Gift-giving season has finally arrived! While some folks are busy trimming trees and baking cookies, we’re making our whiskey shopping lists and checking them twice. Over the years, we’ve had the great pleasure of tasting thousands of whiskeys and discovered such a wide range of flavors. With that in mind, our recommendations this year are listed by flavor rather than by style.
We follow our fruity whiskey gift guide with another favorite flavor of ours: peaty whiskey. Recommendations include limited-editions released this year, as well as some of our all-time favorites. Along with our flavor graph, you can find more details like bottle descriptions, expert tasting notes and community ratings by clicking on each spirit link.
Peaty Whiskey
While peaty whiskey is going to be more Scotch-centric, there are some other parts of the world that produce this style. Single malts, blends, and even American ryes and bourbons have experimented with peat. You can find these whiskeys and more by filtering by flavor within the Distiller app.
Rich & Peaty
Rich and peaty whiskey often have accents of fruit, sweet and spice flavors, but the robust peat flavors dominate the dram.
Compass Box Secrets of Smoke (SRP $165)
malty, tangy, salty and chocolatey with flavors of charcoal smoke
Lagavulin 12 Year Fireside Tales (2024 Special Release) (SRP $180)
robust & peaty with apple, toffee, and tobacco notes
Port Charlotte 10 Year (SRP $75)
peaty & rich with orange peel, vanilla, and hay
Johnnie Walker Green Label 15 Year (SRP $64.99)
rich malt, earthy mushrooms, honey-covered dates, and smoky black tea
Fruity & Peaty
Port, sherry, and wine cask finishes offer a fruity accent to the peaty whiskey.
Glenglassaugh Portsoy (SRP $75)
mix of smoky bacon, cherry jam, and mossy peat
Laphroaig Cairdeas Cask Favorites ($109.99)
mesquite BBQ smoke, grilled pineapple, dried apricots, and roasted salted nuts
Ardbeg Spectacular (SRP $129.99)
dark cherries, toasted malt, and beach bonfire smoke
Torabhaig Cnoc Na Mòine (SRP $65)
smoked meat, prunes, fudge and candied orange zest
Herbal & Peaty
Grassy, mossy and heather flavors here mix well with the moderately peaty flavors.
Westland Solum (SRP $149.99)
peat smoke, vanilla pudding, wet soil, and dark chocolate brownies
Stauning SMOKE (SRP $99.99)
sweet smoke, tobacco, thyme, and bittersweet chocolate
Meikle Tòir The Chinquapin One (SRP $75)
herbal smoke, savory malt, with a peppery bite
Highland Park 12 Year (SRP $60)
heathered peat, honey, and moderate barrel spices
Of course, there are dozens of additional peaty whiskey suggestions that we could make — hundreds, in fact! If you’re ready to dive deeper, you can discover them all with our Flavor Search feature available to all Distiller Pro users.
With Distiller, you’ll always know what’s in the bottle before you spend a cent. Rate, Review and Discover spirits! Head on over to Distiller, or download the app for iOS and Android today!
