Style: Single Malt Scotch

Producer: Kilchoman

Where: Islay

Country: Scotland 

Award tasting note: "Honey and vanilla with smoky smoothness, this spirit offers sweet and savory honey mustard BBQ flavors, medium peat, and a fruity push, perfect on ice." - Silver, USA Spirits Ratings

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Matured in a combination of re-charred red wine casks, oloroso sherry butts and bourbon barrels, a few drops of water were added post maturation to produce a Batch Strength of 57% abv. The result is a colossal dram combining the natural peat smoke and citrus character of Kilchoman with dark fruits, rich spices and salted caramel sweetness.

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Kilchoman Distillery was founded in 2005, the first distillery to be built on Islay for over 120 years. Kilchoman displays all that is great about the grass-roots traditions of Scotch whisky distilling: in addition to being one of the few distilleries to still practice floor malting, barley is also grown on this family-run farm for limited expressions, making Kilchoman a true farm distillery and the only Islay distillery to employ all parts of the whisky-making process on site.

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Kilchoman is a family run business established by Anthony and Kathy Wills in 2005.  As the business expanded, the husband and wife team were joined by their three sons; James, George and Peter.  The Wills family remain the driving force behind Kilchoman with Anthony as Managing Director and Master Distiller, Kathy running the Visitor Centre and their three sons managing the distillery’s sales and marketing activities. 

We farm a variety of landscapes covering an area of 2,300 acres surrounding the ruined Kilchoman Church.  The craggy hill ground to our south is grazed by our flock of blackface sheep.  To the west, our herd of Aberdeen Angus cattle feed on a combination of machair grasses and draff; barley husks discarded during the whisky-making process.

Our most fertile ground, 400 acres of rich soil surrounding the distillery, is reserved for our annual barley crop.  Sown each spring, once Islay’s 50,000 migratory geese have departed, the barley ripens over the summer months before being harvested in early autumn.