Isle of Raasay extends cask strength range
Scotch producer the Isle of Raasay Distillery has unveiled its third release of cask strength single malt whisky.
Following two previous annual releases, the third cask strength expression of the distillery’s flagship single malt, The Draam, is offered at 61.6% ABV.
Explaining the whisky’s name, William Dobbie, managing director of R&B Distillers, owner of Isle of Raasay said: “We wanted to give our hero whisky a name that reflected its character, and stereotypical names such as ‘signature’, ‘original’ or ‘flagship’ didn’t do the whisky justice.
“So, we decided to have a bit of fun with it and aptly name it The Draam. A playful take on the Scottish word for a measure of whisky and our island with too many ‘A’s in its name.”
The single malt whisky is aged by using the Isle of Raasay Distillery’s signature six-cask maturation process, Na Sia, which includes ageing peated and unpeated malts separately in first-fill rye whiskey, virgin Chinkapin oak and first-fill Bordeaux red wine casks.
After the separate maturation, the whiskies are married together to produce a lightly peated expression with a 6-11ppm (phenol per million).
The third edition contains whiskies distilled between 2019-2021 and features ‘rich dark fruit notes with spice, smoke, and sweetness’.
The whisky is offered non-chill and filtered at natural colour.
Isle of Raasay Distillery’s co-founder and master distiller, Alasdair Day, said: “For some, the closest you can get to a ‘pure’ representation of a distillery’s single malt is the whisky straight from a cask at the pure, untouched alcohol strength. There are very few distilleries that bottle their signature single malt at cask strength, so this makes it quite a special release.”
Isle of Raasay Single Malt Cask Strength Third Release is limited to 5,500 bottles worldwide in 700ml format.
The release is also available to purchase directly from the distillery’s website for £65 (US$82).
Isle of Raasay was established in 2017 and released its inaugural single malt in November 2020.
Last year, the distillery released the second edition of its Dùn Cana Sherry Quarter Cask expression.
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