Whisky Trail Glen Keith 20 Year KWM Cask

$259.99

This 1996 vintage Glen Keith was matured 20 years in a Sherry Butt before bottling at 46.6%. Only 24 bottles have come to Canada, exclusively for Kensington Wine Market. But while our logo is on the label, there are just 24 bottles, meaning this isn't your typical KWM cask... so what's the story?!

More than a year ago, while looking at some casks with Elixir Distillers, we were offered 24 bottles of a 1996 Glen Keith, bottled at 20 years of age, presumably in 2016 or 2017. We assumed it was a single cask, bottled for another of Elixir Distillers' clients. In any case, the whisky was good, and the price was fair so we decided to take it.

On arrival, we did a little digging, and came upon an interesting coincidence. We don't know this for sure, but we can only find two other 20 year old 1996 vintage Glen Keiths bottled at 46.6%, and they were both done for the Whisky Exchange, which was owned by Elixir Distillers at the time. One of them appears to have been bottled for the 20th Anniversary of the Whisky Exchange in 2019, and the other, presumably the same year, as a Staff Christmas bottle, also marking the 20th Anniversary.

The most likely explanation, is that ours is the same whisky. In any case it is excellent, and we aren't getting very much of it!

700 ml

Region:Scotland > Speyside
Vintage:1996

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Andrew's Tasting Note

Nose: ooh... old-school sherry... tropical, floral, and waxy; the sherry tones here are soft, subtle, and elegant, with a hint of aged Christmas cake; dark milk chocolate, soft leather, and a touch of pipe tobacco; creamed honey and a bit of waxy honeycomb; starts with citrus, juicy orange and pink grapefruit, morphing into pineapple and ripe mango; Strawberry Twizzlers and Cherry Nibbs to round things out.

Palate: a silky delivery with more old-school sherry notes; more dark milk chocolate, pipe tobacco, soft leather, and aged Christmas cake; building spices: fennel, clove, and Aussie licorice; the citrus notes are a bit tamped down by the sherry, grapefruit peel and candied orange slices; the trop fruits are similarly muted, but still prominent: cooked pineapple, mango chutney, and a bit of guava; still waxy, more honeycomb, and Twizzlers.

Finish: warming, spicy, and sherried with fading fruits and waxy mouth coating oils; elegant and satisfying.

Comment: this is a lovely old-school sherried dram; we don't see a lot of full-sherry Glen Keith, so this is a treat; not hard to see why it was chosen to be an internal Christmas dram for the team at TWE by Elixir in 2019; we didn't choose this cask, nor did we have a hand in designing the label; but we did agree to buy 24 bottles of a 20 year old Glen Keith at a great price after trying a sample in the summer of 2024, at least 7 years after this was originally bottled; now if only I could find my mid-90s fuchsia Sunice wind breaker to wear while drinking this in the sun apres ski!