Single Malt Rare Malts Selection Natural Cask Strength 22YO
⏳ wine.drinking_window
As a fully matured, historic single malt, this bottle is ready to enjoy immediately and will remain stable indefinitely if kept sealed and stored out of direct sunlight.
🍽️ wine.food_pairings
blue cheese, dark chocolate, roasted game birds
✨ wine.spec_sheet
The Rare Malts Selection, launched by United Distillers (now Diageo) in the mid-1990s, remains one of the most legendary and highly collectible series in the history of Scotch whisky. This historic range was designed to showcase cask-strength, un-chillfiltered single malts from both active and lost distilleries. Among these treasures is the Craigellachie 22 Year Old, distilled in 1973. Craigellachie has long been known as the bad boy of Speyside, stubbornly clinging to its traditional copper worm tubs for condensation. This old-school technique limits copper contact, leaving a heavy, sulfurous, and muscular spirit. Over twenty-two years of quiet maturation, this defiant, meaty character transformed into a spectacular symphony of waxy honey, tropical fruits, flinty mineral smoke, and rich oiliness, capturing a bygone era of Speyside distilling.
🍾 wine.about_producer
Established in 1891 by Alexander Edward and Peter Mackie, the Craigellachie Distillery is situated in the heart of the Speyside region in the village of Craigellachie, Scotland. The distillery is highly regarded for its traditional production methods, most notably its continued use of copper worm tubs to condense its spirit, which imparts a distinctive, heavy, and sulfurous character to the whisky. This robust spirit is primarily aged in a combination of ex-bourbon and ex-sherry casks, yielding a single malt renowned for its muscular, fruity, and unapologetically complex profile. Craigellachie's signature style is beautifully showcased in expressions such as their core 13-year-old and 23-year-old single malts, as well as rare, highly prized single-cask bottlings. Craigellachie remains a singular, defiant voice in Speyside, celebrated by enthusiasts for its old-school, full-bodied character. The distillery's address is Hill Street, AB38 9ST Craigellachie, Speyside, Scotland, United Kingdom, and its official website is https://www.craigellachie.com.