Kensington Wine Market -

Blog

Day 24 of the 2019 KWM Whisky Calendar - Kilchoman Alberta Single Cask Madeira Finish

Posted on December 7, 2021

by Evan

We have made it to the penultimate door of the 2019 KWM Whisky Calendar! Looking back at the recent few years' calendars, tradition seems to dictate that this will be something bold and peaty, and possibly from Kilchoman... The 2019 Calendar marks three years in a row with a Kilchoman Single Cask as the bottle behind the twenty-fourth door. This time, however, it is not a Kensington Wine Market Single Cask. We already had that bottle back on day three. Today's bottle is a single cask Kilchoman selected by the gentleman that imports all those great bottles from the Islay distillery into Alberta. His name is Andy Dunn, his company is Gold Medal Marketing, and his single cask is the Kilchoman Alberta Single Cask Madeira Finish.

Andy Dunn has been passionate about whisky for a long time, and his company has been responsible for spreading that passion in Alberta for nearly two decades. He introduced many of us to the likes of Kilchoman, and Springbank, and Cadenhead, and Benromach, and Tullibardine, and the list goes on, and on, and on.

Over the past few years, Andy and Gold Medal Marketing have sourced a few single casks from companies that the import, including Kilchoman, Springbank, and Gordon & MacPhail. Andy has a thing for wine as well as whisky, and imports some of that stuff as well. His fondness for fermented grape juice sometimes shows in his cask selection. His Longrow 17 Year Old that he had bottled for Alberta spent half of its life in an ex-Chardonnay Cask. This is the second bottling of Kilchoman he has sourced in the past two years, the previous bottle being and ex-Red Wine Cask finish. This Kilchoman we are going to taste today spent time in a Madeira Wine cask.

What exactly is Madeira? It is a type of fortified wine, made exclusively on the island of Madeira. The island is Portuguese and lies in the Atlantic, southwest of Portugal and near directly west of Morocco, though it is about 800 to 1000KM away from either coast. Historically, the island of Madeira was an important stop on many shipping routes between Africa, Europe, and England. Ships that stopped here would load some Madeira wine, which is fortified, but also intentionally oxidized and cooked in the island's warm climate during its ageing process.

Madeira wine ranges from sweet to bone dry in style, and because of how it is oxidized and essentially cooked during ageing, it can last a tremendously long time in the bottle. Some bottles have been shown to last well over a century. During the 1700 and 1800s, this made it the wine ideal for ship travel compared to other wine styles since it was already oxidized and cooked. Other wines had difficulty surviving the long voyages and extreme changes in weather, but this would not have much effect on the Madeira wine.

To recap: Here we have a young, heavily peated Single M...

Continue Reading →

Day 23 of the 2019 KWM Whisky Calendar - Glenfarclas 21 Year Old

Posted on December 1, 2021

by Evan

Here were are, it is finally Christmas Eve... Eve! The end is nigh! Only two more doors to open before we get to that special 100ml bottle! Oh, and Christmas Day. I guess. My kids seem to believe that the day itself is more important than that SMWS bottle, so I suppose I should humour them. They aren't old enough to know any better, not by decades.

I am rambling here already, looking to fill this void with words and witticisms without getting to the heart of the matter: day twenty-three's whisky. Why, you ask? Because what more can be said about Glenfarclas Distillery? I am at a loss, so let's leave it at a quick run-down, or Cliff Notes version, for this part:

Officially founded in 1836, though there were certainly illicit stills in operation around the property prior to this.

John and George Grant bought the distillery in 1865, for a sum ofÂ Â£511.19s.0d.

The Grant line continues to own the distillery to this day, with a now six-generation succession of John's and George's at the head of the company, aptly named J & G Grant.

Both the family and the distillery seem to have a thing, and a knack for, ageing their Single Malt Scotch Whisky in ex-Sherry casks. It is what Glenfarclas is known for.

But that is just part of a greater whole for what makes Glenfarclas a distillery deserving of our love and devotion is that they are a buoy in a turbulent ocean of whisky. Other distilleries change their labels, change their house style, and muck around with going from age statement to colour coding in a fickle manner, seemingly blown about by every change in wind direction and economic current. Yet Glenfarclas stays in place, maintaining its level even in the rising tide of new distilleries and new gimmicks, acting as a beacon to those of us that tire of all the change, and at the end of the day don't want to weather every single storm in a teacup. We just want a good Single Malt, dammit. Glenfarclas is a relative bulwark of consistency in a vast ocean Single Malt Entropy.

