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IWS Exclusives Flight

Inverurie Whisky Shop was opened by Mike Stuart and his business partner, Claire Hawkins in 2015. Developing a passion for whisky during his time working in hospitality, Mike saw Inverurie as the perfect spot to open a whisky shop dedicated to customer service and a place that offered more than just a place to buy whisky.

A tasting room was opened in 2016 and we now host regular tastings, such as brand ambassador visits, private events as well as our less formal Flight Tastings, which you are likely enjoying at the moment.

Further to the shop opening for tastings and buying, Mike and the team offer whisky tours and whisky training - with Mike being the only Whisky Ambassador Certificate tutor in the North East of Scotland. Tours are bespoke to your needs, so if you are enjoying your experience in the shop, why not enquire about taking your whisky journey that step further with us.

 

Murray McDavid Auchroisk 9 Year Old Madeira Wine Cask Finish

This was the result of an incredible journey with Murray McDavid. We were on the lookout for a shop exclusive that offered something different to the norm, a cask that gave our customers a taste of something they might not have tried before and so, without question, we contacted Murray McDavid.

We have close relationships with Dean, Ben and the team at Murray McDavid and know that they stock a phenomenal choice of casks. So we gave them a guideline of price, age and cask size and then Mike, Russell and Toni travelled to the warehouses of Coleburn in Speyside to see what was on offer.

After sampling 12 wonderful drams, we whittled it down to 5 before taking these back to the team in Inverurie. After tasting them individually (and blind!), the Auchroisk was a clear winner, and so our bottle was launched in Summer 2023.

Auchroisk is owned by Diageo, built in 1974 and was the first distillery built that didn't have a practical Doig Ventilator installed (this is the iconic Pagoda style roof seen on most distilleries), since all the malting was now done off site. There is only one distillery release, a 10 year old as part of the range given the moniker 'Flora & Fauna' by the late whisky writer, Michael Jackson. It is, however, a favourite amongst Independent Bottlers due to its flexible spirit, creamy fruit notes and sometimes a tiny puff of smoky complexity.

Our cask was 'finished' for 3 years in a Madeira Wine Cask from Justino's Vinyard. Widely regarded as pone of the finest producers of Madeira Wine, Justino's offer a cask full of exciting flavour - especially after 3 years!

Duncan Taylor Holyrood 2021 Octave

Yes, it's only 3 years old, but what a fantastically complex whisky we have our hands on!
Specially selected by the Inverurie Whisky Shop, this is our third collaboration with the Octave range from Duncan Taylor.

This Octave Holyrood has aged for 3 years in oak casks then spent the final 3 months in an octave cask. An Octave Cask is a smaller cask, typically holding 125 litres (1/8th of 1000 - hence the name) of whisky. This created a larger wood to whisky contact ratio, meaning that there is a higher level of interaction between the liquid and the wood.

This only works, with certain whiskies as there is the danger of over-aging the whisky and creating a tannic, woody mess. Thankfully, the guys at Duncan Taylor and Holyrood know what they are doing and have created this wonderful dram that we are proud to call our own. 

This is a limited release of only 99 bottles, bottled at a cask strength of 54.6%.

Upon pouring, this dram offers sherry spices and sweetness - ginger cake and chocolate, however, if you leave it in the glass for around 15-25 minutes it opens up into a wonderfully complex potion of banana loaf and tropical notes. The malt flavours come out of hiding and encourage a brilliant drinking experience.

We did have reservations on bottling this due to the nature of the whisky buyer and the age of this drop - but we're very glad that we went ahead, hopefully you are too. 

Stone Circle Series: Sunhoney Edition, Blair Athol

Sadly, this release has been lost to the sands of time, that is, with the exception of a handful of bottles lurking in our store that we found during a clear out!

For many, the Blair Athol release was the highlight of our Stone Circle series. We launched 5 bottles, all named after local Pictish Stone relics to celebrate each of our first five years in business.

This was our second release, bottled by Independent Bottler Morrison & Mackay (now known as Morrison Distillers) Only 180 bottles were yielded from this refill Sherry Hogshead that was bottled at Natural Cask Strength.

After 9 years of exclusive maturation in the cask, we had the opportunity to taste it for our second edition. It was exactly what we were looking for.

The Sunhoney Stone Circle sits on a farm near the small town of Echt, in Aberdeenshire. We wanted a whisky that would sing honey, and sunshine, to compliment the name of the circle. Here we have an abundance of soft fruits, honey sweetness and malted cereal.

The Stone Circle series not only celebrated our annual birthday as a retailer, but also the fact that Aberdeenshire is home to the largest array of Pictish Stone Circles in the United Kingdom. Many of them are based within 5 miles of Inverurie, where you are sat right now.