Throughout the first half of both of my Burns Night line-ups this year, I gave different grains a good platform. Each line-up featured (effectively) 2 single grain whiskies out of the first 3 bottles (sure, one may not be officially labelable as Scotch whisky), but this bottle is a single malt with a grain story to tell.

Arran single malt whisky (from the Lochranza distillery on the Isle of Arran) is mostly made using the Concerto variety of barley. This bottle, however, is the first in a series of releases that will use different varieties and explore different cask maturations. For this first entry, they’ve used Optic barley from a local Arran farm and aged the spirit in a mix of bourbon and sherry barrels similar to their standard 10 year old.

Much like different grapes with wine, there is a vast whisky canvas to paint with barley varieties. Concerto has, within the last 10 years, been overtaken by Laureate, in Scotland, as the most used for making whisky. When we look at England, there’s a bit more diversity, and I think that’s partly because the operations are often smaller and a little more artisanal in their approaches. Regardless, the industrially popular strains tend to be so because of crop & alcohol yields (same goes for yeasts as well), and older barley varieties, which may have been less hardy or fermentable, often had different flavours, which was what made them attractive in the first place. I’m all for this kind of exploration!

Notes: 👃🏻Citrus, oak, caramel, buttered rye bread, clay 👄Kiwi & lime, pepper, aniseed, oat chocolate.

It had been a few years since I’d introduced a Cù Bòcan, but I have fond memories of their brand of highland smoke: it’s subtle, but undeniable. And, the Creation series has always embodied that, whilst playfully experimenting with casks to produce delicious and different whiskies. This, the 7th edition in that series, is no exception, marrying virgin oak and Pineau des Charentes Rouge casks – the latter being an oak aged French fortified wine produced by combining ~1 year old cognac with unfermented grape juice (to prevent its fermentation).

This brand, which Tomatin distillery uses to release its smokey whisky (made only during 1 week every winter since 2005), is named after the black ghost dog with fiery red eyes that is said to haunt the village, and vanishes in a puff of smoke. This release, however, with the red (fortified) wine effects, and especially with the distillery subtitle of Rhubarb & Custard, feels less demonic, and more like a different, eponymous (misspelt) cartoon dog: playful and adventurous.

Notes: 👃🏻Vanilla, soft clean smoke, treacle, purple Jelly Babies 👄Heather & honey, vegetal smoke, red wine sweetness, floral.

You can’t go wrong with Big Peat. To top off a tasting with a solid example of what a heavily peated whisky can taste like, you don’t have to look much further. The original member of Douglas Laing’s blended Remarkable Regional Malts series, Big Peat comes in many finishes and forms, but it pretty much always packs a peaty punch. This expression is a rare thing, though, as it features a vintage and bottling date, allowing us to infer a rough age. All of the blend components were laid down in their casks in 2010, so with a bottling date of 2025 (released to commemorate Fèis Ìle that year), we know we have 14 or 15 year old Islay whiskies.

The bit of the circle I can’t quite square is that Big Peat advertise their components as Caol Ila, Bowmore, Ardbeg and Port Ellen – but Port Ellen ceased operations in 1983. Maybe the refill casks that this blend is reported to have matured in featured some Port Ellen barrels? No matter that gap in my knowledge, this bottle was a refreshing change to me compared to the last handful of Big Peats I’ve tried, as they were all fun cask finishes. But this was a pretty direct, intense, smokey thing – a wonderful finale.

Notes: 👃🏻Aniseed, citrus jelly, bonfire 👄 Tyres, iodine, ash, agave, cinder toffee.