Garnheath 28 Year Old

1986 vintage single cask of the rare single grain whisky distilled at the closed Moffat distilling complex. Garnheath 28 Year Old 1986 vintage Lowland single grain Scotch whisky. Distilled at the Moffat distilling complex in Airdrie which closed in 1986. Matured in a single bourbon cask #22156 bottled 2015 by The Vintage Malt Whisky Co. for the Cooper’s Choice series. 410 bottles.

GARNHEATH SINGLE GRAIN WHISKY

The site of Moffat paper mills in Airdrie was converted into the Moffat whisky complex in 1965 by Inver House Distillers. The complex comprised three different sets of stills including Garnheath equipped with five column stills which produced grain spirit. The complex also included a maltings which contemporarily was the largest in Europe. Garnheath Distillery closed in 1986 and was demolished in 1988. Occasionally independent bottlings of single cask Garnheath grain whisky are released, most recently in the Cooper’s Choice and Carn Mor ranges.

Shop £490.16

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 234: Strathmill 10 Year Old 2007 The Ultimate

Mark Dermul, Belgian whisky blogger, tries a Strathmill. Did you know that Strathmill only got that name in 1994? Before that, she was called Glenisla-Glenlivet named after the Isla river nearby. But two decades ago she was renamed Strathmill in honor of the mill that was built there in 1823. There are hardly any official releases, because the lion’s share of production goes to the blenders with Justerini & Brooks as biggest customer. Mark, however, tries a very young independent Strathmill 2007 from the Dutch company Van Wees in their series ‘The Ultimate’.

https://youtu.be/s9itQGATUtM

RAASAY DISTILLERY PREVIEWS FIRST RAASAY SINGLE MALT AT NATIONAL WHISKY FESTIVAL AND BEGINS TAKING PRE-ORDERS

Attendees at The National Whisky Festival in Glasgow will be among the first in the world to preview the Isle of Raasay Single Malt Scotch Whisky during Head Distiller Iain Robertson’s Whisky Masterclass on Saturday 26th January.

Festival-goers will also be given an exclusive opportunity to reserve one of the first bottles of Isle of Raasay Single Malt in Scotch whisky history. Pre-orders for the first Raasay Single Malt will then be available on general release on www.raasaydistillery.com from 14th February.

At the exclusive ‘Whisky Masterclass’, Raasay’s Head Distiller Iain Robertson will showcase the new-make spirit alongside cask samples from Raasay. Iain Robertson will conduct tastings of five different drams from specially selected rye, virgin oak and Bordeaux casks, exploring the blending, balance and finish that will characterise the first Isle of Raasay Distillery Scotch Whisky due to be released in 2020.

Visitors to the Raasay Distillery stand will also be able to sample Raasay While We Wait’s 2018 Release – a peaty yet fruity whisky that was created to represent the flavour profile of the future Raasay Single Malt. This is the fourth expression of the independent bottling launched in 2018 to mark one year since production began at Raasay Distillery and to kick-start the two-year countdown to the first bottling of Raasay whisky.

The National Whisky Festival will take place in the iconic SWG3 venue in Glasgow’s Kelvinhaugh as part of the largest winter music festival of its kind: Celtic Connections. Music has played a significant part in Raasay Distillery festivities since the Isle of Skye pipe band first welcomed guests at the 2017 grand opening, and since then as part of the regular ‘Raasay Tunes’ events, which celebrate a wealth of musical talent. The star line-up for Raasay Tunes in 2019 will also be revealed at the event in Glasgow.

Raasay Distillery is owned by independent Scottish whisky company R&B Distillers, which will also be showcasing its heritage brand The Tweeddale at The National Whisky Festival. Brand Ambassador Chris Hoban will be telling the story of the rebirth of the Tweeddale Blend with guests able to sample the 28-year-old Tweeddale: The Evolution and Tweeddale Grain of Truth Single Grain. Chris will also host a live blending session with a selection of Highland single malt and grain whisky, with a chance for guests to try the whisky blended during the class.

