Notes on The Casual Dram:17
Notes on the lineup… (tickets available here)
Daftmill 'New Zealand Exclusive' Cask 055/2011 60.2% (first fill bourbon)
Cask - First fill bourbon from Clermont Springs
Region - Lowlands
Daftmill is one of the few truly self-sufficient Scottish distilleries adopting a farm-to-bottle approach (it has its own artesian well, farms its own barley and matures in a dunnage warehouse on site). It is owned by the Cuthbert brothers, two farmers with a long history of growing barley for malting. They were granted a licence to distil in 2005 and set about converting part of the farm into a micro distillery (with just two stills) which produces only 20,000 litres during two three-month seasons (in winter and summer). The inaugural release was a 12-year-old in 2018.
The barley variety Publican was used for this whisky, grown locally in the 43ac field. It was then dried and stored on the farm to be malted in Alloa during the summer of 2010.
SMWS 112.107 'Exotic probiotic!' 10 years old 60.9%
Cask - First-fill bourbon
Region - Southern Highlands (right on the border with the Lowlands)
Loch Lomond is one of Scotland’s most flexible and innovative distilleries. The distillery was founded in 1966 in a wave of distillery building following the drought of the first half of the 20th century (no new distilleries were built for the first forty nine years).
The original distillery had a set of pot stills with rectifying plates in their necks (also known as Lomond stills), allowing different flavour streams to be produced. Two more, of the same design, were added in 1990, before the distillery installed two continuous stills three years later, in which to make its own grain whisky with a view to self-sufficient blend production. Two ‘traditional’ swan neck pot stills were added in 1998, before an additional continuous still, set up to produce grain whisky from a 100% malted barley mash, was installed in 2007. With the recent addition of two more Lomond stills, Loch Lomond can produce 11 different distillates for its whisky brands. This expression is known as Inchmurrin (named after the biggest island in Loch Lomond), and its starting point is a fruity new make spirit, created as a result of a high cut point from the pot stills equipped with rectifying heads.
Craigellachie Signatory Vintage 11 years old 2012-2023 68.2%
Cask - First-fill sherry
Region - Speyside
Craigellachie is famed for its sulphurous style thanks to minimal copper contact resulting from the use of worm tub condensers. Don’t forget, a small amount of sulphur can be a desirable component in whisky, given time to soften and integrate into the malt, where it can then be perceived as floral, mineral and even (ideally?) meaty. Craigellachie leans towards the last of those styles and apparently, one is greeted with aromas of cabbage and beef stock upon entering the distillery.
Inchfad (Loch Lomond) 'Adelphi' 2016 / 8 years old 57%
Cask - First-fill PX sherry
Inchfad had a short-lived release as a single cask single malt under the Distillery Select banner in the mid-2000s, alongside other Loch Lomond malts including Craiglodge and Croftengea.
However, Inchfad is also used by Loch Lomond to classify one of the many spirit types produced at the distillery, and continues to be used for blending purposes.
To complicate things, although typically a peated expression - Inhfad can range from unpeated up to 50ppm and this expression is certainly peated.
Mystery whisky
Hmmm, what to choose, what to choose! Another first-fill, to make guess work harder, or a second-fill to see if we can really spot the difference?