That last bit is what makes Glenfarclas so difficult to write about. If you enjoy whisky and talk about it as much as I do, you have already said plenty about the distillery, to the point where saying or writing anything about them can make one feel like a broken record. Glenfarclas makes great Single Malt Scotch. Glenfarclas makes some of the best-sherried whisky out there.

[caption id="attachment_9819" align="aligncenter" width="640" caption="The Man Himself - George Grant"][/caption]

Many of you have been to a Glenfarclas Tasting, possibly even one hosted by the great George Grant. If not, I highly recommend you do so in the future. Many people run a good whisky tasting - I like to fool mysel...

Continue Reading →

Day 22 of the 2019 KWM Whisky Calendar - Glen Scotia Victoriana

Posted on December 12, 2021

by Evan

Day twenty-two has arrived, and we are looking at very few doors left to open on the 2019 KWM Whisky Calendar. December has been a blur, and doing all of this whisky tasting (in the name of SCIENCE!) may not have helped, but I do believe this is our first foray into Campbeltown. It is time to crack open that door and reveal the Glen Scotia Victoriana Single Malt Scotch.

Campbeltown is home to three distilleries: Springbank, Glengyle (bottled as Kilkerran), and Glen Scotia. Like its 'Wee Toon' cohort Springbank, the Glen Scotia Distillery itself is chock-full of grimy, victorian, and industrial character in all of the right ways. Also like both Springbank and Kilkerran, Glen Scotia Distillery lies within the town itself.

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, back when Campbeltown was a more industry-driven place and with a more bustling fishing port, Glen Scotia had neighboring distilleries on the other sides of the walls that encase its lot. At this time, the story goes, the town had more distilleries than churches which themselves numbered more than thirty. Boom times eventually went bust, and for quite a while only two distilleries remained in the town, though that could have been considered one and a half for how little Glen Scotia operated in the early 2000s.

Andrew tells stories of visiting the distillery more than a decade ago, when it was only sporadically in operation, and very uncared for. Much of the distillery equipment was falling apart. When Andrew and I visited in October of 2019, times had obviously changed. We had a great tour through Glen Scotia's operations, led by Distillery ManagerÂ Iain McAlister and saw that everything was in operation, the stillhouse had thick coats of paint over nearly every surface possible, and the stills were polished and running.

Glen Scotia Distillery just so happens to be owned the the Loch Lomond Group, which we have seen three times already in this year's calendar with the Inchmurrin 18 Year, the Inchmoan 12 Year, and the Loch Lomond 18 Year. Glen Scotia itself has a fairly robust lineup of five core releases at the moment, including the Double Cask, Victoriana, 15 Year Old, 18 Year Old, and 25 Year Old. There has even been a release of a 45 Year Old, though this is a lot more difficult and a lot more expensive to come by.

We were also lucky enough to select our own cask from Glen Scotia this year, which arrived in June. It is the first official Glen Scotia Single Cask to be sold in Canada and also possibly in North American as a whole. I am biased because I helped pick it, but it is a stunning whisky, just shy of twenty years of age and full of complexity. You can read about it (and possibly grab one before it sells out!) here:Â Glen Scotia 1999 KWM Cask No. 359Continue Reading →

Day 21 of the 2019 KWM Whisky Advent Calendar - Timorous Beastie Blended Malt Scotch

Posted on July 15, 2025

by Evan

Holy moley! These Douglas Laing bottles are coming in fast and furious! Break down door number twenty one on your 2019 KWM Whisky Calendar and you will reveal the Timorous Beastie Blended Malt Scotch.

Just two days ago, back on day 19, we tasted the Rock Island and previous to that back on day nine we had frolicked with the The Epicurean. Timorous Beastie marks our third Blended Malt from Douglas Laing's the Remarkable Regional Malts of Scotland lineup. The Epicurean represented the Lowlands, the Rock Island the Islands, and now with Timorous Beastie we are in the Highlands of Scotland both in style and source.

