Founded: 1960 Stills: 4 Wash 4 Spirit Water Source: Achvochkie Burn Capacity: 3.7 Million Litres Owners: Pernod Ricard

1960-Present: Oranges, Tea, Pineapples and Malt.

There are few bottlings of Tormore that hail from before the early eighties which makes it difficult for us to assess its character in the early days of distillation. There are quite a few excellent early official bottlings that show it to be quite an old school, aromatic style of malt.

The official 10yo from the 1970s, although there are variances between the batches for different markets, was a largely excellent dram, it was herbaceous, gently waxy, full of minerals, vegetal fruit notes, honey, camphor and light phenolic touches. How much of its quality is due to bottle aging is impossible to determine but it doesn't change the fact that it is a fantastic dram.

Undoubtedly the best Tormore ever bottled is a mesmerizing 1966 sherry cask by Samaroli, this is one of those poetically matured sherry cask whiskies that make you realize why you love whisky to begin with. Unfortunately for Tormore this bottling is almost certainly more about the cask than the spirit, what with it being a dark, perfect sherry monster, there are few traces of the original distillate's fingerprints left in the spirit.

Beyond this there isn't much in terms of independent examples until the early eighties where a few aged bottlings from Signatory and Jack Wieber have sprung forward. These whiskies are generally good drams but lack the old style aromatic qualities of the earlier official 10yo bottlings. Instead they are richer, sweeter and heavier with more subtle fruit notes and more overt wood influence.