a one-time donation or a vague pledge to some general charitable fund. It's tied directly to every sale, which means every person who buys a bottle is contributing to the people who did the actual work of containing that fire. For anyone who lived through that October in Colorado, or who has family out there, or who simply respects what wildland firefighters do, that's a meaningful distinction.
Big Blaze Bourbon is one of several limited-edition releases Locke + Co. has put out in recent years, all of them tied to supporting the local community in concrete ways. This one, given the scale of the fire it's connected to and the recognition it's now received on the national competition circuit, is the most visible yet.
Who Locke + Co. Actually Is
Locke + Co. Distilling is a Denver operation built by sixth-generation Coloradans. That's not a marketing line — it means the people making this whiskey have family roots in Colorado that go back generations, and they're drawing on traditions and methods that didn't come from a textbook or a corporate playbook.
Their approach to whiskey is built around small-barrel aging and the use of hand-charred aspen wood, which is unusual in American whiskey production. Most distilleries in this country are working with oak — white oak in particular — and the aspen finishing adds a regional character that you genuinely can't replicate anywhere else. Aspen doesn't grow in Kentucky. It grows here, in the high country, and it leaves a mark on the spirit that's specific to this place.
The distillery's stated philosophy is that good whiskey should feel at home anywhere — around a campfire or at a fine dining table. That's a modest way of putting it, but the competition results suggest they're doing something right.
Where to Find It
Big Blaze Bourbon is available now at select bars, restaurants, and liquor stores across Colorado, and it ships to 48 states through the Locke + Co. online store. Given that it's a limited-edition release and it just won Double Gold at one of the country's top spirits competitions, availability isn't going to last forever.
For anyone looking for a bourbon with a real story behind it — not a manufactured one dreamed up by a marketing department, but an actual story about real land, real fire, and real people — Big Blaze Bourbon is worth tracking down. The judges who tasted it blind already made their call. Now it's everyone else's turn.