NOTES

Raasay Distillery will be at Stand 25 in the Galvanizers Hall at The National Whisky Festival at Celtic Connections.

Tickets to The National Whisky Festival are priced at £37 and available to purchase on the website: www.nationalwhiskyfestival.scot

Places at R&B Distillers’ tasting events are limited with places allocated on a first-come, first-served basis. Tickets for the tasting events will be announced on the National Whisky Festival Facebook page.

ISLE OF RAASAY DISTILLERY Isle of Raasay Distillery opened in September 2017 and became the first “legal” distillery on the beautiful Hebridean island. Co-founded by Scottish entrepreneurs Bill Dobbie and Alasdair Day, Raasay Distillery is designed to produce a contemporary Scottish island malt and catapult Raasay into the global market as Scotland’s newest whisky producing island. Raasay Distillery is proud to be one of the few 100% Scottish-owned Scotch whisky businesses in Scotland. On the site of the Victorian-era Borodale House, formerly the Isle of Raasay Hotel, is a state-of-the-art modern distillery, offering year- round tours and luxury accommodation, with, arguably, the best view of any distillery in Scotland. The distillery has since received Five-Star Visitor Attraction rating and Four-Star Accommodation rating from VisitScotland for the visitor centre and accommodation respectively. Isle of Raasay Single Malt will be lightly peated and fruity, utilising the best of the island’s natural elements and reflecting Raasay’s rugged natural beauty. Raasay Distillery uses water from an ancient Celtic well located behind Borodale House at every stage of production, from mashing to fermentation, cask reduction and reduction to bottling strength, ensuring that natural flavours are retained in the final whisky.

Working with local crofters, Raasay Distillery has successfully grown and harvested barley in a nearby field, the first time that barley has been grown on Raasay in over 40 years. In August 2018, the team successfully produced spirit from the 2017 batch of Raasay barley crop, which will mature into the first ever single malt produced from Raasay-grown barley in 2021. Raasay While We Wait is an independently bottled single malt – which has been crafted as an accurate preview of Raasay Distillery’s future core style. Designed as a peaty and fruity single malt, each iteration of Raasay While We Wait has been crafted through the vatting of two malts from a single Highland distillery – heavily peated at 45ppm and unpeated – matured in bourbon barrels and finished in Tuscan Montechiari wine casks.

Raasay Distillery, Borodale House, Isle of Raasay, Kyle IV40 8PB
raasaydistillery.com Instagram/ Facebook: @raasaydistillery, Twitter: @RaasayWhisky

 January 2019 Auction

is now LIVE!
Take a look at some of the incredible lots on offer this month.

Ardbeg Kingsbury

Kingsbury are Japan’s most sought after independent bottler. They were founded in 1989 by Eaglesome, the high-end deli in Campbeltown that was purchased by J & A Mitchell & Co of Springbank distillery, and turned into one of the region’s finest whisky merchants.

Hanyu Card Series

In 2015 Ichiro Akuto released the first four cards of his now widely sought after series. Now, 14 years later, there are 58 different expressions (13 of each suit, 2 jokers and a second edition of the first four released). This month we are delighted to feature a great selection of the popular collection.

Macallan Fine and Rare

Full of fantastic examples of old Macallan, the Fine and Rare series of whiskies was designed to represent the very best vintages that Macallan had to offer, dating back as far as 1926.

American Whiskey

The world of American Whiskey holds a vast array of spirits to explore with seemingly endless variety – from bourbon and rye to malt, corn and Tennessee whiskey.  The vintage, rare and old whiskies from America are truly a product of their time, more often than not holding a direct connection to historical events at the time.

Tullamore Private Stock circa 1950 / Daly’s

A fascinating piece of Irish whiskey heritage, this is a late 1950s / early 1960s bottling of Tullamore which will have been produced entirely at the original Daly’s distillery in County Offaly.

GlenDronach 26 Year Old 1992 Twin Sherry Butts

New & Exclusive GlenDronach 26 Year Old 1992

We’re delighted to be bringing you two more single cask expressions of sherry matured Highland malt whisky from GlenDronach distillery. Exclusive to customers of The Whisky Barrel. This time two sherry butts.

