Ardnamurchan 10yo
Adelphi Cask 10 Whisky Fringe | 56.8% ABV
I didn’t want to write this review. There’s so much whisky right now that I want to review, not least of which are in my stash that I’m opening in the spirit of re-discovery. Yet here I am, writing this review.
Why? Well it’s mostly due to being bribed by Wally with handfuls of Smarties and a vigorous massage. Or maybe it was vigorous Smarties and handf…it doesn’t matter really. What does matter is that The Ardnamurchan Distillery turned 10 in July and, with their decade of distilling generating a meteoric reputation in the exciterville space of uber critique, Dramface rewarded their integrity, quality and value with a triple dunter of reviews over a recent weekend.
At that moment, when three bottles of one distillery’s output were given big number reviews, this Bourbon cask matured, single cask 10 year old dropping into my hands; bought at retail price via mule channels from the Whisky Fringe Festival, where this bottle made its debut, I was eager to get it doon the facepipe.
This bottle won The Spirit of Whisky Fringe 2024, an award given to the most voted dram of the festival - with over 1,500 votes and over 350 whiskies to pick from, the Ardnamurchan 10yo beat out the likes of Springbank 18, Tomatin 17, Ardbeg 19, Springbank 26, Aberfeldy 21 and many, many other more popular things. It was all everyone talked about on socials and to win this people’s choice award from a gaggle of whisky ultras must surely have made the team at Ardnamurchan proud.
I stuck this bottle aside in readiness for my 40th birthday, where I’d unzip it with Crystal Senior and celebrate still having several brown hairs on my head, amongst the crop of white. I was all set to give this a good rinsing when the Seniors gifted me a GlenAllachie 8yo Scottish Virgin Oak, and we took to that bottle big licks instead. A very drinkable dram, so it was, because it’s gone already. Rinsed.
The Ardna 10yo was nipped quickly at the death, to wave off a wonderful night with the oldies and our neighbours from the top of the hill. A really lovely birthday treat, sitting with the folk who brought me into this world, and the people who have embraced us into theirs, here on the Misty Isle.
Compared to the GlenAllachie’s canonball of caramel cream, the Ardnamurchan hit like a sawn-off shotgun, peppering the face with so many interesting flavours it was difficult to be present in the room. I looked forward to sticking my nose into many copitas throughout the duration of the bottle, as it eventually, quietly, shuffled off with nothing said, no comment offered.
For I wouldn’t be reviewing it.
Review
Ardnamurchan 10yo, cask #10, 2014-2024, Released for The Whisky Fringe Festival, Single Cask Bourbon Full Maturation, 56.8% ABV
£85 Sold out
I think back now to my entry into the world of Ardnamurchan, through their 07.21 core range bottling, and how since then I’ve utterly, completely fallen in love with their whisky. I’ve spent countless hours thinking about their whisky, and many more bashing keys to put those thoughts into words. I’ve drank through 46 bottles of Ardnamurchan whisky, and have been sad enough to list them out just now, to count them. I’ve tried non-UK release samples. I’ve wandered the warehouses at Glenbeg, through irritating good fortune and tasted some whisky maturing there that has reshaped my understanding of what whisky is through modern, fresh faced perspectives and made sincere connections that have opened doors to other fantastic opportunities.
Connecting with a distillery and their character of whisky is something we all experience at some point in our golden hued journey, and is to be celebrated in and of itself - how often do we find something, in any sphere not just whisky, that just works for us?
To have experienced their spirit, from new-make all the way through to 10 years of age? That’s a unique window into a distillery that not many people are lucky enough to share in their whisky journey yet - through location or age, or just not connecting with their character. Yet we can all do just that with Ardnamurchan. It might go some distance to explain why perhaps my love of Ardnamurchan has become a bit of a sticking point when it comes to reviewing their whisky.
You see, I’m a Fan Boy with a capital F, and I’ve dived into their wares with unabashed enthusiasm - I’m not just swimming in it, I’m living in it. As a result I’ve had a lot more contact, and context, and discussion, and insight with which to appraise their whisky than some of you lot reading this now. The more you try, the more you see, the more you talk, the more you know.
My love of Ardnamurchan whisky isn’t just because of the whisky in isolation, although it’s spectacular enough to warrant it. My love has been shaped because I’ve spent a lot of time with the people behind Ardnamurchan whisky. Without exception they’re all incredibly wonderful people. The staff in the shop that I’ve met - Ricky, Karen and Sally - have acerbic dry wits and an eagerness to spend time with everyone that walks into that remote shoppe. And loitering in that shop revealed to me something that has put wind into the sails of this review.
Everyone that’s walked into that shop, when I’ve been there, has more often than not said the following phrase: “Are you guys new? I’ve never heard of Ardnamurchan whisky”. With that question comes relief, from worrying that this constant talk and praise of Ardnamurchan will somehow be a detriment to Ardnamurchan; that by speaking so often and so highly of them that it’ll become boring, hackneyed, trite.
