Today we’re thrilled to announce the launch of Caskstrength.net’s first official whisky! Bottled to mark its 3rd Birthday, this is the first time any blog has released its own single malt, and we’re very proud to be the exclusive stockist!

Caskstrength.net was founded in 2008 by Neil and Joel, both formerly rival A&R men, working at Warner Bros and Island Records respectively. They formed the blog to share their love of whisky with friends and family, but since More...

We gave a few whisky bloggers a simple brief: come up with a great cocktail using our 8 year old blended whisky. We’ve had some great responses, and today’s cocktail is no exception! This recipe was sent to us by Gal Granov who writes the brilliant blog “Whisky Israel”, which is a great source of tasting notes and whisky reviews (despite being written in a country with an incredibly high tax on spirits!). So without further ado… More...

Following our intrepid journey to Islay in May, we were invited back to brave the gale force winds and torrential rain to attend a very special event at the island’s youngest distillery.

We left early, and headed to Kilchoman for the launch of their new bottle, as well as a new limited edition, cask strength distillery-only number. More...

On Monday we took the train up to London for an event we’d been looking forward to for some time. London in summer is quite possibly the best combination of city and season the world has to offer, it has to be said. So we were in high spirits as we arrived at the Saatchi Gallery for a Suntory tasting entitled “The Art of Japanese Whisky”. More...

Father’s Day 2011 (Sunday 19th June) is encroaching, and as a whisky retailer we feel dutifully obliged to recommend that you buy your papa a gift he will actually enjoy, and not another pair of socks. In a bid to save father/child relationships the country over, we’ve compiled a list of the socks you were going to get him, and the whisky-related merchandise you should really get him instead. More...

Sadly, due to the sheer number of brilliant whisky blogs out there, we could only invite ten to participate in our Bloggers’ Blend competition. We felt simply awful about limiting it in this way; it was like we’d discovered utopia but, due to out-dated licensing laws, were forced to allow just 10 people in.

In response to this, some bloggers sent us tear-stained letters, one fled to Nepal and now makes and sells terracotta pots, and, in protest, one has pledged to talk exclusively through a Kazoo. More...

A couple of weeks back, a contingent of Chaps from Master of Malt attended the brand new Boisdale over at Canary Wharf, for an extra special Old Pulteney tasting.

The tasting was led by Lucas of Edinburgh Whisky Blog fame and now brand ambassador for Inver House.

First off, the venue was fantastic. The Boisdale over at Victoria is superb, but the new one, right in the heart of Canary Wharf, is astonishing. On the 2nd floor (the whisky bar/jazz club) is an enormous window that spans one side of the room entirely, and it overlooks the Credit Suisse building, and beyond that, the Thames. It was an idyllic setting as we sat at the bar enjoying a couple of G&Ts prior to the tasting. More...

You’ve almost certainly seen the numerous posts about the Blogger’s Blend competition on the bloggers’ own websites. Just in case any of you missed it, you can read more here.

Well, it’s votin’ time. If you’ve bought yourself a Bloggers’ Blend set with samples of all the blends, you can vote for you favourites at the Blogger’s Blend Voting page. Look how shiny it is. It was crafted by the finest artisans, all of whom were gifted with an in-depth knowledge of jQuery and ASP.NET, just like the craftsmen of yore. We’ve selected AV as our voting method, so simply visit the page and order the blends by order of preference. More...

Sadly, when we awoke on Saturday, we discovered that there had been “poorly defined ferry issues”. This meant we couldn’t attend Ardbeg’s distillery day, and instead we had to pack our things and race across the island to reach the morning boat. You can imagine our chagrin. It looked to be a great day and the weather was splendid, complete with blue skies and, for the first time in over a week, we were thrilled to see our tired bodies were casting shadows on the ground. This felt like a good omen for our Lord of the Rings-style quest home (in this case, back to the Shire). More...

For the first time ever, one of France’s big Cognac houses has started putting age statements on its products. Courvoisier have begun labelling Cognacs just like we do in the whisky industry, where the number reflects the age of the youngest spirit in the bottle.

The new age statement releases give a real insight into Cognac, and it’s particularly interesting that Courvoisier should take this route, as the previous designations were very vague indeed. In fact, if you were to ask the average spirits drinker what the difference between a More...