Kilchoman 100% Islay Bourbon Cask Matured Single Cask 16/664 (Italian Cities – Florence)

As it has done every October since 2023, Italian Kilchoman importer Beija-Flor has now released the latest edition of its “Italian Cities” series of Kilchoman single cask bottlings. Following “Milan” (2023) and “Rome” (2024), the third edition of the series is dedicated to the city of Florence.

This is a 100% Islay bottling matured for nine years in fresh bourbon casks. And not just any bottling, but one of the very first releases produced from the Concerto barley variety, which has been grown at Kilchoman since 2015.

These 100% Islay whiskies, also known as ‘Single Farm Single Malts’ and produced exclusively on-site ‘from barley to bottle’, account for 20–30% of the annual production volume and are Kilchoman’s raison d’être, as they embody Kilchoman’s claim and pride in being Islay’s farm distillery. Furthermore, Kilchoman is the only distillery in Scotland to enable whisky enthusiasts to distinguish between different barley varieties in terms of flavour, particularly when the whisky is matured in ex-bourbon casks. Other distilleries that had made this their mission have taken this claim to absurd extremes, because they have matured the whisky in cask types with more dominant flavours that mask the subtle differences and/or have not released bottlings that would have allowed for comparison, precisely because not all parameters – apart from the barley variety – were kept consistent.

Following the Optic barley variety grown between 2006 and 2010, which gave us whiskies with a slight strawberry note, the Publican variety grown from 2011 to 2014 tended to exhibit pineapple notes. The Concerto variety used here, by contrast, is characterised more by grassy and hay notes, as I have already observed in some cask samples.

The bottles are currently available online at whiskyshop.it for £130.

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Cask No.: 664/2016

Cask type: 1st Fill Ex-Bourbon Barrel

Date Filled: 16.8.2016

Date Bottled: 18.8.2025

Age: 9 yo

Strength: 57,5 % abv

Level of phenols in malted barley: approx. 20 ppm

Barley variety: Concerto (harvested at Rockside Farm in 2015)

Number of bottles: 247

Bottle volume: 0,7 l

Bottle Code: SC 18/08/25 16/664

Barcode: 5 060210 709013

Market: Italy

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