Probably the finest highland malt whisky. Those were the words on the first ever bottle of The Balvenie Classic. Now, our Honorary Ambassador and Former Malt Master David C Stewart is far too modest a character to tell us whether or not he agrees, but he did share the story of how that first expression came to be…

Back when some of today’s distillery workers were still but loons and quines, he was working on a new creation. It would become the world’s original cask-finished single malt Scotch whisky, the making of which involved maturing the liquid in one cask, before transferring it to finish maturing in another. Success depended on the masterful managing of many different elements: the choice of wood, the warehousing, the testing, and, of course, the tasting.

Surrounded by shelves heaving under the weight of many, many books in The Balvenie’s Dufftown archive, David tells us what happened when he found the ultimate cask combination: American Oak, then sweet Oloroso sherry butts for finishing.