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KWM Advent 2018 Day 23: First Editions Aberlour 1995 KWM Cask

Posted on November 13, 2022

by Andrew

Image courtesy of @frombarreltobottle

I had to go back through our records to confirm this, but today's malt is another first, it is the first time we have featured a whisky from the Aberlour Distillery in any of our five editions of the Kensington Wine Market Whisky Advent Calendar. Not only that, but todayâ€™s Aberlour is in itself a curiosity, atypical of the distilleryâ€™s house style and also one of the oldest bottlings we have ever seen from the distillery. But more on this unique whisky below, first, to the distillery.

Aberlour Distillery as we know it today was founded by a businessman and banker, James Fleming in the town of the same name in 1879. It was not the first â€œAberlour Distilleryâ€, the original one was built on the same site in 1826 by Peter Weir and James Gordon. The distillery was operated by lessees James and John Grant until 1933 when they left to build their own distillery, Glen Grant, in Rothes. James Fleming was a well-respected member of his community and lived by his family motto, which dates from the time of Robert the Bruce â€œlet the deed showâ€. When a local boy drowned crossing the Spey, which was without a bridge at the time, he had one built at his own expense without expectation of reward.

In 1879 the first of a few fires ravaged the distillery destroying much of the site. Fleming rebuilt the distillery near St. Drostan's Well, named after an early monk linked with St. Columba. The site's use for brewing and distilling may have gone back even further to Druidic times. The distillery was sold to Robert Thorne & Sons Ltd. in 1892, who expanded it as the boom in whisky production took hold. Six years later it burned to the ground. The famous distillery architect Charles Doig was brought in to consult on the reconstruction. During the Second World War, when the distillery was only intermittently in production, the locals are said to have smuggled wash up the Aberlour Burn to distill hidden behind Linn Falls.

In 1945 Aberlour was purchased by Campbell Distillers. They closed the floor maltings in 1962 and doubled the capacity from two to four stills in 1973. The following year the distillery was purchased by Pernod Ricard, and so began the single maltâ€™s long association with France where it is the bestselling single malt. The first edition of Aberlour Aâ€™Bunadh, â€˜the originalâ€™ in Scots Gaelic, was released in 2000. The cask-strength sherry matured single malt is a staple of any good whisky shop (it is currently sold out in Alberta).

As eluded to above, today's Aberlour is a little unusual. All distillery bottlings of Aberlour are at least partly if not entirely matured in sherry casks. Independent bottlings, w...

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KWM Advent 2018 Day 22 - Compass Box The Story of the Spaniard

Posted on November 12, 2023

by Andrew

Todayâ€™s whisky, the Compass Box The Story of The Spaniard is especially exciting because this is a preview of a whisky that hasnâ€™t even hit our market yet. It is expected to arrive late in the 1st quarter of 2019. The Story of The Spaniard is the first new core release in the Compass Box Range in over 5 years. The whisky is also a change in style for John Glaser. In the early years of Compass Box, the first decade, few if any Compass Box Releases featured whiskies with sherry cask influences. Ex-Bourbon and French oak were Johnâ€™s muses. I remember asking him why this was a little over a decade ago, and my recollection is that he told me he preferred the elegance and subtlety of American oak. Some of his go-to whiskies for Blending, like Clynelish and Coal Ila, often shine brightest in Ex-Bourbon.

About 7 years ago sherry influences started creeping into Compass Box Whiskies, at first subtly and over time more prominent ones. The turning point came around the time notable releases like the Last Vatted Malt and The General came out. I remember asking John around this time why he had seemingly changed his mind. I donâ€™t remember his precise answer, but I was left with the feeling that his style as a blender was evolving. And besides, the sherried components which found their way into The General and Last Vatted Malt were just too good to ignore.

This is the second Compass Box in the Kensington Wine Market 2018 Whisky Advent Calendar. On Day 3 we featured The Peat Monster, and if you read that blog post, you might rightly have come away with the impression that we are Compass Box fanboys and girls here at KWM. John and his team at Compass Box are almost single headedly making Blended Scotch whisky relevant and sexy again. Blends are a category I had personally written off as irrelevant early in my career. My introduction to Compass Box and their approach to whisky making was a revelation. Consider for a moment that at least in theory, blending different whiskies together is an opportunity to create something more interesting and complex than any of the individual parts on their own. John left Diageo and Johnny Walker to found Compass Box in part because he wanted to explore the artistry of Blending Scotch whisky and get people excited about the techniques used to produce them.

