A 52-year-old Dalmore distilled in 1926

Barely a week goes by these days without another surprise in the super premium spirits category. A lot of them are created by The Dalmore, the single malt whisky owned by Whyte & Mackay.

The latest is the news that the distillery has teamed up withUnited Kingdomnational independent retail chain The Whisky Shop to release a ‘one of one’ bottle of rare single malt. In fact it’s very VERY rare because it’s the only bottle.

Called The Dalmore Zenith, it’s a single malt but it contains Dalmore whisky from three sources; a 1964 Dalmore, a 1951 Dalmore, and a 52-year-old Dalmore distilled in 1926, the year of The Wall Street Crash, and bottled in 1978 – before Margaret Thatcher came to power in Britain.

The whisky will tour round The Whisky Shop’s 17 stores and potential buyers are being asked to make a sealed bid for it by March. The highest bidder will get the bottle, and bids are expected from across the world.

What sort of figure are you looking at? Well, bids must be a minimum of £50,000 and The Dalmore has some form here, having sold two of its three bottles of Trinitas for £100,000 and the other for £125,000.

Is this sort of super luxury pricing obscene? Maybe, but a not insignificant 10% of the sale price will go to the Red Cross, and in the past other charities have benefited from this sort of sale. A year ago, for instance, a Macallan was auctioned at Sotherby’s inNew Yorkfor $600,000 (£375,000) with all the money going to Water.

So what does The Dalmore Zenith taste like? Well I requested a sample and to the producers’ credit, they responded straightaway.

Unfortunately, with laughter…