Edradour Ballechin 2003 Cask #702

This official Ballechin, a 13 year old, from 2003, cask 702, at 54.6%, 435 bottles in all. Ballechin is Edradour's smoky single malt, peated to around fifty parts per million. Its tiny copper stills and worm tubs give a rich, oily, full bodied spirit.

The spirit was made from malt peated to around fifty parts per million in the tiny stills, building the rich, peated Ballechin style. It was matured in refill ex-Bourbon oak, a soft vanilla beneath the rich spirit. Integration folds eugenol (clove) and vanillin (vanilla) into the smoky malt, the body fuller and oilier. Maturation in the dunnage warehouses at Pitlochry is slow and steady. Under Signatory the range has grown to a wide run of sherry and wine cask bottlings. It keeps the old ways, with an open cast iron mash tun, Oregon pine washbacks and worm tub condensers. It is one of the smallest traditional distilleries in Scotland, long run by just two or three hands.

At cask strength 54.6% it is big and oily. Peat smoke, fig and a soft chocolate, with a soft vanilla from the oak. It is rich and smoky, the oily spirit shining through. A rich finish ends on soft ash and dried fruit. This is Ballechin's heavily peated, oily style.