Teaninich 1981 - 16 Year Old - First Cask - Single Cask 89/587/94

Teaninich is one of Diageo’s more interesting workhorse distilleries. The distillery was almost unknown before a handful of epic early 1970s vintages were bottled for the Rare Malts series, after which Teaninich slid back into obscurity.  As far as official bottlings go, since 2000 only the worthy Flora & Fauna 10-year-old, one Managers’ Choice and one Special Release bottling have appeared, the latter a highly-rated but horribly overpriced 17-year-old from the 1999 vintage.

Teaninich’s ultra-pure, austere, grassy spirit is well-suited to long ageing but casks of old Teaninich are still very rare on the market today: despite a recent increase in the number of indie bottlings from the distillery, most are under 15 years old. Indie Teaninichs bottled in the early years of this century were often 20-30 years old or even older and are worth seeking out at auction for fans of the uncompromising old school Highland style.

The First Cask range was a prolific series of single malt whisky bottlings by the UK’s largest mail order wine company Direct Wines Ltd, owner of Laithwaite’s and The Sunday Times Wine Club. From the early 1990s until the mid-Noughties Direct Wines released dozens of outstanding single cask whiskies annually under the First Cask label, almost all of which were bottled at 46%.

These whiskies were not particularly highly sought-after on release, probably because they were only sold online through a wine club.  Back then, of course, it was not widely known that the casks had been sourced from Signatory Vintage, which would certainly have raised their profile among whisky fans. Nowadays, although still frequently excellent value at auction, the First Cask collection - which includes hundreds of long-aged whiskies from distilleries including Brora, Port Ellen, Ardbeg and Macallan - is finally getting the recognition it deserves.