On the label for this bottle, we are not given the portrait of the very picture of a gentleman accosted by his own moustache or a giant oyster laden with pearl, but the picture of an inquisitive rodent. The name Timorous Beastie is a reference to a poem by the Scottish Bard himself,Â Robert Burns, titled "To a Mouse" which he wrote in 1785. It was possibly written whilst Burns was looking around a room for ideas and there was no haggis to be found to which he could write an Ode to. Just kidding. "To a Mouse" is a often referenced Burns poem. John Steinbeck also used part of the verse for the the title of one of his more popular novels "Of Mice and Men".

So what is the makeup the liquid inside the bottle of Timorous Beastie, you ask? Given the region that the bottle represents, there should be Highland Distilleries featured in this blend, right?

Right. This Beastie is composed of Single Malt Scotch sourced from distilleries' Blair Athol, Dalmore, Glengoyne and Glen Garioch to create its prototypical Highland style. Of these four distilleries, Blair Athol is the one that you have likely seen around as a single malt the least. Most of what Blair Athol produces goes into Blended Scotch, predominately Bell's. The other three are more easily found as Single Malts on shelves. The Timorous Beastie is matured entirely in ex-Bourbon casks.

Blended Malt Scotch and Blended Scotch in general seems to be under going either a resurgence or renaissance right now, depending on your point of view. Including Compass Box's The Spice Tree and MacNair's Lum Reek 12 Year Old, this is the fifth Blended Malt in the 2019 KWM Whisky Calendar so far. How will this Highland Blended Malt show against it cohorts and esteemed competition. Let us crack it open and see!

Timorous Beastie Blended Malt

Bottled at 46.8%, the Timorous Beastie, named for the immortalized creature in Robert Burns' famous poem "To a Mouse", is a Blended Malt composed of Highland Malts, specifically: Blair Athol, Dalmore, Glen Garioch and Glengoyne.

Producer Description

"The original Timorous Beastie, immortalized in Robert Burnsâ€™ famous Scots p...

Continue Reading →

Day 20 of the 2019 KWM Whisky Calendar - Ballachin 10 year Old

Posted on December 1, 2021

by Evan

Day twenty is here! If you are keeping up in real-time with our 2019 KWM Whisky Calendar, that means Christmas is only five doors days away now. Perhaps you are now slowly becoming more content, as work is done (or nearly done) and your holiday has possibly started. Or conversely, a state of panic might now be activated, as you realize how much shopping for gifts and holiday get-togethers still needs to be done. Maybe you are capable of emotionally multi-tasking and feel both The Dread and The Calm at the same time? That seems to be my personal base level, which I run on 24/7 regardless of the season. Does that make it the norm or am I just a walking and talking contradiction? I don't really have time to find out, so I will roll with it.

Where was I? Right - what lies in wait for us behind door twenty, just waiting to pounce? Open it up and take a look! We going to Edradour Distillery for the second time this Calendar, but this time we are going peaty with Ballechin 10 Year Old.

Here is a quick refresher from the first time around: Edradour Distillery. Owned by Andrew Symington, who also owns the independent bottler Signatory Vintage. The distillery used to be considered the smallest distillery in Scotland, though with the craft distillery boom, this is no longer the case. Regardless, the distillery attracts more than one hundred thousand tourists every year. The distillery and the people that work there do a very good job of turning these tourists into lovers and ambassadors of the Edradour Single Malt Scotch and Brand.

What I neglected mentioning with the first Edradour bottle that we tasted is that the Distillery produces both unpeated and peated malt. Edradour 10 Year Old, which is arguably the flagship bottle for Edradour, is unpeated in style. When the distillery runs a peated batch, they call the resulting spirit Ballechin. It was given this name by Edradour's owner Andrew Symington chose for its heavily peated runs of spirit. The Ballechin name was previously used for another distillery that used to reside nearby Edradour, though it closed down for the last time in 1927.

For Ballechin, Edradour Distillery uses malted barley peated to about 50PPM. The first runs of this heavily peated style happened back in 2003, and after a series of limited runs with the Ballechin name attached, the Ballechin 10 Year Old was officially introduced as a regular bottling in 2014.

Another interesting tidbit that I just hinted on in my post for the Edradour 10: The Edradour distillery currently has TWO stillhouses on site. Both are operational as well. The new stillhouse, which is classified as Edradour no2 when the spirit is put into barrel, is in a building that also doubles as a warehouse. I should have asked whether they were running both peated and unpeated runs at the same time when Andrew and I visited in October of ...

Continue Reading →

Newer Posts →

← Older Posts