The Malt Cask

A first for me on the Malt Cask, the review of a bottle of rye whisky. I have not really spent much time with rye since I got into whisky apart from Woodford reserve rye -which is actually excellent- so I thought it was time to change that and get myself a bottle of the stuff. But which one to choose? As usual, I did my homework and went online checking different names and reviews and came up with a few names which seemed to be highly recommended, Rittenhouse amongst them. From the web to real life, I ended up finding a bottle of their Straight Rye 40 % (they also have a bottled in bond version at 50%) in one of my local spirit shop and what was even better is that it only cost me £29.  Rittenhouse Rye is produced by the Heaven Hill Distillery, based in Kentucky. Heaven Hill also produce Henry McKenna, Elijah Craig, Evan Williams and a few other names.  So what is the difference between a standard Bourbon and a Rye whiskey. Of course the base of the mash bills, Bou...

Apart from my post about the Caol Ila 19 from the Old Malt Cask range, I haven't actually reviewed anything more from independent bottlers. Today, I am going to change that with a bottle from Gordon and Macphail and their Macphail's Collection range. It is an 8 years old Bunnahabhain, but unlike the standard 12 I reviewed a few months ago, this one is "heavily peated".  If you are familiar with the Bunnahabhain distillery, you will know than despite being located in the North East of Islay, the single malt they produced is mostly unpeated. In my mind, it has this very distinctive Christmas cake nose and taste, rich, full of sultanas and dried fruit notes. Every now and then, they do release some peaty whisky with bottles like the Toiteach or Ceòbanach. I have never tried any of these before, so peaty Bunnahabhain is a first for me. As far as the Macphail's Collection range is concerned and according to the Gordon and Macphail's website , it is "a sma...