Fresh off the early arrival of our highly-coveted and rare Kinship single barrel editions, we’re back again this week with four new direct arrivals from Scotland, featuring a diverse range of price points and flavor profiles, but a singular value proposition across the board. With prices this reasonable for single barrel single malt expressions of this caliber and quality, we’re bringing the holiday cheer a bit early this year! That's the value of buying direct.
I’ve been traveling to Scotland for over a decade, selecting single barrels in person, tasting through thousands of casks, and working with suppliers to have them imported back to the United States for finicky retail customers. We’re still just getting started now that I’m here at Mission, but these four barrels are as good as anything I’ve uncovered in my career. If you’re a peat fan, a Speyside fan, a rare bottle collector, or just someone who loves good whisky, we’ve got something for you in this new line-up.
Caol Ila 9 Year Old "Hepburn's Choice" Single Sherry Butt 46% Single Malt Whisky 2010 700ml - $59.99
There are few pleasures in the Scotch world greater than the smoky, creamy, oily character of Caol Ila single malt when it’s matured in a fresh Sherry butt, allowing the sweet, fruity, nutty character of the Jerez wine to marry with the whisky over time. Single malt fanatics like myself are often willing to pay a hefty price for that experience (see the current Caol Ila 30 year we have in stock from Kinship), but with this single barrel 9 year old expression, we were able to bring the barrel in directly from Scotland for a price too good to believe. Brimming with soft fruit, peat smoke, salted taffy, creamy vanilla, nougat, and sea brine, this whisky is so fat and textural on the palate you almost have to chew it. The concentration on display from this single barrel specimen is unlike any Caol Ila I’ve ever tasted; it’s so dense and layered in its flavor profile, that you need to taste it over and over again to fully comprehend and appreciate what’s in your glass. Simply put, it’s a bottle you’ll probably want multiples of.
The term “teaspooning” probably means very little to the average whisky drinker, but for those in the know it refers to the act of adding a teaspoon of one single malt whisky into the barrel of another. For what purpose, you’re probably asking? It’s done before the sale of a barrel to prevent independent bottlers from marketing off the name of the distillery from where it originated. For example, imagine if one of the major Glen distilleries was to sell Mission Wine & Spirits a single barrel of 21 year old single malt, but wanted to ensure that we couldn’t market the whisky as a single malt. By adding a teaspoon of a second 21 year old to that single barrel, the whisky would become a blended malt whisky, and no longer a single malt, due to the addition of a second single malt whisky. We would have to call it something like Hector Macbeth 21 year old blended malt whisky as a result, since we wouldn’t be allowed to legally label it as a single barrel of single malt whisky. Hence, this 21 year old cask strength Highland “blended” malt whisky is a rich, vanilla-laden, sweetly-malted, elegant, yet powerful single barrel expression, bottled at cask strength with no water added. Compared to other 21 year old single malts at that age, it’s also a fraction of the price given that we brought it in direct from Scotland. We can’t tell you where it’s from unfortunately, but hopefully our analogy helps to explain why it’s labeled the way it is. Once you get a taste of this liquid, there should be no doubt of its pedigree.
Over the years, I’ve probably purchased more barrels of Benrinnes single malt whisky directly from Scotland, than any other unbranded single malt. Other than the rare direct release from Diageo, Benrinnes exists to supply Johnnie Walker with single malt for its blends, rather than to exist in its own right, but that hasn’t stopped me from buying single barrels of it for thousands of customers over the last decade. When allowed to shine on its own in the very best of expressions, I would put Benrinnes next to Clynelish and Macallan any day of the week, and twice on Sunday. It has an inherent richness and oiliness of fruit that rolls over the palate with weight and texture, permeating the senses with beautiful viscosity and concentration. When I saw we had the chance to purchase a single barrel 40 year expression (from my birth year, no less), I jumped all over it. I was so excited to get the sample bottle, I had difficulty settling down to take it all in. The nose is simply otherworldly: deep, rich aromas of wood, earth, caramel, resin, followed by a softness on the palate that is ghostly in its presence. It's bottled at full proof, but after 40 years it's evaporated down to a natural 42.1%. The texture of this whisky is so delicate it almost floats through your mouth, rising up on the finish for an intense wave of wood oils, stewed fruits, exotic spices, and candied malt. If you want to know what old Highland single malt tastes like without the existence of Sherry, this Benrinnes 40 is like a master’s class. It’s everything that makes four decades in wood worth paying for: that earthy, resinous, oily backbone that only reveals itself in the most mature of whiskies. I haven’t stopped thinking about it since I first tasted it, and with only 21 bottles available now, I’m hoping those lucky enough to secure a bottle from Mission will experience a similar sense of awe and admiration.
Strathmill is one of the many faceless Diageo distilleries that provides single malt for the Johnnie Walker whiskies and other blends, rarely bottled or seen as a pure single malt, and often confused with Strathisla when it is available. Just outside of Keith in the Speyside region, it’s one of the few distilleries left that continues to use purifiers on its spirit stills, pushing the heavier alcohols back down during distillation, allowing the lighter alcohols into the condenser to create a delicate and lithe Highland malt. As part of our recent container, we grabbed every bottle available of this absolutely gorgeous 33 year old Strathmill from Hunter Laing’s Old & Rare series. Bottled at 54.2% cask strength from a concentrated barrel that yielded just 150 total bottles, the nose on this whisky alone is worth the price of admission. Candied stone fruit, creme brulée, oily wood, the purest aroma of freshly malted barley are still alive and well in the glass, despite the age of the whisky. On the palate, the oak strikes first, but soon gives way to more vanilla, lanolin (waxiness), sweet cereal grains, and a richness that reminds of my favorite Glenmorangie whiskies. Tough to go wrong with this one, especially with the beautiful box and packaging. If you need a gift for the whisky lover in your life, it’s hard to imagine anyone not enjoying this immensely.
-David Driscoll