Since 2000 Compass Box has been pushing the boundaries for Blended Scotch Whisky and leading the charge for innovation. Like the most exciting single malt producers Compass Box has a core range but also releases interesting one-off expressions to showcase unique parcels of whisky and the range of styles. Some of these releases have drawn the scrutiny of the uptight bullies at the Scotch Whisky Association or SWA, an industry-funded lobby group. The SWA tends to defend mainly the interests of the established larger players and has cast ...

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KWM Advent 2018 Day 21 - Cadenhead Glenrothes 2001

Posted on November 12, 2023

by Andrew

I canâ€™t believe the journey is nearly at an end, there are just 4 whiskies left in the Kensington Wine Market 2018 Whisky Advent Calendar includuing this WM Cadenhead Glenrothes 2001. This is the final Cadenhead bottling in the Kensington Wine Market 2018 Whisky Advent Calendar, and there have been a few of those. But I hope youâ€™ve appreciated the different styles these whiskies have showcased over the last 3 weeks. We also gone deep into the history of Scotlandâ€™s oldest independent bottler, which is a part of J & A Mitchell & Co. Weâ€™ve talked a lot about Cadenhead this month, and there is no wonder why, they are a huge part of our business here at KWM, as their exclusive Canadian partner. We also have a huge selection of Cadenhead whiskies in the store.

In 5 years of KWM Whisky Advent Calendars, it is hard to believe that today malt is the first Glenrothes to feature. The distillery is a pillar of the Blended Scotch Whisky industry, especially for brands like Cutty Sark and Famous Grouse. The industry used to regard Glenrothes as a top dresser malt, a whisky used sparingly to finish Blends. Glenrothes spirit profile is influenced by a short fermentation and a long distillation in tall stills with boil bulbs. The result is a malty, floral and citric spirit. The owners, the Edrington Group, who also own Macallan and Highland Park, fill the spirit predominantly into ex-Sherry seasoned European and American oak casks. Many experts feel Glenrothes needs a long maturation to reach its potential, and I would agree that I have not often looked favourably on the whisky from the distillery. The spirit seems to hit its stride in its mid-late teens. But I also donâ€™t think the distillery has done itself any favours by bottling at 40 or 43%. The best Glenrothes bottles I had over the years have almost all been from independent bottlers like Gordon & Macphail and Cadenhead.

[caption id="attachment_7859" align="aligncenter" width="640" caption="Glenrothes Stillhouse - from theglenrothes.com"][/caption]

Glenrothes distillery was built along the Rothes Burn in the town of Rothes, just 10 minutes south of Elgin, near the heart of the Speyside whisky region. The distillery was built in 1878 at the beginning of a major boom in distillation, never the less the owners nearly went bust even before they finished construction. The collapse of the Glasgow bank left them without financing. Three of the original investors, all of whom were also owners of Macallan, soldiered on with the project. The financing they required was provided by a loan from the nearby United Free Presbyterian Church of Knockandoo. Curiously, said Church was part of the teetotalling movement prevalent throughout the UK at the time. Presumably,...

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KWM Advent 2018 Day 20 - Eau Claire Single Malt Batch 001

Posted on November 12, 2023

By Andrew

Image courtesy ofÂ @frombarreltobottle

There was a lot of fanfare over Eau Claireâ€™s first release of single malt last fall. The whisky was only available from the distillery and didnâ€™t last long. When I approached them last winter about bottling some whisky for the Kensington Wine Market Whisky Advent Calendar they were very keen to participate. I assumed they would offer me some of Batch 002, but no, they did better than that. They held back stock of their inaugural single malt release to pour at events and over time. They rebottled some of Batch 001 into 50mls, just for our Calendar, and we are very grateful for that. Not everyone was able to try their first release of whisky, but everyone joining us on the 2018 Whisky Advent Journey can!

