Arran reviews

Like many distilleries, Arran too has a peated version, that was dubbed Machrie Moor, named after the peat fields on the island. The label shows Bran, a dog that – as legend would have it – was chained…

When I tried the first Arran Devil’s Punch Bowl, now more than 4 years ago, I was qutie impressed. Unfortunately I missed the second release, but thanks to my buddy Manny I was able to get a generous…

The Nectar presented this single cask of Arran from 1996 at the most recent edition of the Spirits in the Sky festival, last November. After the maginificent Arran 1996 that Manny and I bottled ourselves…

When we launched our Arran 20 Year Old 1996 for MMM, we were the first to bottle an Arran single cask at that age and at cask strength, something we are very proud of. Much later we found out that we…

When I saw this Arran from 1997 at a whisky festival, Jan Beckers – the ambassador for Douglas Laing – told me I just had to try it, so I allowed him to fill up my sample bottle. Today I took it out of…

In 2014 a limited edition of the Arran 17 Year Old was released. I find it surprisingly dark, actually.Great nose on candied fruit and brown sugar, green apples, blood oranges, a hint of pear drops,…

The 10 Year Old is part of Arran’s standard range for many years now and I have been fortunate enough (yeah, well) to try it before. I found it to be okay-ish. Let’s see what this newer release from 2014…

Was a big fan of the 10 when I had a bottle last year and was able to try the 14 at a festival early last month and was impressed. This is from my own bottle opened just over a week and down to the neck…

The third and final bottling in the Smugglers' Series - The Exciseman – again contains peated and unpeated Arran malt, of which part matured on Madeira casks. Quite a few of the 8700 bottles were never…

The second volume of Arran’s Smugglers’ trilogy was dubbed The High Seas. Like its predecessor and it successor, it was put – or is that hidden? – in a nice packaging. Both peated and unpeated Arran were…