Laphroaig 10 Year Sherry Oak

Distillery

Originally written by Evan for a blog post related to KWM's 2020 Whisky Calendar

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This is one of the Islay classics, one of the peated beasts that makes you either love or fear this style of Single Malt Scotch. For me, this was the first heavily peated Scotch Whisky I ever purchased years and years ago. I was just getting into Scotch Whisky at the time, and I had no experience with the smoky, peated side of it yet. I just picked a bottle of Laphroaig 10 Year Old off the shelf because I liked the plain, stark style of the label on the tube I guess.

When I got around to cracking open the bottle and tasting it for the first time I honestly thought that there was something wrong with it, like a corked bottle of wine. I asked my Dad to taste it to see if I should take it back and he instead confirmed that yes, that is what Laphroaig is supposed to taste like. If memory serves, I choked down the rest of that bottle of Laphroaig 10 Year Old by mixing it with coke and ginger ale.

That first dive into the deep end of heavily peated Scotch is nearly two decades back in time for me now. After that, I started going to tastings and festivals and tried more Scotch and quickly developed a love for peated whisky.

Belly Of The Beast - Inside The Malt Kiln At Laphroaig Distillery

Laphroaig Distillery celebrated its 200th anniversary in 2015. Two centuries plus five years back now, it was founded by two brothers, who placed the distillery right on the shores of Islay. Today, it remains one of a handful of distilleries to at least partially supply its own malt. Using the floor maltings and kiln at the distillery, the malt is peated to a spec of between 50 and 60 PPM. The distillery’s own maltings can only supply about 15% percent of the malt needed, though. The rest is brought in from Port Ellen Maltings, which is less than a 10-minute drive to the west, on the opposite side of the town of Port Ellen. The sourced malted barley is peated between 35 and 45 PPM.

Two Kilometres down the road from Laphroaig Distillery is Lagavulin Distillery. Walk or drive another two clicks down the same road and you will hit Ardbeg Distillery.

On Islay, all other distilleries are dwarfed production-wise by Caol Ila. Laphroaig can outproduce most other Islay distilleries beyond that, but wouldn’t only be able to pump out half as much spirit as Caol Ila if they were both running at full capacity. However, Laphroaig is the number one selling Islay Single Malt Scotch brand. It also happens to be the favourite Scotch Whisky of the Duke of Rothesay, who also goes by Prince Charles when he is not in Scotland.

The core lineup of Laphroaig currently consists of the Laphroaig Select, the 10 Year Old, Quarter Cask, Triple Wood, Lore, and 25 Year Old. There is also a 10-Year-Old Cask Strength which sadly does not come to Canada. I believe we can all agree that is a travesty.