North of Scotland Batch 1 (That Boutique-y Whisky Company)

This is the first North of Scotland batch from That Boutique-y Whisky Company, a 46 year old single grain bottled at 193 bottles. The whisky comes from the silent Cambus grain plant near Alloa, the plant George Christie converted from the Forth Brewery and ran until its closure in 1980, after which the equipment was stripped out and sent to other DCL distilleries.

Christie took a wider congener cut than most grain producers, which is why this single distillery grain could age 46 years without thinning out. That long spell in ex-Bourbon American oak brings the whisky into the ethereal stage, waxy and delicate, with the strength worn down toward the legal minimum by decades of angel's share.

Bottled at 41%, this is grain whisky at a fragile and refined age. Spent lignin has turned to vanillin and vanilla, the oak lactones give coconut, and decades of oxidation build beeswax and polished oak with a soft honeyed sweetness. The light maize backbone still shows through, the tannins quiet, closing on a long and gentle finish from a distillery that vanished decades ago. As the first of the bottler's North of Scotland batches, it set the tone for the single grain releases that followed under the Boutique-y label.