Whisky Ramblings on YouTube

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 509: Armorik Maitre de Chai 2023

I recently visited the Distillerie Warenghem in Lannion, which is in Brittany, France. After a great tour of both the distillery and the nearby cooperage they work with, we tasted their 2023 Maitre de Chai edition. And it was delicious!

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 510: Armorik Yeun Elez

In addition to the Armorik single malt, the Distillerie Warenghem in Lannion, France, also produces a peated malt called Yeun Elez, named after a nearby peat field. I had the pleasure of tasting this on the wild Brittany coast.

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 511: Glengoyne 16 Year Old 2007 Asta Morris

When I saw this bottle of Glengoyne for the first time, I was a bit surprised with the beautiful label. Not that I'm surprised that Crazy Bert Bruyneel puts beautiful labels on his bottles, but it's a totally new design. I really like it and in this case it complements the color of the whisky very nicely. It’s a Glengoyne that spent 16 long years in a sherry cask. That transports me back to the trip I made to this distillery in... 2011. Wow, has that been that long? And this whisky was distilled another four years earlier.

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 512: Paul John Christmas Edition 2023

Just like last year, I had the honor and pleasure of discussing this Christmas Edition of Paul John live on Instagram with none other than their Global Brand Ambassador. Nice, right? For this new – their sixth already and this time completely unpeated – Christmas Edition they have used two types of casks: Ex-Bourbon for maturation and then a Single Vintage Colheita Tawny Port cask for the finish. FYI: Colheita is a port wine made from single-vintage grapes aged in barrels for at least 7 years.

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 513: Glengoyne 12 Year Old 2010 Cask Owner for The Glen Connection

Some Belgian friends visit the Glengoyne distillery, enjoy both an extensive tour and a so-called blending masterclass afterwards and immediately decide to participate in the (now no longer active) Cask Owner's Programme. They carefully choose a PX hogshead and pay for 10 years of warehousing in advance. This is 2010. The intention was to bottle the cask at 11 years, but the pandemic put a stop to that. In the end, the three (Koen, Charly and Glenn) had to wait until June 2023 before their cask #1837 was bottled. It yielded 318 bottles. The cask strength of 56.3% is impressive, but especially the deep bronze color immediately appeals to the imagination. I was blown away by this malt!

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 514: Auchentoshan 13 Year Old 2007 La Maison du Whisky

This dark Auchentoshan – a vatting of two so-called 1st use sherry butts – was bottled by La Maison du Whisky, a famous French importer, in their so-called Artist Collective Series. This is release 5.6, a 13 years old Auchentoshan from 2007 at 48% with a great label by French artist Théo Guinard.

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 515: Auchentoshan 31 Year Old 1991 Whisky Sponge

Whisky Sponge – AKA Angus McRaild – is a lovely man with a great sense of humor and a way with words. He bottled this cask of Auchentoshan from 1991 with Decadent Drinks with the words ‘If you are a fan of Auchentoshan, please be aware, this whisky may have too much flavour and charisma for you’. Probably the best Auchentoshan he ever tasted, largely due to the fact that is very unlike Auchentoshan. His words, not mine. Have to check that out, right?

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 516: Auchentoshan 9 Year Old 2014 Old Particular for GOS

GOS is a whiskyshop in Heers, Belgium which is still a rather a long drive for me, but luckily the shop owner Ruben also ships his bottles, so it was easy peasy for me to get some bottles of this stuff to my house. It’s a young Auchentoshan, drawn from a refill barrel, that was bottled especially for the shop in the Old Particular series by Douglas Laing.

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 517: Nc'nean Quiet Rebels 'Gordon'

This is the third release in Nc'nean's Quiet Rebels series, all of which were created by a distillery employee. It started with the Annabel, named after founder Annabel Thomas, followed by the Lorna, named after the master distiller Lorna Davidson and now it's time for the Gordon, named after Distillery Manager Gordon Wood. Gordon chose a malt that was made with STR red wine casks, ex-sherry casks and ex-Rivesaltes casks. Rivesales is a French fortified dessert wine from the Longuedoc-Rousillon, a so-called vin doux naturel.

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 518: Glenkinchie 27 Year Old ‘The Floral Treasure’ DSR 2023

The Diageo Special Releases are a yearly returning series that is highly anticipated by many whisky lovers. This year’s edition included on of the oldest expressions from Glenkinchie, that Lowland distillery about an hour’s drive away from Edinburgh. Aptly named ‘The Floral Treasure’, I found it one of the best releases in this year’s offering.

