Welcome to Inbox, our weekly round up of whisky news and PR material that has found its way in to our WFE email. Inbox features items from around the world of whisky and is published by us each Friday. Here is this week’s whisky news…
Ardnahoe
The Islay distillery of Ardnahoe, which is owned by Hunter Laing & Co and began production in 2018, has announced the release of its inaugural bottling – the Ardnahoe Inaugural Release 5 years old.
It is the first new whisky from a new distillery on Islay since Kilchoman in 2009. Ardnahoe, which translates as ‘height of the hollow’ from Scots Gaelic, sits on the rugged northeastern coast of Islay and makes a mid-range peated style of spirit.
The Inaugural Release 5 years old marks the beginning of a series of whiskies that Ardnahoe will launch during 2024. It features barley malted at Port Ellen Maltings on the island and is peated to a level of 40ppm. The whisky is bottled at 50% ABV and is both non-chill filtered and of natural colour. The bottle will be available from May 10 via www.ardnahoedistillery.com, and shortly afterwards in specialist retailers in the UK and beyond. The cost will be £70.
“This is a very proud moment for the Laing family. Our passion and knowledge about Scotch whisky has endured for three generations now and it is a momentous milestone to be releasing our very own, traditionally crafted single malt whisky from our own distillery on Islay.”
Scott Laing | Business Development Manager at Hunter Laing & Co.
The Hearach
The Isle of Harris distillery has released four new batches of its Scotch single malt – The Hearach Batches 9 through 12.
This follows the inaugural release of last September which saw the previous eight batches sell out in 4.5 hours. The Hearach is the Scots Gaelic name for the Isle of Harris. The new batches are larger and designed to get more people tasting the whisky. Batches 9, 10, 11 and 12 are all bottled at 46% ABV and are both non-chill filtered and of natural colour.
Each batch release differs due to alterations in individual casks types used for maturation, barley peating levels, marrying times and distillers’ cut-points on the still. The four bottlings feature individual maturation in first-fill ex-bourbon, ex-Oloroso sherry and ex-Fino sherry casks before a 12-week marrying period. There are 12,000 bottles available in each batch and are available in specialist whisky retailers in the UK and 20+ markets worldwide, plus via www.harrisdistillery.com. A bottle will cost £65.
