We know from other sources that Westland is experimenting with local Pacific Northwest (USA) peat, but that the core range Peated expression uses already-peated malt imported from the Eastern Highlands of Scotland. That peated malt is distilled (together or separately, I can’t tell) along with Westland’s standard “5-malt” blend of Washington Select Pale Malt, Munich Malt…
Here’s something I didn’t expect to find on the shelves in 2020: A 14 year-old single malt with a cognac cask finish for $40. What is this, 2012? In the arms race that is the modern whisky industry, it’s actually pretty surprising that it took this long for someone to crack out a brandy finish. We’ve seen everything from…
In the UK and other markets this NAS Tomatin expression is sold as “Tomatin Legacy” while in the US it’s sold as “Tomatin Dualchas”, which is the Scots Gaelic word for ‘heritage’ or ‘legacy’. This bottling, whatever its name, is the NAS (no-age-statement) entry-level bottling from the Tomatin distillery in the village of Tomatin in the Scottish Highlands … is vatted from Tomatin single malt aged in a combination of ex-bourbon and virgin (new) American oak casks. The virgin oak is intended to give the under-matured malt component an extra dose of …
Westland’s meticulously-sourced sherry casks are shipped whole (rather than broken down into staves and re-coopered, which is how most whisky producers handle them) to the States and then filled with the same five-malt blend as the American Oak release. The distillery uses both ex-Oloroso and ex-PX sherry casks, and blends the resulting full-term sherry-matured malt whiskey with…
This Aberlour is aged in two separate cask types: “Traditional Oak” which is a funny way of saying ex-bourbon American Oak casks, and ex-Sherry casks. These are aged for 12 years and then married together in undisclosed proportions before bottling at the legal minimum 40% ABV. Interestingly, all of Aberlour’s official lineup is now labelled as a “Double Cask” whisky with the exception of a’bunadh. This may be their way of dealing with the expanding crisis of…
An undisclosed Speyside distillery referred to only as “Speyside #3”, this is an 8 year-old Speyside single malt bottled at 50.7% ABV. A fellow Twitterer… Tweeter?… suggested that it might be ex-bourbon Glenrothes. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Nothing will teach you how little you really know about whisky than tasting blind or semi-blind. In hindsight it almost definitely is…
Westland does a few things differently, and the results are right in the glass. First, it’s not just “malted barley” like 99% of single-malt scotch. Westland uses a blend of 5 different barley malts: Washington Select Pale Malt, Munich Malt, Extra Special Malt, Pale Chocolate Malt, and…
Most of Caol Ila’s output is peated and most of it (95%!) ends up in various blends, as it’s the go-to standard for adding smoke to blended malts these days because of its inherent softness and willingness to play with others. This being a Diageo malt, there is essentially no information online. It’s clearly been aged in ex-bourbon casks for its 18 years of maturation, but…
This limited edition malt was distilled in 2003 in one of Glen Scotia’s heavily-peated batches and bottled in 2019 to celebrate the annual Campbeltown Malts Festival. The 15 year-old malt was finished for 8 months in Guyana demerara rum casks (it was matured in refill ex-bourbon American oak) and bottled without added color or chill-filtration at a cask strength of 51.3% ABV, which is fairly low…
Both Glengoyne 12-year and 10-year appear to be on the US market at the same time, which is a little odd. Usually distilleries stick to one of the classic “flagship” ages. The 12 retails for $10-$15 more than the 10, and my review of the 12 shows that I appreciated that one as budget sherry bomb. This 10 year-old (which is the only one of the two I can find near me) is the same bottling strength (43%), also has no added coloring, and also…