Ardbeg

Region: Islay

Owner: Glenmorangie (Moet Hennessey)

Founded: 1815

Ardbeg is a behemoth of the whisky world, it probably elicits a greater degree of devotion than any other distillery in Scotland, however if things had turned out differently then it could’ve been filed in the ‘Lost Distilleries’ archive. Like many distilleries it faced hardship in the late 1980’s with the downturn is Scotch whisky sales. It appeared that the then owner Allied Distillers wasn’t able or prepared to invest money in the distillery and therefore it spent the majority of the 1980’s closed. It was briefly re-opened in 1989 but closed once again in 1996.

Glenmorangie came to its rescue a year later and purchased the distillery for £7 million and set about investing money in not only casks but the buildings itself. It has always been known that the distillery produces exceptionally good spirit but given that a good proportion of the flavour of whisky is derived from the cask, it doesn’t take a genius to work out what happens to good spirit when it is filled into ropey old casks that are well beyond their life expectancy.

When I first tasted the 10 and the 17 year old in late 2002 I wondered what the fuss was all about. To say that I was less than impressed would be a massive understatement, but by 2005, when the first of the new, improved, spirit hit the shelves, things were a lot different. Many people were unhappy at this new direction, they claimed that the spirit had lost its original character as Glenmorangie had upped the peating levels, putting it on a similar footing to Laphroaig, but to be honest I really don’t think that supercharging the phenols did the spirit any harm at all, besides heavier peated spirit was becoming fashionably popular. By 2007 when the ‘new’ spirit officially replaced the ‘old’ spirit in the 10 year old, the transformation, in my opinion was complete. In fact, I often prefer the 10 year old to some of their fancy, expensive releases.

(Image Copyright James Mortimer Photography)