Aberfeldy 12 Year Highland Single Malt
07.04.20162 Min Read — In Review

Mellowed for twelve years in handmade oak casks. This smooth, sweet dram offers rich rewards for those who like to dig deeper.

Scottish alchemy: turning water, barley and yeast into liquid gold is simpler when the stream tumbling towards you contains that precious metal. Built on land famous for deposits of gold, our distillery has welcomed travellers to taste its treasure since 1898


About the distillery

Aberfeldy Distillery was founded by the John Dewar & Sons, Ltd. in 1896, and opened in 1898. The distillery is located on the eastern outskirts of Aberfeldy, on the southern bank of the upper Tay.

The demand for barley as a basic foodstuff during World War I led to the distillery being closed from 1917 to 1919. The Second World War also caused barley supplies to be cut, and the distillery was again forced to shut down for some of this period. Supply to final markets was kept up by reducing the period whisky was laid up from 7 years to 3.

In 1972 the distillery was enlarged, and the old stills were replaced by four new steam heated stills. In 1999, an Aberfeldy 12 Year Old Single Malt brand was introduced. In 2000, the Earl of Elgin opened "Dewar's World of Whisky" at the Aberfeldy Distillery: this is a centre for marketing the products and educating the public about the process of distillation and history of the Dewar's brand.

Aberfeldy is the largest malt whisky component of Dewar's Blended Whisky

Aberfeldy is situated in the centre of Scotland, some five miles east of Loch Tay and the town of Kenmore and about eight miles south of Loch Tummel. Aberfeldy relies on the fresh water stream Pitilie Burn, which runs alongside the distillery. Aberfeldy is the only distillery in Scotland to use these waters. Aberfeldy uses only Scottish barley, yeast and water.

The area contains historical landmarks, such as Kenmore Bridge. This was built by the 3rd Earl in 1774 and the view from it was the inspiration for Robert Burns's poem on the chimney piece of the Kenmore Inn.

The distillery has two wash stills with a capacity of about 16,500 liter and two spirit stills with 15,000 liters. With these capacities the Aberfeldy distillery lies in the middle of the range of pot still sizes.


Details:

StyleSingle Malt, Scotch
RegionHighlands
Alcohol40%
Cask TypeOak Cask

Our Score:

Nose7/10
Taste8/10
Finish8/10
Overall8/10

Comments

"Lots of sweet Liquorice on the nose"

"Sweet and smooth taste"

"Quality body, smooth and even all across the tongue"

"It's smooth but really only because of the low 40% alcohol content, any higher and we think it'll be quite harsh"

"Reminds me of Chivas Regal"

Overall:

We think this is a very morish whiskey. A quality whiskey to bring to a party, everyone would be happy to have a glass of this.

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