Founded: 1897 Stills: 12 Wash 11 Spirit Water Source: Allt Na Frithe Burn Capacity: 5 Million Litres Owners: Takara Shuzo

1965-Present: An Ever-Changing Distillery

Tomatin was already expanding in 1965, it had had ten stills since 1961. By the time the maltings were dismantled in 1974 the distillery would have 23 stills and be producing 12 million litres per year.

This was massive and encroaching on previously unknown production territory in terms of malt production in Scotland. Despite this, many of the aged Tomatin bottlings from this time are excellent drams, fruity and lush in the classic Speyside style with lots of wax, honey, chocolate and touches of menthol and mead.

The best examples from these transitional years are fairly numerous, bottlers like Duncan Taylor, Douglas Laing, The Whisky Agency, Signatory, Sestante, Jack Wieber and the distillery themselves have all bottled outstanding examples of the make. In recent years Tomatin has lost some of its fruit driven luster, however it has compensated with a typical richness and elegant malty complexity.

Whether this is down to the fact the number of stills has been reduced and the output of the distillery more than halved is anyone's guess. What's for certain is that Tomatin is a fine dram and recently repackaged official bottlings are showing it to be a continuously excellent whisky. One that maybe one of the big hits of the future if enough people realize what a great whisky it is.