GlenDronach 1992 Sherry Butt #179
&
GlenDronach 1992 Sherry Butt #180

HOW TO ORDER

We appreciate the high demand for GlenDronach, especially single cask vintages.

SALES START

MONDAY 28 January 2019
5-AM EDT / 6-PM HKT / 10-AM GMT

As an existing TWB customer, we will email you a link to the product page at this time before the product is visible across the website.

On Sale – MONDAY 28 January 2019

We’re encouraging you to quench your thirst for knowledge and explore new experiences this month as you delve into our colourful collection of single casks. We’ve released five preview bottlings to whet your appetite ahead of our February Outturn. Only a limited number of bottles are available now, with the full Outturn coming your way on Friday, 1 February at 9am. Order now before they’re gone

BOTTLINGS

The Scotch Malt Whisky Society, The Vaults, 87 Giles Street, Leith EH6 6BZ

Contact: sales@smws.com or call 0131 555 2929 (Mon-Fri 9am-4.45pm). Visit the Society at here for membership information

This is your chance to join and to take advantage of their great offers!

Spot the SMWS bottles in this amusing You Tube video

Welcome to this weeks episode of the show, in which I’ll be looking at a selection of bottlings by Gordon & MacPhail.

https://youtu.be/A8HcSFDA1c0

Havin a chat aboot my favourite drink …

Half dozing off at the King James (Christies pub in Perth) these points came up when doing my best to get some whisky virgins to commence their long career with the water of life. When you drink whisky, why do you only fill up a little bit in a glass? why not fill it up?  Whisky is strong, some will burn your mouth and throat, this can ruin the experience and wreck and numb your taste buds to the point you don’t want any more whisky, ever. Grand whiskies, aged drams and expensive drams maybe best enjoyed by pouring 1 or 2 drops of water  to “open it up” – to cut the alcohol enough to let the drinker appreciate the excellence of the craft that is whisky making. Not distilling you hear, but making! Distilling is just one small step in the craft art of delivering a whisky. Like art, a whisky in a glass is in the eye (and mooth) of the beholder. Let the whole whisky experience blend, experiment what works for you. A cheap blend whisky might be great for adding ice and making cocktails, but an expensive dram doesn’t deserve to be treated like any old cocktail mixer. Give it respect. If you want to just get drunk, then donder down to the pub and have a few shots of crap liquid enjoyed by the mass of younger idiots every Friday and Saturday nights.

Is the Glencairn glass the best way to enjoy a whisky? How often have you heard “it must be in the right glass”? Personally, that is pish, I am happy extracting a dram from any container, a Glencairn or a mug for tea. By adding a few drops of water you can open up different flavours that you previously had not found. Specially true when enjoying cask strength that have higher alcohol levels (can be over 60% ABV although illegal in Norway). With cask strength whisky the alcohol and burning in your mouth can overpower even the flavours. By adding water, this dilutes the alcohol and reduces its effect, giving the flavours a chance to come oot. Ice is slightly different. Rather than bringing out flavours, the ice makes the temperature drop rapidly. The aromas and taste will only start to open up and reveal their characteristics once the whisky starts to warm up to room temperature. Do you have all night?

On a bottle of whisky and the label says “non-chill filtered.” What does that mean?  it means your whisky may turn cloudy  if served on ‘the’ rocks. Chill filtering is a step most distillers take to remove chemical compounds such as esters, proteins and acids produced during fermentation and maturation. Whisky bottled at a typical alcohol content of less than 46 per cent will become cloudy if subsequently chilled, either during transport or in the presence of ice. In chill filtering, whisky is cooled to between -10° and 4° Celsius and passed through a fine adsorption filter. This is done mostly for cosmetic reasons – to remove cloudiness – rather than to improve taste or consistency, and tell me if I am wrong here, mostly this affects to USA market and drinkers. Hey guys, there is nothing wrong with a cloudy whisky. Get over it, try a stone in the dram maybe, or just learn the art of dramming like in Scotland.

