Glenfarclas The Family Casks 11 Years Old 2011

This official Glenfarclas, an 11 year old, from 2011, cask 1148, at 58.3%, released for a whisky festival. Glenfarclas is a Speyside single malt matured almost wholly in sherry casks from Jerez. It draws on that deep inventory for the Family Casks, single vintages reaching back to the 1950s. It has been run by six generations of the Grant family, one of Scotch whisky's last truly independent houses. Its whiskies are bottled at their natural colour, without chill filtration.

Distilled to a rich, generous cut, building a deep malt of dried fruit and dark sugar. It was fully matured in an Oloroso sherry cask, the wood deep in the rich spirit. By the integrating teens the raw notes fade and esters build, the rich spirit growing rounder and darker. The wood frames the spirit without ever stripping the full Speyside body. The full spirit deepens with time, the cask drawing out its darker register.

At a hearty 58.3% it carries real weight. A rich, sherried sweetness, 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 rich Speyside malt of dried fruit and nut.