Description

Glen Garioch 1987 SMWS 11 Year Old 19.34 ‘Smokey Bacon and Soaped Leather’ The Scotch Malt Whisky Society (SMWS) was founded in 1983 by a group of friends lead by tax accountant Phillip ?Pip? Hills as a private members club. The concept behind the society was to source casks from all over Scotland which would then be bottled and made available exclusively to its members. Perhaps the most famous feature of these bottles are the unique codes. Each distillery is represented by a different number and the following digits indicate that particular release. That same year, the SMWS set up its first location in Leith?s Vault buildings in Edinburgh where it still stands today. This whisky was distilled in May 1987 and aged for 11 years before being bottled in September 1998. Glen Garioch is one of the oldest distilleries in Scotland. For most of the 20th_century it was self-sufficient, malting its own barley using peat from Pitsligo, giving it a unique smoky character. In fact, in 1968 it was short-listed by then-owners DCL, to convert to heavily peated production in order to make up for a shortfall on Islay caused by a drought. In an odd twist of fate, the decision was instead made to re-open Brora for the job, and close Glen Garioch down. Morrison Bowmore then sprang to its rescue, restarting production in 1973. The maltings_and distillery were shut down again by Beam Suntory_in 1995, and only the latter resumed operations two years later, with contemporary Glen Garioch becoming an un-peated single malt. These pre-1995 vintages are worth investigating while you can.