Westland Week

Have the tariff turkeys and their enablers gotten you down? Never fear. Blended scotch, Irish pot still, cognac and many other brown spirits won't be affected. Yet.

Or you can, like, not buy stuff. Yeah, I know, I know. I know the struggle.

For my American readers, there is at least one decent single malt made in these United(?) States. As one of the only 21st century American distilleries that was backed with ample private investment, Westland produces a steady stream of single casks and limited edition malts. They also have a regular range that's widely available here and abroad.

I visited Westland Distillery nearly four years ago, enjoying the experience and the whisky. Rémy Cointreau bought the company the company a year later (yes, it's my fault), and wisely kept the lead distiller, Matthew Hoffman. There's been very little obvious corporate tinkering since then. Much like Westland, Rémy's scotch distillery, Bruichladdich, is all about barley varieties. The ownership has let both facilities continue to fly that experimental flag.

Westland sells their trio of regular bottlings in a 3x200mL set, something I wish more scotch companies would consider. When I found one of these sets selling at half price this year, I scooped it up and open the bottles relatively promptly.

Yes, the word 'American' appears six times.

I'm going to review each of these three whiskies this week, then sum it up on Friday, comparing the results to my expectations and previous experiences. Hopefully each post will be bite-sized or dram-sized or at least not TL;DR. But no guarantees!