The Malt Cask

Highland Park is a distillery located in the Orkney Islands, at the very North-East tip of Scotland, alongside the Scapa distillery. It is a malt that I never really considered at the beginning of my whisky adventure as it seemed to be readily available in supermarkets, often discounted (which to me suggested it wasn't anything special) and final nail in the coffin, the presentation didn't really shout quality in my opinion. After a couple of months investigating the whisky world, reading reviews of various distilleries and bottles, I realised Highland Park very often came out on top in terms of quality single malt for a very affordable price, so decided to wait for the next offer, and when it happened, I bought a bottle. And I haven't been disappointed indeed. The official packaging states the following: "A uniquely smooth, balanced single malt, with a rich full flavour and a gentle smoky finish" and I do fully agree with this statement. Highland Park 12

A bit of a 'sherry monster' today, that is to say a heavily sherried whisky which has matured exclusively in ex-sherry casks, and for this particular one, it has been Oloroso casks all along. Aberlour A'bunadh is a name which has come back again and again when I have done some research about sherried whisky. Macallan has always seemed to be some kind of reference as far as sherried whisky go but I still haven't tried any of their bottling. To me, the Macallan hype added to the fact they have now discontinued their aged statement range to replace it by Non Aged Statements (NAS) have meant a serious bump in prices which I am not prepared to pay (for now at least). However, many other distilleries do produce more affordable sherry monsters, such as Glenfarclas (the 15 is on my list of bottles to buy) or Glendronach (which I have tried and will review when I manage to bring my bottles back from France!).  Aberlour is a Speyside distillerie I was already familiar as I hav

Laphroaig (like many other peat power-houses) is like Marmite, either you love it or you hate it! Fortunately for me, I love it. I say fortunately because in my opinion they produce some excellent whisky. The 18 year-old I am about to review is a good example of this. I started with the Quarter Cask, which is still one of my favourite go-to dram (and I need to review it, yes!) before upgrading to the 18 when I realised how much a bottle would cost me if I bought it in France... The 18 replaced the 15 in 2009 in the standard range. The 15 re-appeared in 2015 as a "limited release" for the 200th anniversary but some sites mention that the 18 could potentially be discontinued by the end of 2016*. Other people told me that, in their opinion, Laphroaig might alternate between 15 and 18, which would allow them so preserve their stock for a longer period...  Keep an eye and an ear out and if any of you have any concrete info, let us know in the comment section. Anyway, back to the