The Dalmore Releases ‘Cask Curation Collection II: Port Version’ for $44,450

Within the fall of 2023, The Dalmore — a distillery located within the Highlands of Scotland, some 190 miles north of Edinburgh — launched the primary of its multi-year, four-volume Cask Curation line. The collection focuses on what the producer has develop into finest identified for: a cask-finishing program that makes a speciality of sherry and port, along with extra unconventional barrels represented by releases like The Dalmore King Alexander III, which used six finishes, incorporating Marsala, Madeira, and Cabernet Sauvignon barrels. 

Every Cask Curation set consists of three extra-aged whiskies aimed to rejoice the accomplice winemakers The Dalmore works with. The primary set up featured three single-malts completed in sherry casks from González Byass, the most important sherry producer on the earth and a long-time collaborator of The Dalmore.

In October, practically one yr after the gathering’s inaugural launch, the second version is lastly obtainable. The Cask Curation Collection II: Port Version acts as an homage to The Dalmore’s longtime partnership with Graham’s Port, whose port pipes are used completely for The Dalmore’s different port-finished expressions.

This yr’s highlight is on three port-finished single-malt whiskies: a 27-year-old, a 30-year-old, and a 43-year-old whisky completed in 1997, 1994, and 1952 single-harvest tawny port casks, respectively. Every expression affords its personal distinct character and taste profile rooted in every model’s historical past. 

“They’ve obtained totally different dynamics of ‘vintage’ flavors,” says Gregg Glass, grasp whisky maker and blender for The Dalmore. “What will we imply by vintage flavors? We speak about umami qualities. We speak concerning the stability of candy, dry, and of fruit and floral notes. What we discovered, significantly with these vintages, was that there was an abundance of those vintage flavors that may lend nicely to that older inventory of Dalmore that we had. So usually, most of the older Dalmores that we’ve had had been put into daring sherry or port kinds, and that’s been nice. However with these ones, what you’re getting is the nuance, the subtlety, and the delicacy of age and ‘antiqueness.’” 

The youngest of the trio is a 27-year single malt that clocks in at 49.3% ABV and is completed for 2 years in Graham’s 1997 single-harvest tawny port casks, after spending 25 years in ex-bourbon barrels. The 30-year-old expression, which is a comparatively sedate 87.8 proof (43.9% ABV), rested for 28 years in ex-bourbon barrels adopted by two years in Graham’s 1994 single-harvest tawny port casks. The 43-year-old expression, at 41.8% ABV, sat in ex-bourbon barrels for 40 years, earlier than a three-year ending in Graham’s 1952 single-harvest tawny port — produced the identical yr Queen Elizabeth II ascended the throne of England.   

“The thought course of for the Cask Curation collection has not been purposeful. It’s been pure, is how I put it,” says Glass. “We weren’t saying, ‘We’re going to do that to do a three-bottle set.’ We’re doing this as a result of it’s the suitable factor for the flavour pairing.” 

The one-harvest ports, referred to in Portugal as colheita, aren’t most customers’ stereotypical thought of port. Nothing just like the thick, grape juice-hued wines many affiliate with the fashion, they’re nearer to the colour of sunshine whisky — considerably golden amber, with a mildly syrupy viscosity. By regulation, colheitas are aged for at least seven years, however in apply, winemakers usually age them for for much longer,  typically holding onto casks for many years. 

“Single-harvest tawny ports are limited-release wines which were chosen from excellent particular person years for long-term barrel growing older. They differ from aged Tawnies, that are a mix of wines from a couple of totally different years,” says Charles Symington, head winemaker and grasp blender of privately owned Symington Household Estates. His group oversees a trio of esteemed port homes: Graham’s, Dow’s, and Warre’s. “We repeatedly style wines and consider [port] as they mature,” says Symington. “Whereas most of those wines are blended in our aged tawny ports, there are a couple of completely distinctive tawny ports from particular person years with extraordinary character that we really feel need to be bottled as single-harvest tawny ports.”

For Glass and The Dalmore grasp distiller Richard Patterson, choosing the port casks — that are round 450–500 liters in capability — was an train in creativeness and creativity. 

“Should you’re a chef, for those who’re a whisky maker, for those who’re a perfumer, and that there’s one thing that, by itself, isn’t fairly proper or not the perfect, however in the suitable atmosphere [when] partnering it with the right flavors and in a mixing approach, can produce one thing stunning with numerous depth and complexity,” says Glass. “These ones, we felt, embraced the home fashion and the character superbly. They reached a pinnacle of the place they could possibly be.”

The trio of whiskies, obtainable solely as a set and priced at $44,450, are available a cylindrical inexperienced leather-based carrying case that’s been handcrafted in Florence. The Cask Curation collection is out there via choose retailers reminiscent of London-based Whisky Change and by way of [email protected].