We might see pushback beginning in earnest against the unrelenting wave of adulation that’s visible across exciterville for Ardnamurchan, but in the wider world, the real world, Ardnamurchan are still an obscure, niche distillery. I sigh in relief that the general public have no idea that Ardnamurchan whisky exists, because it means that they’ve got a long way to go, a wide space to grow.
But not in capacity or output, because right now they have about 18,500 casks maturing in their dunnage warehouses on the banks of Loch Sunart, and their production can only continue so long before they’ve hit capacity. Ardnamurchan will never be of a scale comparable to Glenfiddich, Glenmorangie or Macallan, and they don’t want to be. Ardnamurchan have their own way of doing things, their own culture, and having spent time in the company of those forging that culture, I can’t see that changing anytime soon.
I speak so highly of Ardnamurchan because I’ve spent time with the people working their fingers to the bone, in the collective pursuit of bringing extremely high quality west coast whisky to the world in a fun, honest and endearing way. If I didn’t have that face time with the people behind the sales team - Connal, Graeme, Antonia, Carl, Jenny and DJ - then you too might not “get” why I love this place so much.
It’s a way of life for folk like gentle giant Al Macaoidh or the catalyst for the Crystals moving to Skye Bob Garven, folk that I’ve stood in the corner and observed (in a totally not creepy way) them going about their work in quiet professionalism, and whom if you asked any manner of technical question, would answer immediately. They live and breathe the creation of Ardnamurchan whisky, yet you wouldn’t find a bragging bone in any of their bodies. They know how good the whisky is, they know how honest their distillery is, and they know that the work they're doing is reaching the folk that matter. They don’t have to shout about it.
When I see a bottle of Ardnamurchan, I don’t think of how irritating it is that everyone is banging on about how good the whisky is when I can’t see the virtue. I don’t get upset because it’s not as good as X or Y, and I certainly don’t get angry because young whisky on a whole can’t begin to compete with vintage whisky, apparently.
I do think about how it depends on your angle of approach into whisky and certainly how quickly that angle exposes those who have spent their formative whisky years basking in the easily accessible company of whisky most couldn’t dream of affording now.
I think of the people who make it, and the chats I’ve had whilst drinking whisky in their company, or at the AD/Venturer Club gatherings, various festivals and online. Much the same as folk go wobbly at the knees when Francis Cuthbert lifts a bottle of his whisky to eager glasses at festivals - because they’ve spent time with him and understand his dedication to the craft and love his whisky - I go wobbly at the knees thinking of Carl Crafts in his speedos, floating a foot above the icy Loch Sunart water. Most would, to be honest, at a vision that spectacular, and that anti-gravitational.
Nose
Sparkling gold and white. Bright, malty, chamomile, tans and yellows. Bready, soft white sliced. Salty rocks and coastal sand. Salty sweaty socks. Bold tropical pineapple, mango, yellow fruits. Highland toffee laced with refresher bars. Fresh milk! Hint of airfix glue.
Palate
Luscious, prolonged, silky, joyous. Savoury malty, thick. Bready and salty. Chamomile tea. Coastal pop from that underlying Ardna spirit, but it’s not the most coastal I’ve found. Big pineapple and saucy toffee, tropical fudge. Magic whisky.
The Dregs
So when I look at this 10 year old bottle of Ardnamurchan I can’t help but want to talk about it. To share the experience that I’ve had in some peripheral way. To say “I was there when…” as we watch these new distilleries hitting their decade stride. I wrote in my Ardnageddon piece that we were in the golden age of whisky, and although two years on we’re starting to see a bit of concerned brow furrowing, the team at Ardnamurchan are still ploughing on, going about their work with the same humble drive.
I love Ardnamurchan whisky but I love the people and memories more. I wish I had the same connection to all the distilleries, and all the people involved. It would certainly give me a lot more fodder to pen articles. But it’s just not humanly possible to be so involved, as a hobbyist. So I’ve picked the distillery that resonates most with me, even if there have been whiskies from Ardnamurchan that might not have worked - Rum Cask was flat, Madeira was hot, April Fool was dud, SMWS A Walk in the Woods was weirdly un-Ardnamurchan.
But there have been Ardnamurchan whiskies that have set my heart aflame. Whiskies that have removed all the air from the room and whacked me around the face like a sledgehammer, things that have redefined what Ardnamurchan whisky is, to me. Things like the Doddy Cask. Things like the Golden Promise octave. Things like the Sauternes Cask Release. And things like this, Cask 10. It is astonishingly good. It is superb whisky. It’s pure, honest. There’s no-where for the spirit to hide. No cask influence to mask a deficiency. It’s not been reracked. It’s not been fiddled with.
