Auchentoshan 15 Years Old 2000 Cask #800035 (LMDW)

Bottled by La Maison du Whisky as a 15 year old single cask release, drawn from cask 800035 of 2000 vintage Auchentoshan with 159 bottles distributed to the French market at high cask strength of 60.3%. La Maison du Whisky was founded in Paris in 1956 by Georges Bénitah and is one of Europe's leading whisky importers and independent bottlers, with stores across France, Singapore, and elsewhere.

Distilled in 2000 from 100% unpeated malted barley with Loch Cochno water from the Kilpatrick Hills, the wash was fermented around 62 hours across Douglas fir and stainless steel washbacks before triple distillation. Auchentoshan runs every drop through three copper pot stills, with the intermediate and spirit stages collecting at around 81% ABV. The extra copper contact strips sulphur compounds and fusel oils while concentrating ethyl hexanoate, isoamyl acetate, and other light esters, giving a clean spirit base filled into a single ex Bourbon American oak cask.

Fifteen years in temperate Lowland maturation drove measured oak extraction. Vanillin from lignin breakdown gave vanilla, cis and trans oak lactones added coconut and sweet wood, and char layer interaction produced furfural with Maillard derived caramelised sugars. Holding 60.3% across fifteen years indicates a tight cask with minimal evaporative loss, and continued ester transformation layers concentrated fruit over the lighter triple distilled spirit base.