We are pleased to announce the upcoming release of the 2nd Editon 100% Islay which will be released on the 1st of September.
This is the second 100% Islay release from Kilchoman and has been produced from barley grown, malted, distilled, matured and bottled at the distillery. It has been aged for over 3 years in a combination of fresh and refill bourbon barrels.
The International Wine and Spirits Competition was held recently and it was a successful day for Kilchoman! We entered three releases for the competition; Machir Bay, 2006 Vintage and the Sherry Cask release and all three received top awards.
Machir Bay – Gold Award
2006 Vintage – Gold Award
Sherry Release – Silver Outstanding
The Master of Malt team visited us along with around 20 others for a special tasting during Feis Ile. The tasting was taken by Anthony Wills and consisted of some special drams of the Feis Ile 2012, Sherry cask release, Sauternes single cask and a bourbon single cask. Master of Malt have written about their visit in the link below.
http://www.masterofmalt.com/Blog/post/Feis-Ile-2012-Day-5.aspx
The Scottish Field Whisky Challenge took place recently with 40 different whiskies being blind tasted by a panel of judges. Our 2006 Vintage release did fantastically well, placing 3rd in the £35 – £80 section and an impressive 7th overall!! Not bad for a 5 year old…
Last week reviews of the Machir Bay and Sherry Cask releases were shared wiith you and now here are some more from The 2006 Vintage release and Single Cask #322 bottled for the Kensington Wine Market in Calgary –
2006 Vintage – http://theperfectwhiskymatch.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/kilchoman-new-kid-on-islay-block-she.html
Single Cask #322 – http://www.allthingswhisky.com/?p=859
An interesting blog written by David Driscoll from K&L Wines in USA, who visited Islay recently and took his first trip up to see us at Kilchoman..
Here are two recent reviews of our most recent releases…
The Sherry Cask release is our first fully matured sherry release. This release has been matured for 5 years in Oloroso sherry butts and has a unique flavour, different to that of previous Kilchoman releases – http://www.edinburghwhiskyblog.com/2012/05/02/a-quick-dram-kilchoman-sherry-cask/
The Machir Bay release which is our first general release. This is a vatting of 3, 4 and 5 year old bourbon casks with the 4 year old casks being finished in Oloroso Sherry butts for 8 weeks – http://www.dramming.com/2012/05/02/kilchoman-machir-bay/
The Sherry Cask Release is now available to buy from the online shop and at the distillery!
The Sherry Cask Release is a limited bottling of 6,000 worldwide and is a vatting of 5 year old sherry casks at 46%. This is the first release to have our smart new ‘Sherry Cask’ packaging.
Kilchoman Comraich is a global network of bars dedicated to the enjoyment of Kilchoman single malt. Here you will find the finest and widest range of Kilchoman single malts, including special Comraich bottlings exclusively available from Comraich sanctuaries.
The ruined Kilchoman Church stands proudly beneath the cliffs of Creag Mhór, half a mile west of the distillery. Chief amongst its artefacts are Sanctuary stones dating back to the 800s. Such sanctuary stones were common place in medieval times, marking
an area of ‘Comraich’ or sanctuary in the local Gaelic language, safe from harassment and arrest.
Kilchoman Comraichs are a collection of sanctuaries, sheltered from the commotion of the outside world, dedicated to the enjoyment of Kilchoman Single Malt. Kilchoman Comraich establishments serve as bastions of Kilchoman with exclusive access to the Kilchoman Comraich batches. These will be available solely from the Comraichs along with a wide range of other Kilchoman bottlings.
Batch No.1 of the Kilchoman Comraich series is a vatting of 2007 oloroso sherry butts and bourbon barrels selected by Anthony Wills, Kilchoman Founder. The combination of cask types allows for a unique marriage of rich, sherry influence and light citrus and vanilla character from the bourbon barrels.
Comraich bars have already begun to launch around the world and the locations will soon be available on our new website in June! Keep an eye out…
With the recent dry and warm weather we have been having on Islay the guys have been able to get out on the farm to sow our barley. This barley will then be harvested at the end of the summer before its malted, distilled and filled into casks sometime next year
This year we have planted a total of 97.5 acres. After an unsuccessful trial of a new barley variety called Laureate last year, we have reverted back to two tried and tested varieties, planting 77.5 acres of Concerto and 20 acres of Octavian. Though most years we grow multiple varieties, in the past all fields have been harvested and malted together. This year however we have plans to malt, distil and mature each variety separately, meaning we will be able to analyse the impact of barley variety on the character of our spirit. We have always been interested to analyse the impact of variety on flavour and new space and equipment finally mean that by 2022 we will be able to release single barley variety Kilchoman single malt. Exciting times!
With the mixed weather that we have all been experiencing recently, Andrew Wood, who is responsible for all barley farming operation at Kilchoman had to work particularly hard to get the barley into the ground. The photo above is of Keith sowing our Ministers field with the beautiful Machir Bay in the background.
We would just like to thank Keith, Jim, Lewis, Mathew, Islay, Fraser, Hunter, John and Dunlossit Estate for all their help in getting the fields prepared and the barley sown.
