The 18th Annual Gathering of the Clan, Ardbeggeddon XVIII.
Ardbeg. Including an Allied director’s personal ‘Ardbeg 10’*, all three 1974 Provenance, Feis Ile 2002 Cask 2390, and a few others.
This particular Ardbeg 10 was distilled in the 1960’s during Hiram Walker’s ownership and bottled prior to Allied mothballing the distillery in the 1980’s. The thrifty Scots used 10 year old labels in those days, regardless of the age of the distillate. Not a great whisky, let alone a great Ardbeg, but a worthy and interesting bit of history.
On purchasing Ardbeg in 1997, GlenMonsanto decided to start cash flowing to the distillery by releasing a few bottlings of stuff they found in the warehouse: 17 yo lightly peated, Vintage 1975, Vintage 1978, and 1974 Provenance. There were three releases of Provenance: 55.6% bottled in 1997 for Europe and Asia, 54.7% bottled in 1998 for the US (which sold so poorly at $500 that much unsold whisky was repatriated back to Scotland), and 55% bottled in March and September 2000 for the US and Japan. We managed to bring sealed bottles of all three to Ardbeggeddon XVIII last week and tasted them side by side for the first time. 54.7% was the most fruity and sweet, 55.6% was the most coastal, and 55% had the most oomph. My favorite was the 4th glass, in which I vatted all three together; it was perfection.
I contributed the shorter bottle on the left, the first release (55.6%), which was bottled only in 700ml and never sold in the US.
A friend of ours in Italy bought a bunch of the '74 a number of years ago. Now, whenever his wife gets mad at him for buying too much whisky, he says “But remember how well we did on that '74 Ardbeg you didn’t want me to buy…?”
My favorite Bunnahabhain, second only to 1968 Bunnahabhain Auld Acquaintance, is this Whyte and Whyte 1969, 25 year old fresh sherry cask (52.8%). Whyte and Whyte was a Chicago area Signatory importer in the 1990’s. Their cask selection was excellent. If you ever see one of their bottles molding on a retail shelf, the odds are it is very good (or better) and worth buying. The odds aren’t very great of finding any, as my friends and I have vacuumed them up over the years. I think we exhausted the supplies of this 25 year old Bunny in the last century.
Sarah,
Yup, there are some great, old Islay sherry casks from the usual suspects (primarily Ardbeg and, less often, Laphroaig and Bunny). Of the newer releases, Kilchoman does better than the others, in my opinion, but their oldest whisky is 10 years old and only time will tell. Sherry casks are generally miss and hit throughout Scotch whisky these days, as cask selection is mostly poor. I have no tolerance for sulfur, matchstick, rubber, whatever. Probably to my disadvantage.
One of the great fresh sherry cask Ardbegs is Cask #2390, pictured among the Ardbegs in the original post; the one with the gold seal on the label. Distilled in 1976, hand bottled in 2002 for Feis Ile, and one to a customer at the distillery during the festival for a day or two before they sold out. My bottle is long gone and I truly appreciate when one of my brethren or, this year, sisters, sacrifices a bottle. The dumpy Signatory at the far left in the first photo is a dark oloroso Ardbeg 30, distilled in 1967. Also a very, very fine whisky.
Mark - do you think the poor sherry cash selection has anything to do with the fact that so many of the aren’t really sherry casks? I mean, they have been briefly seasoned with sherry, but were actually made for the scotch industry, so they don’t impart much of the good stuff?
I noticed the Signatory dumpy bottle in your original picture right away. Thanks for the details on that and the '76 Feis Ile.
Paxarette is no longer permitted to season barrels and sloshing a bit of px sherry in a barrel isn’t the problem, in the opinion of many. The problem is sulphur.
Jim Murray has long raged against the use of sulphur candles to sanitize sherry casks. Here are a couple of interesting articles.
I am among those who are sensitive to sulphur in whisky and cannot stand even a whiff of it.
A few more Bunnies, including a sample drawn by valinch at the distillery.