Breaking a cork –  you pull out the cap of a whisky to find a handful of wood or plastic topper, while the cork remains wedged in the neck of the bottle?  What do I do?  carefully use a corkscrew to remove the cork, just like with a bottle of wine, if the cork falls into the bottle get another empty bottle or jug, with a sieve pour the whisky out into the empty vessel, then clean your original container and pour the liquid back into the original bottle. One wee tip from myself; when you finish a bottle of whisky that has had a cork, keep the cork top just in case!

DRINKING WHISKY is a pleasure not to be missed. But – so often have folks said to me “it burned my mouth, it taste horrible”, well, all I can say is, either you are not drinking it correctly, or – you havnee found the right whisky for you yet. There are so many whisky snobs out there, my advice, take your time, sample as many as you can – not all on the same day – find the one that suits your taste. Me? To all my Scottish friends and contacts in the whisky industry, I am NOT sorry, my drink of choice at the bar is Bushmills Black Bush, easy to drink, doesnee burn and is light, no peat. Aye but that doesnee mean I don’t drink other drams by the way. I do tend to stay away from cheap shite blended rubbish, that’s only good for cocktails, mixing with coke and for Campbells.

A personal blether from Paul McLean. www.whiskytours.scot

BUFFALO TRACE DISTILLERY BREAKS ANOTHER

RECORD FOR VISITATION

More than 230,000 Guests Visited Historic Distillery in 2018 

FRANKFORT, Franklin County, Ky (Jan. 22, 2019) – Buffalo Trace Distillery continues to see exceptional tourism growth, setting new records for visitation year over year. The Distillery ended 2018 having welcomed a record-breaking 231,523 visitors during the calendar year. This is a 15 percent increase in visitation over the previous year, and a 345 percent increase since 2010.

            This rapid increase in tourism is on trend with growing bourbon sales and is why the National Historic Landmark distillery is in the midst of a $1.2 billion investment to expand its distilling and aging capabilities, and again expand its visitor center to accommodate an increasing number of guests.

            “It’s exciting to be growing in all aspects, we are thrilled that so many people took their time to come and see our team at work” Meredith Moody, director of Homeplace development said. “Our growth in visitation has allowed us to expand our tour offerings to six different complimentary tours, and offer our guests a unique look at the Distillery with each visit. Having just completed an expansion of our Visitor Center in 2015, we are looking forward to again expanding our tour capabilities to accommodate even more guests as we continue to grow.”

            Planning is underway now for the second expansion of the Visitor Center. The Distillery anticipates construction to begin by this fall.

Also part of its Distillery expansion, Buffalo Trace just finished replacing its 1951 boiler, and will soon begin adding 12 additional fermenters and replacing the mash cookers. In order to make room, the existing bottling hall is in the process of moving to another area on site where the bottling lines will be modernized to allow for more efficiency and better capacity.

The Distillery is also building 22 new barrel warehouses on the farm it owns adjacent to the Distillery at a rate of one new warehouse every four months. Each warehouse will hold 58,800 barrels.

This is all part of the first large scale structural expansion at Buffalo Trace Distillery’s campus since the 1950s.

About Buffalo Trace Distillery

Buffalo Trace Distillery is an American family-owned company based in Frankfort, Franklin County, Kentucky. The Distillery’s rich tradition dates back to 1773 and includes such legends as E.H. Taylor, Jr., George T. Stagg, Albert B. Blanton, Orville Schupp, and Elmer T. Lee.  Buffalo Trace Distillery is a fully operational Distillery producing bourbon, rye and vodka on site and is a National Historic Landmark as well as is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The Distillery has won 21 distillery titles since 2000 from such notable publications as Whisky Magazine, Whisky Advocate Magazine and Wine Enthusiast Magazine. Its Col. E. H. Taylor, Jr. Four Grain Bourbon was named World Whiskey of the Year by “Jim Murray’s Whiskey Bible 2018.”  Buffalo Trace Distillery has also garnered more than 500 awards for its wide range of premium whiskies. To learn more about Buffalo Trace Distillery visit www.buffalotracedistillery.com.