Ardmore 20 Year Old 1992 Cask #4957 (Glen Fahrn)

A 20 year old single cask Ardmore released by Swiss merchant Glen Fahrn in 2013 as part of the Airline Edition series. The 1992 distillate sits inside the late Allied Distillers period that ran from the 1976 William Teacher sale through to the 2005 Pernod Ricard and Fortune Brands carve up. 224 bottles drawn from cask #4957 for the German market, an example of the central European independents who built sustained Ardmore inventories during the years when the official single malt did not exist.

Distilled in 1992 from peated Aberdeenshire malt and filled at 63.5% into a single ex Bourbon refill American oak cask, the spirit matured in dunnage at Kennethmont through the entire pre Beam Global era. Twenty years brought the strength to 51.4%, with no chill filtration applied. The wash stills ran on direct coal heating throughout the distillation, the heating regime that defined every Ardmore vintage between 1898 and early 2001.

The cask reads as a classic refill ex Bourbon profile at twenty years: cis whisky lactone giving coconut and a soft resinous pine note, vanillin and syringaldehyde from oak lignin building a light baked custard register. Coal era furfurals carry through as toasted oat and baked pastry. Apple and pear esters from the Mauri and Kerry yeast fermentation sit at the centre, with the inland peat profile reading as heather smoke and earthy phenolic at moderate intensity. Honeyed barley closes the finish.