Friday, August 26, 2016

Inbox - The Week's Whisky News (August 26, 2016)

Welcome to this week's Inbox.  For those that have recently discovered us, Inbox is our weekly round up of whisky news and PR material that has found its way in to our email inbox. It was created as we cannot write full articles or do justice to every piece received. It features items from around the world of whisky and is published by us each Friday.

Within Inbox we aim to write a few lines detailing each press release/piece of news/PR event that we have received and provide links, where possible, for you to find out further information.  Here is this week's news that caught our eyes ...

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Douglas Laing
Leading independent bottler of Douglas Laing & Co have announced a very special limited edition of their Timorous Beastie blended malt - the Timorous Beastie 40 years old.  As with the regular bottling of Timorous Beastie, this whisky is created using single malts from Highland distilleries but in this case their minimum age is 40 years. It has been bottled at the natural cask strength of 54.7% ABV and is non chill-filtered and of natural colour.  There are just 1,080 bottles and they will be available via selected specialist whisky retailers worldwide.  No indication of price was given in the press release.

In addition, Douglas Laing are running a competition to win a one-off gold bottle of Timorous Beastie 40 years old.  The competition, which will run from next Tuesday (August 30) on www.douglaslaing.com, will give consumers the chance to taste the limited liquid and write their own tasting notes.  Managing Director Fred Laing will then judge his favourite set of notes and award the gold bottle to the winner.  Why not give it a go?


Scotch Malt Whisky Society


The SMWS have teamed up with a psychologist to launch a new and innovative whisky research project for consumers.  Dr. Adam Moore (pictured above), a research scientist at the University of Edinburgh, and the Scotch Malt Whisky Society have created Flavour Behaviour - a psychometric test that matches personality types to flavours of whisky and whisky style preferences. The test is a result of an international study that took place at whisky events over a six month period.

Over 300 volunteers took part in locations such as Edinburgh, London, Melbourne and Vancouver and were asked to take a personality test and rate 12 core whisky flavour characteristics.  From the results Dr. Moore then analysed the data and niticed fascinating correlations between personality type and flavour preferences.  From this he created an algorythm that predicts the whisky style that is best suited to each person.

"We’ve used decision-making science and psychometric techniques to gather data from events around the world to create this test, which we hope will help people to find the perfect whisky for them. It’s fascinating to think where this type of study could lead for both how food and drink producers make goods and how consumers choose them."
Dr. Adam Moore. 

"The Flavour Behaviour Test is a fun and scientifically researched way to help with the search for the perfect dram – from novices struggling to find a whisky flavour they like among all the different varieties, or aficionados looking for inspiration for new whisky flavours to try."
Helen Stewart - Senior Brand Manager at the SMWS.

To take the Flavour Behaviour test for yourself, please visit the dedicated website - www.flavourbehaviour.com.


Tomatin
The Highland distillery of Tomatin have announced a trio of limited edition single malts that demonstrate their experimentations with different types of casks - the 9 years old Caribbean Rum, the 14 years old Cabernet Sauvignon and the 21 years old Oloroso Sherry.  All are bottled at 46% ABV and will be available in selected specialist whisky retailers worldwide.  The 9 years old (pictured left) is the first ever rum cask matured whisky released by Tomatin and there are just 6,600 bottles available.  The whisky used was all distilled in 2007.  They will cost £39.99 each.

The 14 years old expression (pictured right) has been matured for its full term in red wine barriques that have previously held Cabernet Sauvignon wine.  The whisky was distilled in 2002 and there are just 2,463 bottles available.  They will retail for £69.99 each.  The 21 years old (pictured below) has been matured in ex-Oloroso sherry casks and was distilled in 1995.  It is the rarest of the trilogy with just 1,908 bottles to be available.  They will retail at £99.99 each.

"We are constantly striving to experiment and push boundaries with our Tomatin single malt to produce unique creations that appeal to our existing customers and a wider audience. The array of tropical notes, citrus spices and rich sherry infusions will entice a range of enthusiasts to sample the new products"
Stephen Bremner - Sales Director at Tomatin.




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