And yet, being the 10th cask they ever filled, it used a new-make spirit still in development. A spirit in testing and wayfinding mode. It’s not even close to what the eventual formula to which the casks filled from 2015 onwards were filled with. But it’s still remarkable.
That salient point, that truth of which Connal, Sales Director and legitimate wonderman whom I’ve shared many drams and belly laughs with, definitely more than I deserve, speaks often and free that we’ve not seen nothing yet from the warehouses of Glenbeg. That is what everyone should be thinking about, the 2025 and onwards releases where the Ardnamurchan character we all know and some love, was properly dialled in. Where the stills were set to stun and the spirit safe flowed its refined cleric into the waiting casks.
This 10 year old bourbon matured whisky is an indicator, nothing more, nothing less. But that indicator is pointing towards unparalleled greatness. For who can touch them? Integrity. Value. Quality. Variety. Fun. Relatability. Dynamics. Nimbleness. I can’t believe I’m witnessing it first hand, as a whisky enthusiast. I’m here to see a distillery step confidently, proudly, humbly into a giant stride, a golden age of their own making, where the liquid we will all have a chance at experiencing will shake the very nucleus of our souls.
I’ve said all that, and I’ve not mentioned the person leading the charge. The one at the front, carving the path, pointing the sword to the horizon and shouting “that way!” The one setting the beat for the ensemble to play to. The one who has steered the Ardnamurchan ship to this stage through nothing more than exceptional ability and an unlikely, unassuming, modest, deferential poise.
Some talk about Dave Broom, Charlie MacLean, Jim Swan or Billy Walker operating on a different playing field to the rest, people who have changed the face of whisky in ways we will never quite understand or appreciate. Folk held up as being gods of whisky, walking amongst us in reverence and with authority, that pose for selfies and command rooms. Despite not doing any of that, and not expecting it either, Alex Bruce is showing everyone the way; producer, distributor, drinker alike. He is, for me, the zenith. And the whisky in this bottle proves it.
Score: 9/10
*The Dougie Crystal New Scale of Ardnamurchan
Something I think needs to be addressed now that I believe a golden age of Ardnamurchan is about to commence. My scores for Ardnamurchan’s whisky, up until this point, have been given within the framework of what I’ve been able to experience with what Ardnamurchan whisky has been at my disposal - granted most of it. How good one Ardnamurchan whisky is compared to other Ardnamurchan whiskies has been the process, simple as that - I started at the core range and worked from that baseline.
The scale has peaked, so far, at a 9/10 for the Doddie Weir single cask of joy because it offered (through being peated) an elevated experience versus a load of other single cask Ardnamurchan’s I’ve tried, but there’s also been many 8’s, loads of 7’s, a 6 and a 5.
As we see Ardnamurchan hit their stride, and as we enter into a world where 10 year old releases from the Glenbeg warehouses are more and more frequent, the scores will undoubtedly hit 10/10 very fast, if nothing were to change. For if a 10 year old release is markedly more enjoyable than the previous 9/10, then it’s only logical it scores higher.
I say this not looking into a crystal ball, but from having extremely fortunate experience of trying enough 10yo whisky from their warehouse to know that it’s better than a lot of the things I’ve marked highly already. So what to do? We’re already seeing pushback on the amount of Ardnamurchan 8/10s and 9/10s - what happens when there’s a horde of 10/10s, because there’s literally nowhere left to go? As much as I’d love to give something a 15/10, it doesn’t quite work.
So it means that my perspective, the scale ruler or I guess the frame within which I look at Ardnamurchan whisky, will have to adapt. Those 8/10s like the CK.339 UK Exclusive or the Nickolls & Perks single cask, that I still believe to be two of the best unpeated Oloroso single casks they’ve put out, will be more like 7/10 compared to something in the future - very good indeed.
This 10yo Cask 10 single cask from Adelphi scoring 9/10 - exceptional - will be seen more like an 8/10 - Something Special - through the new lens. I guess you could see this as the last whisky from Ardnamurchan using Dougie Crystal’s Old Scale of Ardnamurchan. The line in the sand.
I guess one could’ve reasonably predicted that this would happen, given the quality and consistency to which Ardnamurchan have been putting out whisky, and could have scored things more timidly from the start, but you can only work with what you’ve got to hand - hindsight is a wonderful thing. Ardnamurchan could easily have cashed in their kudos chips and released stinker after stinker. But they didn’t. It’s no wonder the scale is groaning under the weight of expectation. For how much better can any whisky get?
We’ll see what happens, but don’t be surprised if I start marking things with this new perspective, to give myself room for maneuver in the light of what’s coming out of those west coast warehouses. We live and learn, and I’ll be the first to say I’m learning the most. The goalposts are moving, and so I too need to move with them.
A conundrum, but one I welcome with open arms, gladly, willingly. I’m so excited.
Tried this? Share your thoughts in the comments below. DC