Eau Claire Distillery was founded in Turner Valley, Alberta in 2014 by David Farran. The historic town is located on Highway 22 (The Cowboy Trail), about 60 minutesâ€™ drive from downtown Calgary. Named after the areaâ€™s first settlers, Robert and John Turner who arrived in 1886, the town was made famous by the discovery of the Turner Valley oil fields. For a period of nearly 30 years, the oil and gas fields were the largest producer in the British Empire. The town has a bit of an illicit past, with moonshining believed to have taken place on the nearby Whisky Ridge, and a street in the north end of town known as Whisky Row. The distillery was opened in 2014 in the old Turner Valley Movie Theater and Dance Hall building, circa 1929. A piece of this heritage, the projector, is preserved in the still room.

Eau Claire is not Albertaâ€™s first distillery. There are, in fact, three large distilleries: Alberta Distillers in Calgary, Palliser Distillery in Lethbridge and Highwood in High River, but it was the Provinceâ€™s first craft distillery. Eau Claire's single malt is also the first Alberta Single Malt Whisky! In addition to single malt (made in the Scottish style) and (future) rye whiskies, it is also producing vodka, gin and some other spirits. Opening a whisky distillery is no small feat, keeping it operating and well-financed in the early years is an even more daunting challenge. Salaries, utilities, taxes and raw materials need to be purchased and paid for, for years before the first revenues are realized. Eau Claireâ€™s gin, vodka and other spirits have helped pay the bills and finance the cost of laying down whisky.

The distillery makes all of its spirits from Alberta barley, mostly from local farmers, and some of it from the owner David Farranâ€™s own land. The distillery tries, where possible, to purchase the grain direct from the farmer, and works with them to select specific grain varietals. Eau ...

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KWM Advent 2018 Day 19 - GlenAllachie 10 Year Cask Strength

Posted on November 12, 2023

by Evan

We were not alone in our grief when news broke in 2016 that the BenRiach Distillery Co. had been sold to Brown Forman. For the previous decade, BenRiach and Glendronach had been two of the most interesting distilleries to watch. Their impresario Billy Walker had built both whisky brands into respected players in the single malt world. Billy Walker was...

Wait a minute. This all sounds eerily familiar - almost like we talked about the same thing just a week ago...

Like the variety of Cadenhead minis in this year's KWM Whisky Advent Calendar, this might feel like a bit of dejaÂ vu, seeing another a second stubby bottle from the new GlenAllachie lineup. This guy is a bit different than the 12 year old tasted on Day 12 (Just a happy coincidence that those numbers lined up. I wish we could say that we had planned it). The 12 year is bottled at a very respectable 46% ABV, but this is the new GlenAllachie 10-year-old Cask Strength of 54.8%. Just as 46% is the new 43% - Cask Strength should be the new 46%.

When BenRiach and GlenDronach were under Billy Walker's care, he set the tone by being one of a few producers to bottle at a strength of at least 46% ABV and also explicitly stating on most releases that no chill-filtration was used and no colouring was added. Along with Compass Box, Bruichladdich/Murray McDavid, Arran and Springbank amongst others, Billy Walker's distillery bottles helped shape the palate of many Scotch drinkers that were just getting into the hobby five, ten, and fifteen years ago.

For me and many others, 46% is often seen as a good starting point for good Scotch. That isn't to say that bottling at less than 46% automatically makes a whisky bad - it does make it a little less intriguing though. The same can be said for chill-filtration and adding colouring. I won't completely write off a company that uses such methods in a (misguided) effort to make theirÂ Scotch whisky more palatable to the masses - I just don't see how intentionally adulterating your product for the sake of homogenizationÂ improves it.

He also adopted the interesting choice of capitalizingÂ a letter in the middle of the distillery name, doing to GlenAllachie the same as he did with BenRiach and GlenDronach. For some reason, he did not do the same thing with Glenglassaugh when that was previously owned by his group.

Another thing that Billy Walker did with the previous distilleries in his care that he has carried to his new forayÂ is regular cask strength offerings. We already received some of the first officialÂ Single Cask releases from GlenAllachie earlier this fall. Having a cask strength bottle in the core lineup is something that eventually happened with GlenDronach and BenRiach, but with GlenAllachie, Walker has released one right out of the gate. I guess that...

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