Glenrothes 18 Year Old - The Golden Cask Miniature

Glenrothes is a much-loved Speyside distillery with a couple of notable claims to fame, namely that it was the keystone malt for Berry Bros & Rudd’s Cutty Sark blend from its launch in the 1920s, and in the 1990s it was the first distillery to specialise in vintage single malt releases. 

Founded in 1879, Glenrothes was expanded three times between 1963 and 1989, bringing the total number of stills to ten with a hefty production capacity of over 5.5m litres per year. The spirit seems to perform best with medium to long term maturation in sherry casks.

After sporadic old vintage releases in the 1970s under Highland Distillers (later fully acquired by Edrington), Glenrothes launched a core range of vintage single malts in 1994. A string of terrific vintage releases followed, including some astonishing 1960s casks. Although the vintage range has now been dropped, Glenrothes is remarkably consistent - just about any sherried release over 15 years old is likely to be terrific whisky.

House of Macduff is an independent bottler of Scotch whiskies. The company is a subsidiary of Cumbrae Supply Co., and most of their releases are single malt and single grain whiskies under their Golden Cask brand. Cumbrae Supply Co. has been owned by the Macduff family since 1987 and has been bottling single malt whiskies since the 1990s. 

The Golden Cask series first appeared in 2002 and have released some terrific whiskies, including Bowmore, Highland Park, Macallan and a string of excellent Port Ellen casks. House of Macduff is also behind the rare Whisky Life series, a short run of casks selected by John McDougall around 2002, and proprietary brands including Burns Nectar single malt and the Selkie blended malt.