Glenfarclas Heritage 45° North

A distillery release of Glenfarclas, at 45%. Glenfarclas is a deep, dark Speyside malt of dried fruit, nut and spice. Its slow, cool dunnage maturation loses very little to the angels each year. It holds some sixty eight thousand casks on site in dunnage warehouses, with stock from every year since 1953. Its whiskies are bottled at their natural colour, without chill filtration. It launched the 105 in 1968, one of the first cask strength single malts sold to the public.

It was distilled in copper pot stills, for the rich, sherried make Glenfarclas is known for. It was fully matured in an Oloroso sherry cask, the wood deep in the rich spirit. Without an age statement, a dark sugar and dried fruit point to good years in cask. Vanillin and oak lactones from the wood lend vanilla and a soft coconut over the fruit. The full spirit deepens with time, the cask drawing out its darker register.

At an approachable 45% it is soft and fruity. Raisin, chocolate and a warm spice, with dried fruit, fig and walnut from the cask. The body is full and rich, the fruit deep and dark. A long finish carries raisin, chocolate and a treacle. This is a Speyside single malt of real standing.