Whisky Off The Beaten Path

Aged initially in American oak, they are subsequently finished in Ruby Port, Tawny Port, and Vintage Port casks. Tricky business aging whisky in a tropical climate, let alone double maturing.

Indeed, as the name states, this is aged in ex-bourbon casks and, unlike their Soloist Ex-Bourbon bottling, this is reduced from cask strength to 46% abv.

Kavalan is in a unique position of having to define, not only for itself, but in a way, for Taiwan, what whisky from this location should taste like. They've settled on creating whiskies that they and their countrymen would drink which are whiskies that are more sweet and fruity. As a result, expect to see many of their whiskies either aged entirely, or at least finished, in wine casks.

The young distillery, Kavalan, released their first bottling in December 2008, but they have already made quite an impression winning awards and accolades. Distilled at the King Car Distillery in Taiwan, Kavalan is the name of the earliest tribe that inhabited Yilan, where King Car resides. The Classic bottling here is aged in ex-bourbon and ex-sherry casks but mostly of the refill variety.

While there is a history of distilling in Wales, there had been over a hundred year old lag until September 2000 when the first distillate at Penderyn was produced. This whisky is a single malt that, due to the unusual shape of their copper pot still, only is distilled once to an usually high 92%. The whisky is aged in ex bourbon and finished in a Madeira wine cask.

Amrut Distilleries has been distilling since 1948, but only began producing single malt whisky back in the 1980's (prior to that, it was brandy). When they had a surplus of whisky back in the mid 1990's they decided to let it age a bit longer than they previously had been. Well, that changed everything. Hello world, there's a new style of whisky on the market!

As the climate is quite warm and tropical where it is aged (Bangalore), the single malt whiskies are aged only 4-5 years. Amrut Fusion is made using both Indian and Scottish barley. Mashed, distilled, and aged separately, they are then married and aged for a further 3 months in Bourbon barrels.

This Indian whisky was originally matured in either ex-bourbon casks or virgin oak casks. The whiskies then went through an intermediate maturing process in Sherry butts at Amrut’s Bangalore distillery. Amrut then transferred the whisky back into ex-bourbon casks for another round of aging.

This single malt sources its barley from the Himalayas and ages the whisky at an altitude of over 3,000 feet above sea level in Bangalore. In this climate, the angels take way more than their share as up to 15% abv of the whisky is lost per year.

This bottling from Utah based High West is a combination of three different whiskeys. It combines straight bourbon (71% corn, 21% rye, 4% barley malt) and straight rye (95% rye, 5% malted barley) both distilled at Indiana's MGP distillery. Also included is blended malt Scotch whisky from an undisclosed (per the contract) source. The whiskeys range in age from 5-8 years. Note: This product has been updated to include High West's own rye distillate to the blend.