Port Dundas 15 Years Old 2006 Cask #TNT 314748 (TnT Casks)

TnT Casks bottled this Port Dundas grain at 15 year old from 2006, drawn from cask TNT 314748 and bottled at 50.2%. 516 bottles in all. Port Dundas, Scotland's largest distillery in its prime opened in 1811 in the city of Glasgow, was wound down by Diageo in 2010. Grain whisky on this scale was the quiet engine of the Scotch blending trade.

The spirit was produced by continuous distillation in Coffey stills from a mash of wheat and malted barley, the gentle grain make once destined for blends. An Oloroso butt held it, building dried fruit and a walnut depth over the grain. Fifteen years or so gives the oak time to build sweetness over the light spirit. With little of its own weight to fight, grain takes a cask's character readily.

At 50.2% it is big and oily. The Oloroso lends fig, raisin and a walnut depth, while the lactones add coconut, vanillin from the lignin gives vanilla, and a rich toffee and fudge note, with the soft grain spirit carrying it. Water is rarely needed, the spirit already soft and open. It closes long, sweet and gently woody. This is ever scarcer now the distillery is gone.