Cragganmore 1976 - Connoisseurs Choice Miniature

Cragganmore was founded in 1869 by John Smith, and became part-owned by Diageo forerunner DCL in 1927 when the latter bought White Horse Distillers, which had taken a 50% share of Cragganmore in 1923. DCL obtained full control of Cragganmore in 1965, the year after the distillery was expanded to four stills. In 1987 Cragganmore 12-year-old became the Speyside representative of DCL successor United Distillers’ Classic Malts series of single malt whiskies.

Cragganmore’s official bottling history is uneventful. Prior to its elevation to the Classic Malts, a 12-year-old Cragganmore was bottled by DCL subsidiary D&J McCallum Ltd, which held the distillery’s licence; subsequent official bottlings included a superb 17-year-old Manager’s Dram sherry cask released in 1992 and regular outings in Diageo’s Special Releases. Independent Cragganmore is relatively rare, although the SMWS, Duncan Taylor and Gordon & MacPhail have all bottled fine examples from earlier vintages.

Founded in Elgin as a merchant grocer and wine and spirits wholesaler in 1895, Gordon & MacPhail are one of the oldest independent whisky bottlers in Scotland. Co-founder James Gordon owned shares in Longmorn, Strathisla and Glen Grant, and Gordon & MacPhail were soon bottling officially licensed single malts from several distilleries and sending empty casks from their wine business to be filled with new make spirit and returned for maturation in their Elgin warehouses.

Gordon & MacPhail pioneered high strength single malts at 100 proof (57%) in the 1950s, and in 1968 the company launched Connoisseurs Choice, one of the first integrated ranges of small batch independent whisky bottlings. After finally becoming distillers themselves with the purchase of Benromach in 1993, in 2010 Gordon & MacPhail bottled the first 70-year-old single malt whisky (a Mortlach 1938) and in 2020 the company released the first ever 80-year-old whisky: Glenlivet 1940.