Balcones Single Malt Whisky Ratafia Champenois Cask T-022

When St. Kilian meets Turkish apricot brandy, you get a special edition that sparks curiosity. This single cask bottling spent four years in a French oak barrique previously used for Turkish apricot brandy – an unusual cask that lends the young single malt a distinctly fruit-forward character.

The Benromach 11 Years (2010/2022) Contrasts Peat Smoke is an experimental single malt from Speyside, in which Benromach audibly turns up the use of peated barley. It was matured exclusively in first-fill bourbon casks; added to that are 57 ppm and a vintage design that refers to the once hand-painted sign above the kiln as well as the distillery's red gates. Sounds like a grand performance, but in the glass it would rather charmingly trip over its own shoelaces.

Benromach is primarily known for reviving a lightly peated Speyside style, but the Contrasts Unpeated deliberately shows the other side of the distillery. This nine-year-old single malt from Bourbon and Sherry casks comes in at 46 % vol. and clearly focuses on an unpeated, approachable aromatic profile.

Falken 5 Years (2022) is a German single malt from Farny Destillerie with 43% ABV, whose profile is strongly shaped by the idea of a “lager finish”: six months of alpine summering on the Falkenalpe are intended to bring topography and climate into the cask and ultimately into the glass. It matures for a total of five years in the distillery's casks and presents itself as a rather mild, unexcited representative with a regional mountain backdrop in tow – whether that is great alpine air or rather alpine marketing is something the glass may answer.