“Hey! Wait just one second. People are incorrectly spelling November and are growing things on their faces that suggest they shouldn’t be within a 500 metre radius of a school. What the devil is going on?”

Maybe that reaction was entirely made up, but it does give me an excuse to fully explain Movember to all who will lend an ear, and so here goes…

At Master of Malt, we’ve been loyal Movember supporters for ages, but for the past few years we’ve actively participated by launching our own, incredibly special, More...

So – it’s that time of year again. Jim Murray waves his magic wand, and retailers and brand owners alike scrabble around frantically trying to fulfil orders of what, last week, was a very good, if slow-selling line (before you ask, the 90 bottles I managed to prise out of the distributor’s hands disappeared within an hour and a half. I’ll let you know when there’s more stock available).

For those of you who are interested, you can read all about my trip up to The Old Pulteney distillery here and Mike’s tasting notes of the full range (including an exclusive taste of the soon-to-be-released 40yo) here.

Now; I’m going to leave all the usual punditry around whether or not it deserves this title to others (and I’m sure there’ll be no shortage of discussion as ever). It’s a very good whisky, for sure, but what I really wanted to talk about was this screenshot: More...

Created by the “madcap” Professor Cornelius Ampleforth, the romantically- and SWA-appeasingly-named Proprietary Barley Spirit Drink combines the Professor’s signature love for infusin’ and mixin’ with his passion for whisky and the ways and techniques of yore. Yes, yore.

For this thrilling instalment, Ampleforth turned to Spain, and to the mountainous countryside that surrounds Pajarate. It was here that Paxarette was born; a dark, syrupy liquid made by boiling down grape juice and fortified wine. In the past, the Scotch whisky industry made use of Paxarette to season casks, simply by pouring this rich flavouring into the wood, to help impart a fuller, richer sherry character into the whisky that was aged in them.More...

Today I have the supreme pleasure of tasting the latest batch of Aberlour a’Bunadh.

Of all the on-going cask strength whiskies, a’Bunadh is steadfastly in the top three of our “best value for money” malts, because it’s just such an awesome, enveloping dram.

It’s actually a recreation of whisky from the days of yore (from 1898 to be precise), and it all started in 1975, when a team of distillery workmen were installing the second pair of stills at Aberlour. As they worked, they discovered a time capsule which contained a newspaper from 1898, wrapped around a bottle of Aberlour whisky. More...

It’s official – Maltstock is Awesome.

I mean, last year’s event was really, really good, but this year it kicked up a gear in every conceivable way. Having sung the praises of the event to Neil from Caskstrength, we decided to go to the event together, and resolved to deliver a masterclass on some of our favourite whiskies from closed distilleries.

Having set off for the drive from Tunbridge Wells to Dover in ‘plenty of time’, we managed to miss the ferry like a complete pair of rejects (well, one reject, and an immaculately dressed man in Crepe Soled Shoes at any rate). Having secured passage on the next available ferry, we settled in at Dover for the wait. After what seemed like an eternity, our Ferry arrived, and we boarded. After ascertaining that there was nothing of interest in the Duty Free Shop, we repaired to shoot Zombies (we couldn’t find a ‘boy in care’ to help us out, and were consequently killed reasonably soon). More...

Today I’m tasting a brace of “craft” rye whiskeys from the High West distillery – the first legally licenced distillery in Utah since US Prohibition ended.

I’m starting off with High West Rendezvous – the first commercially available whiskey from the distillery. It was named after the 19^th century meetings of mountain men, who gathered together in the summer to trade their various wares (mostly fur). These gatherings were frequented by the kind of men who wore coonskin caps, bushy moustaches and moccasins, and the whiskey they drank at the time was fairly raw and fiery. More...

As many of you will remember, a Master of Malt contingent attended last year’s Maltstock event, and had an absolute whale of a time – read all about it here...

The Maltstock Sharing Table

Maltstock is coming again, and in under 2 weeks’ time, I’ll be making my way over there with the irrepressible Neil Ridley (from off of that there www.caskstrength.net), a car full of Master of Malt goodies, my responsible drinking boots, and my iPhone charger. Must take the iPhone charger (I figure if I keep writing it, there’s at least a 50% chance I’ll actually remember this time). More...

We've just received this press release from the Number One Drinks Company. This is literally the biggest thing to happen to Japanese whisky in decades!

The entire remaining inventory of Mercian’s Karuizawa Distillery has been acquired on behalf of Number One Drinks by an Asian-based company. International importer and distributor of Japanese malt whisky, Number One Drinks Company, has handled worldwide sales of Karuizawa single casks since 2006 and has helped raise the profile of Japanese single malts internationally, especially with the help of distributors in the key markets of Taiwan, France, UK and Sweden.

Of the 12 Gold Medals awarded by the Malt Maniacs in 2010, four were for whiskies sourced by Number One Drinks (including three Karuizawas) and the Best Japanese Whisky in Jim Murray’s Whisky Bible 2011 was a 1967 single cask from Karuizawa. More...

It must be said, we’ve been on a bit of a bottling frenzy recently; in the last few of months alone we’ve put our name to four new casks, including an incredibly bourbon-rich North British, a big, complex Cragganmore, a rich and spicy Dalmore, and an impressively malty Inchgower!

Today we have another new addition to the Master of Malt range, in the form of an utterly delicious number from Dailuaine (pronounced Dall-YEWan). More...