Today we have a guest post from a Shai, a friend who gets to travel around way more than me or the average person (or a dozen of them). If you have ever been looking for a decent whisky in an airport lounge, you know it’s hard to get by, but a whole whisky club in a lounge? That’s unique. Shai has visited the club is happy to report back to you all:

As part of their recent overhaul of the Terminal E lounges, Swiss Airlines recently opened a whisky bar called Whisky Club 28/10 in their Senator lounge at...

It seems that Glenlivet Distillery is planning to release a sequel to the controversial and enigmatic 2016 release Glenlivet Cipher....

It’s this time of the year where we recovers from the new year celebrations and looking forward new releases and festivals in 2018. So here’s the forthcoming Laphroaig Cairdeas 2018 edition – Fino cask finish....

David Zibell of Golan Heights Distillery is bottling today the second single malt release, another three years old whisky, but unlike the first cask which was an ex-red wine cask, this time it’s an ex-Golani Black cask, a charred American Oak cask that previously held the distillery Golani Black whisky (two grain whisky) for a couple of months (so it’s almost an ex-bourbon cask).

Just like with the first release, there will be 40 bottles at natural cask strength of 62.1%, and 295 bottles bottled at 46%.

Golan Heights Distillery Cask #10 (Ex Golani-Black) (62.1%, 480NIS )

Nose : Velvety butterscotch,...

And on the seventh day of BTC 2017 we had a Speyside whisky: Glenburgie 1995 21 Year Old bottled by the whiskybase.com folks under their Archives brand.

Upon smelling and tasting it I knew we’re probably in the Speyside region but I had some doubts because of the strong honey which could hints at Highlands region and the salt which could lead to Islands region (like Arran). But eventually I played the odds and selected a random Speyside distillery, just too bad I didn’t pick up Glenburgie.

I had suspicions it maj be 20+ year old whisky but eventually I...

Last night we had a very interesting whisky at the BTC 2017 event. For the 8th day we had an 8 year old whisky matured in wine cask from Deanston distillery.

This young handfill (bottled on 23.09.2017) whisky was quite whacky, delivering a leathery profile I’d usually associate with old mature whiskies and this is how I tried to guess. I also whiffed on the ABV as it carried a far higher ABV statement then what I felt. Thankfully I did get the region correctly, phew!

Deanston 8 Year Old Handfill (57.8%)

Nose : Sweet red fruit, sour wood spices,...

Last night at the BTC 2017 competition we had Springbank 14 Year Old Bourbon Wood that was bottled last augusti and it was quite an infuriating experience. I tasted it, took notes, filled in my guess and continued to drink a few more drams with a friend and one of those drams was also this Springbank 14 Bourbon. So I had the same whisky twice in a single night, just a few drams apart but oh what different notes did I take for each of them. Luckily I got points for age and ABV (12yo and 55%) but if I’d had...

Last night dram of the BTC 2017 was a nasty surprise from the organizers. Nasty as who would have think of a handfill (!!!) from Glenfiddich distillery (!!!!), no less and no more! As expected, nobody managed to guess the distillery. It was a good dram and it reaffirms my belief from my two last Glenfiddich reviews ( here and here ) that they should stop chill filtering and bottle in higher strength.

And how did I do with my guess? I got points for region as it was clearly a Speyside offering and totally missed on the ABV. I...

Day 4 of the BTC 2017 competition brought me the first Ballechin I tasted. For those who don’t know it, Ballechin is the peated whisky distilled in Edradour distillery. In our case it’s a 12 year old Ballechin, distilled in 2004 and matured in Manzanilla sherry cask #278 that was bottled in 28.10.2016 after yielding 495 bottles.

When I sniffed and tasted it, my first reaction was: this is no Islay peat. But then I recalled a virgin oak Octomore single cask which held a very similar profile so it was either peated laddie or product outside Islay. I went...

Today I review a young single cask Benromach (from 2008) that was bottled earlier this year for whiskysite.nl shop. 231 Bottles were bottled from cask 347 at 59.5% and a few of those entertained us on the 3rd day of the BTC 2017 competition.

I didn’t have much free time to tackle this dram so wrote some quick notes and went with a gut feeling guess of a young Caol Ila. I got points for age but nothing else. majbe if I could sit down with this dram properly I could (and should) recall those 2008 Benromach that flooded the market...

Last night I’ve started my annual whisky torture, also known as the BTC (Blind Tasting Competition) in some circles. It’s my 4th year in the competition and it’s never getting easy.

