Glenfarclas Single Cask Bottling 37 Years Old 1968

A distillery release of Glenfarclas, a 37 year old, from 1968, cask 689, at 51.4%, 152 bottles in all. Glenfarclas is a Speyside single malt drawn from the largest, direct fired stills in Speyside. Its whiskies are bottled at their natural colour, without chill filtration. It draws on that deep inventory for the Family Casks, single vintages reaching back to the 1950s. Its spirit is matured almost wholly in sherry butts brought up from Jerez.

The spirit was distilled in copper pot stills, building a deep malt of dried fruit and dark sugar. A bourbon barrel held it, the wood adding a soft honey over the fruit. In its ethereal years the malt turns waxy and oxidative, faded esters and a whisper of sotolon over dark fruit. Active wood drives the maturation, the cask deep in the malt. The wood frames the spirit without ever stripping the full Speyside body.

Bottled at a cask strength 51.4%, it is deep and concentrated. A rich, sherried sweetness, lifted by a sweet oak. Beneath it run dried fruit, dark sugar and a warm spice. A long finish carries raisin, chocolate and a treacle. This is a deep, sherried Speyside single malt.