Cooley 25 Year Old 1992 (Cadenhead’s)

Cadenhead's, Scotland's oldest independent bottler, marked its 175th anniversary in 2017 with a run of special casks, and this 25 Years Old Cooley was among them: 1992 distillate from the Co. Louth independent, matured a quarter century in an ex-bourbon barrel and bottled for the Italian market in just 174 bottles.

At a cask strength 51.3% the whiskey arrives undiluted, and age has taken the double distilled Cooley malt somewhere savoury, a waxy, gently rubbery funk of the kind old Cooley casks are known for wrapping itself around deep orchard fruit and honeyed oak. It is a collector's slice of early era Cooley, distilled only a handful of years after the distillery first fired its stills.