Day 1 sample was a clear ex-bourbon whisky with cask strength ABV. After sniffing and tasting I went with a random Highlands distillery and high ABV of 56%. I wasn’t sure about the age, at first I thought it’s either 9-11 or 16-18 but the tropical fruits and the lack of malt notes made me go with 17 years.

Then the whisky was revealed, from Benrinnes distillery (speyside region...

After a decent start to the BTC 2017 competition, came day 2 and embarrassed me.

Wolfburn No. 128 was the blind sample for this day and unfortunately (for me) it is one of the few official Wolfburn releases I haven’t tasted, not that I’m sure it would help…

I immediately felt it’s some OB whisky and not independent bottler bottle with a 46% offering (which is where I scored my points), but it felt much older with a gentle offering (no rough and burning liquid here) and matured in some old/weak refill sherry cask so it threw me off the...

I’ve realized that once again life and work consumes most of my time in the last few weeks, leaving almost no free time to work on the blog. But I think that going for a quick and down to earth review mode maj help building the momentum again.

Let’s get festive with the latest Douglas Laing Christmas Edition of Big Peat. This series has been going for a few years already and always provided a good value.

Big Peat Christmas 2017 (54.1%, £53.95 / €52,95 )

Nose : Young and malty. Then sweet peat with gentle smoke, honey, some Ardbeg...

Black Friday descends upon us and while it started as a pure brick and mortar retail event in USA, thanks to international commerce and online shops taking a hike on this day (in addition to Cyber Monday), we’re flooded with all kind of deals, including deals on whisky from reputable web shops around the world, including Scotland and England.

The Whisky Exchange shop took this one step forward and also released a special whisky to celebrate this day. A 16 year old whisky from single sherry butt hailing from a family owned distillery in the Speyside region which doesn’t allow...

A quick review for Sunday as you’re either slumbering as part of your weekend rituals or you’re swamped with work after getting back to work. Either way, here’s something real nice to end/start the week – a review of Rock Oyster 18 Year Old.

Rock Oyster 18 is a limited edition in the Islands blended malts series from Douglas Laing. It was released along with Timorous Beastie 18 (reviewed here ) and it contains whiskies from Arran, Orkney, Jura and Islay. As usual it’s non chill-filtered and without colouring.

Rock Oyster 18 Year Old (46.8%, £72.50 / €76,99 )

Nose :...

When Struan Grant Ralph, Global Brand Ambassador for Glenfiddich, visited Israel last month, I had a rare glimpse into the Glenfiddich 21 Reserve Rum Cask making process. This expression is made from whisky that is matured in ex-bourbon casks for 21 years and then is finished in Rum casks for additional four months before being bottled to create the final result.

Struan brought with him a 21 year old whisky distilled back in 1996 and then matured in ex-bourbon cask (#201). This is one of the casks that is destined to get finished in Rum casks for the Reserva Rum...

In the wake of the news that Glendronach Distillery are releasing a second peated whisky, finished in Port casks, I think it’s a good opportunity to review the first one, the Glendronach Peated.

A lot of eyebrows were raised when this one was released. Glendronach are known for something completely different – Sherried whisky and to lesser degree the whiskies finished in other type of casks (like Port, Madeira, etc). But jumping on the peated bandwagon somewhat seems contradicting to the Glendronach we know. Will it work for them?

Glendronach Peated (46%, £35.98 / €36,49 )

Nose : Nice maltiness...

Today’s review is the forth and latest release under the ‘Timorous Beastie’ label from Douglas Laing, the Timorous Beastie 18 Year Old that was released last maj. We’ll review this today and next week we’ll check out both the 21 year old and the 40 year old that were released last year.

Timorous Beastie is Douglas Laing label for highlands blended malt. In this case, It’s a vatting of whiskies from Blair Athol, Dalmore,  Glengoyne and Glen Garioch. A quite large batch of 7258 bottles was produced with a bit of an uneven pricing where it’s noticeably cheaper in mainland...

Last month Douglas Laing has released the last missing piece of their Remarkable Regional Malt series, The Gauldrons, representing the Campbeltown region.

The Gauldrons in Gaelic means “bay of storms” and this is the bay located west to Campbeltown. The legend says that Robert the Bruce was inspired there by a spider rebuilding his net to keep fighting, hence the golden web on the bottle label and tube.

Since there are only three distilleries in the region, I think we can quite safely assume that 99% (if not 100%) of this blend comes from Glen Scotia and Springbank due to the...