Master of Malt Whisky Blog

Category: Tasting Notes

Spotlight on… Armagnac!

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Armagnac is a fantastic spirit that many savvy drinkers, including many whisky fans, have begun exploring with enthusiasm in recent years. The good news is that there’s never been a better time to dip a toe in the Armagnac ‘eau’, as we’re offering Free UK Shipping on your *entire* order (or £5 off elsewhere) when you buy any bottle of Comte de Lauvia until the end of July. That includes their Fine, Réserve and Hors d’Age expressions, newly launched in the UK!

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Categories : Armagnac, Cognac, News, Tasting Notes
Tags : Drinks by the Dram, free shipping, Guides, Tasting Set
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‘The Exceptional’ Whiskies Now Available!

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The Exceptional whisky

The Exceptional Malt, Grain and Blend from Don Sutcliffe and former Managing Director of The Macallan Willie Phillips launch in the UK.

Available on Master of Malt today are three new Scotch whiskies from American independent bottler Sutcliffe & Son, brought to the UK by Number One Drinks. Called ‘The Exceptional’, the chaps behind them are none other than Willie Phillips, who was Managing Director of The Macallan between 1978 and 1996 (crucial years for the development of this famous single malt, of course) and Craft Distillers Managing Director Don Sutcliffe who worked with him to grow The Macallan in the US back in the late 1980s. Friends for 25 years, The Exceptional is something of a passion project for them both, working also with Master Blender Bill Arthur.

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Categories : News, Scotch Whisky, Tasting Notes, Whisky
Tags : Balvenie, Glenfiddich, Loch Lomond, Macallan, Speyside Whisky
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Whisky Advent Day 24: 50 Year Old Douglas Laing Grain

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Whisky Advent Calendar

Well, here we are. Here we stand, on the very brink of Christmas 2015 – Christmas Eve itself – and the final day of #WhiskyAdvent. Behind window 24 of every Drinks by the Dram Whisky Advent Calendar is a grain whisky that’s at least 50 years old(!), bottled by the fine folk from Douglas Laing for their excellent Xtra Old Particular range.

Whether you have an exclusive 50 year old Invergordon*, a 50 year old blended grain, a 50 year old Girvan (image below) or, as we’ve received here at MoM Towers, a 53 year old North British (tasting note below), you’ll be able to enjoy some extraordinarily well-aged grain courtesy of Douglas Laing. Many of you let us know how much you enjoyed your Girvan grains on Day 18, so this second grain should cause a fair bit of excitement. These are whiskies that matured for over half a century for goodness sake! Enjoy, and have an absolutely fantastic Christmas one and all!

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Categories : Scotch Whisky, Tasting Notes, Whisky
Tags : Advent Calendars, Douglas Laing, Drinks by the Dram, Girvan, Grain Whisky, Invergordon, North British
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Whisky Advent Day 23: Glenfiddich 18 Year Old

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Whisky Advent Calendar

Just one day to go before Christmas Eve, which means:

You still have until 9pm tonight to get your UK Mainland Christmas orders in!

Meanwhile, in The Whisky Advent Calendar from Drinks by the Dram today is a whisky from one of the best selling speyside single malt Scotch distilleries in the world (until recently, the best selling)…

The Glenfiddich name and stag (reendowed with his 12-pointed antlers last year) have become synonymous with single malt, with Glenfiddich having been the first whisky marketed as such back in 1963. It was a gamble that paid off handsomely, and the rest, as they say, is history! It’s well worth revisiting their range, with this 18 year old having been matured in a mix of Oloroso Sherry and bourbon casks.

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Categories : Scotch Whisky, Tasting Notes, Whisky
Tags : Advent Calendars, Drinks by the Dram, Glenfiddich, Single Malt Whisky, Speyside Whisky
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Whisky Advent Day 22: Teeling Small Batch Irish Whiskey

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Whisky Advent Calendar

Just three days until Christmas and, including today’s, just three drams left in The Whisky Advent Calendar. Slightly bittersweet perhaps, with Christmas being completely awesome but having to say goodbye to a new whisky every day… Fortunately Drinks by the Dram have thought of that, and have a range of dram-filled Christmas Crackers too!

For now some fine drams remain, however, with another Irish whiskey to enjoy behind window 22 courtesy of those Teeling boys. First their family gave us the independent Cooley distillery (producing the excellent Connemara Peated single malt and Greenore single grain, for example), purchased by Beam in 2011, and now in 2015 they’ve opened the first whisky distillery in Dublin for 125 years!