@markjedi1 seems like I forgot the link... youtu.be/-L0MShbj4lU

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 519: The Wasted Wolf

The Wasted Wolf is a whisky bar & shop in Belgium. They’ve recently started bottling single casks as well, which triggered me to go an pay them a visit. In this 15min Rambling, we’ll try their first three releases: a Glen Moray, Campbeltown blended malt and a Milk & Honey.

youtu.be/GxwfdEtqJCM

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 520: Glen Scotia 10 Year Old 2010 Limited Batch Release

In 2021, Glen Scotia launched this so-called Limited Batch Release, 1918 bottles strong, for our northern neighbours in The Netherlands. The malt, distilled in 2010 and bottled in 2021, was given a heavy charred finish, which means as much as finished in heavily charred casks. I got a serious bottle remnant as a gift from my buddy Manny.

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 521: Braeckman Double Cask

Aha! A single malt from Belgian distiller Braeckman from Oudenaarde. It was not given an age statement for the understandable reason that this malt matured in first fill bourbon and oloroso sherry casks for 3 to 6 years.

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 522: Milk & Honey 4 Year Old 2019 Rye Cask for Liquid Art

In this Ramling I beg the question ‘do we need more M&H releases?’. Because despite the fact that they have only been around for a decade, I’ve already tried over 50 expressions, of which a large amount were independent bottlings. This is a release of a young Israeli malt that matured on a rye cask, released by Belgian bottler Liquid Art – at cask strength, of course. The answer is ‘yes’! Because this is again an outstanding malt.

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 523: Roseisle 12 Year Old Diageo Special Releases

The Diageo Special Releases are a yearly event that every whiskylover looks forward to. This year, it also saw the very first release – as a single malt – of the Roseisle distillery, that huge green plant near Elgin that produces two styles primarily: Speyside Light and Speyside Heavy. Most of the 12 million litres per annum are destined for blends like J&B, Bells, Buchanan and, of course, Johnnie Walker). But now we find ourselves able to try a 12 years old single malt from Roseisle, nicknamed The Origami Kite.

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 524: Teeling Crystal Malt

Happy Saint Patrick's Day! This can certainly be called a world premiere. On February 29, Teeling launched the very first triple distilled Irish whiskey made from Crystal Malt, a malt obtained by exposing the grain to extra heat during malting to crystallize the sugars. The result should provide additional notes of caramel and toffee. The whiskey was matured in Virgin American Oak barrels. It was initially only available in The Loop, the duty-free shop at Dublin Airport, but is now being rolled out to what they call key markets and that means it won't be long before it will also be on our shelves.

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 525: Starward in collaboration with Lagavulin

In 2015, Diageo invested a whopping 10 million Australian dollars in Starward, which meant that the distillery was able to move to new, much larger premises and thus increase production tenfold! In addition, it gained access to a global market, which explains the current popularity of the Starward whisky. And of course, the new family connection also meant that they suddenly had access to barrels from other distilleries from the Diageo stable at Starward, as happened here. After a regular maturation in red wine barrels from Australia, this malt was given a finish in barrels from the aristocrat of Islay: Lagavulin. To highlight the link, both the label and the box were given the typical Lagavulin green color.

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 526: Royal Salute 21 Year Old The Malts Blend

Every time my American friend John comes to visit, he brings a bottle, something I always say he shouldn't do, but something I'm always glad he did. For example, on his last trip he brought this Royal Salute 21 Year Old The Malts Blend, bought in Japan. Well, the Malts Blend is of course a blended malt, which in this case was put together by Chivas' master blender Sandy Hyslop, with no less than 21 malts that have all matured for at least 21 years and come from all the different whisky regions. Fascinating!

Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 527: Tomatin 12 Year Old 2011 Double-V

This young Tomatin was bottled by Belgian bottler Double-V for a local whiskyshop – The Whiskybarn - & a local whisky club – The Green Door Whisky Club. It was in fact presented last summer when I was at their club hosting a tasting. At the end of the tasting the final bottles were offered and I was able to grab the very last one. I promised them I’d do a Rambling on it, so here we are. Let me first apologize for the long wait, but I really wanted to take it to Austria with me. Nice detail: the malt was matured on a Koval cask, a craft whiskey producer in Chicago!