Kilchoman Machir Bay 2012

Cask type: vatting of 3, 4 and 5 year old bourbon barrels, with the 4 year old being finished in oloroso sherry butts for 8 weeks

Bottled: 2012

Strength: 46,0 % abv

Phenol level: 50 ppm

Bottle size: 0,05 l / 0,7 l / 0,75 l

Distribution: worldwide

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After the first Kilchoman whiskies were released approximately quarterly as limited releases from 2009-2011, the first General Release – i.e. the distillery’s first always-available bottling – was launched at the beginning of 2012 with Machir Bay, which is still Kilchoman’s signature release to date. Named after the bay not far from the distillery with one of Islay’s most beautiful sandy beaches, the batch-bottled release was labelled with the year of bottling from 2012 to 2014. During this period, the age of the whiskies contained in the bottle increased from year to year. From 2015 onwards, this procedure was abandoned, mainly due to the fact that the cask stocks were still too low. Since then, Machir Bay no longer has an explicit year specification – the time of bottling and the batch number can only be recognised by the bottle code – and the age of the whiskies contained was frozen at around 3-5 years and a sherry cask proportion of 10% was specified.

But back to the 2012 release. This is a vatting of 3, 4 and 5 year old Fresh-Ex-Bourbon Barrels, with the 4 year old being finished in oloroso sherry butts for 8 weeks.

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