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Categories : Irish Whiskey, Tasting Notes, Whisky
Tags : Advent Calendars, Blended Whisky, Drinks by the Dram, Teeling
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Whisky Advent Day 21: Dalwhinnie Winter’s Gold

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Whisky Advent Calendar

We really are on the final stretch now, and in Drinks by the Dram The Whisky Advent Calendar today is a dram that you may wish to prepare before drinking. You see, it’s designed to be served thoroughly chilled (ice cold) so reach out of the window and pop it in the snow for a good while. Or, if the weather where you are is actually pretty mild (absolutely no sign of a white Christmas here this year!) then you’ll have to shove it in the freezer as the producer suggests.

A whisky designed to be served straight from the freezer?! No, it’s not The Snow Grouse. In fact, it’s a single malt! Made with spirit distilled exclusively between October and March, Dalwhinnie have released a winter special edition that has been “Crafted by the Cold”…

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Categories : Tasting Notes, Whisky
Tags : Advent Calendars, Dalwhinnie, Drinks by the Dram
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Whisky Advent Day 20: Jura Elixir 12 Year Old

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Whisky Advent Calendar

After all the excitement of yesterday, you may be in need of a pick-me-up. Some kind of elixir, perhaps? Well, Jura believe they have just the thing with their second contribution to Drinks by the Dram The Whisky Advent Calendar, this time carrying an age statement (the youngest whisky used is at least 12 year old).

Elixir seems an appropriate name for a scotch single malt whisky, a word that comes from ‘uisge beatha’ or ‘water of life’. There’s even a gravestone on Jura that suggest that one local man lived to see 180 Christmases! Local folklore credits the island’s water, which was blessed by St. Columba nearly 1,500 years ago, for helping the inhabitants live long and healthy lives. Then again, perhaps it was just a ‘typo’… (Engrave-o? Monumental masonro?)

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Categories : Scotch Whisky, Tasting Notes, Whisky
Tags : Advent Calendars, Drinks by the Dram, Islands Whisky, Jura, Single Malt Whisky
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Whisky Advent Day 19: The Lost Distilleries Blend

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Whisky Advent Calendar

We’ll be honest with you, we didn’t think anything Drinks by the Dram’s The Whisky Advent Calendar could throw at us would be more exciting than the release of a new Star Wars movie. (Even with the endless adverts beforehand “make sure you have the official Star Wars mascara” etc.) Not until the final window, perhaps. Wrong, we were, however, as day 19 has provided The Lost Distilleries Blend from The Blended Whisky Company!

Named World’s Best Blended Whisky at Whisky Magazine’s World Whiskies Awards in 2014, it does exactly what it says on the tin – it’s a blend of whiskies exclusively from sadly now closed distilleries, many of whom have become legendary such as Port Ellen and Caperdonich. There’s even some Imperial entanglements in there… Yes, the force is strong with this one.

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Categories : Tasting Notes, Whisky
Tags : Advent Calendars, Blended Whisky, Drinks by the Dram, Peaty Whisky, Port Ellen, The Blended Whisky Company, The Lost Distilleries Blend
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Whisky Advent Day 18: Girvan Patent Still Proof Strength

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Whisky Advent Calendar

Into the final week of #WhiskyAdvent we go and today it’s time for our first grain whisky from The Whisky Advent Calendar by Drinks by the Dram…

Now, most of you will have William Grant & Sons’ Girvan Patent Still Proof Strength. As mentioned on Day 2 though, these advent calendars have been extraordinarily popular this year, with sales surpassing all forecasts! This means that on a small number of days not everybody could have the exact same dram. Everyone does have a Girvan today, but some of you may be enjoying a Girvan 20 Year Old 1993 from Douglas Laing’s Clan Denny range, or indeed a Girvan 21 Year Old 1994 from their Old Particular range (both excellent independent bottlings).

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Categories : Scotch Whisky, Tasting Notes, Whisky
Tags : Advent Calendars, Drinks by the Dram, Girvan, Grain Whisky, Haig
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Whisky Advent Day 17: Mackmyra Brukswhisky

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Whisky Advent Calendar

Day 17 of #WhiskyAdvent and time to leave Scotland once again, for today’s Whisky Advent Calendar dram is a single malt from Sweden!

Mackmyra opened their first distillery back in 1999 and have since gained a reputation for producing some top malts. In 2012 they opened a second site, a gravity-run facility that stands at 37 metres high! This is where all of their distillation now takes place, save for the odd special run.

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Categories : Tasting Notes, Whisky
Tags : Advent Calendars, Drinks by the Dram, Macallan, Mackmyra, Single Malt Whisky, Swedish Whisky
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