The big news recently for Kilchoman was the 100%Islay Release. What was newsworthy was that the barley was grown, malted, distilled, aged and bottled, all at the farm distillery. If one goes back in time to the beginnings of most distilling operations they all began in small farm distilleries where excess barley at the end of the year was turned into whisky.

The 100% Islay release was bottled at 50%ABV although a cask-strength, 61.3% bottling was available at the distillery. I have yet to get my mitts on a sample of that bottling, but did get to taste a new single cask that just made it to the US.

The Kilchoman Single Cask Bourbon was from cask #434/07, Distilled 12/113/07 and bottled 2/8/11 at 62% ABV, just a touch over 3 years old. This bottling was exclusive to The Wine Merchant in St. Louis, Missouri and is, unfortunately, sold out although the folks at Wine Merchant are currently working to get another single cask later in the year.

This bottling was pale gold with very slow legs. The nose was gentle and sweet with light smokiness and scents of toasted almonds, slight iodine and cedar. On the palate is was creamy, oily with burnt caramel at the front, slightly charred bacon fat, and a sweet and spicy fruitiness with a long and spicy finish. Water opened up the smoky nose and released bourbon and vanilla sweetness. I struggled a bit on the rating, but settled on 85-90. I might have scored higher had I not recently tasted the Kilchoman Spring 2011 Release which was a vatting of three and four year old whisky that was finished for 5 weeks in sherry butts. It was more complex and well rounded.

Now that Kilchoman has older stock it can pull into its bottlings I look forward to releases that will show more maturity and complexity.