Glen Moray was among the first Scotch distilleries to experiment with white wine cask finishes, and its Chardonnay Cask Finish, introduced in the late 1990s, remains something of a curiosity within the category. Where most wine finishes lean on the colour and tannin of reds or fortified wines, Chardonnay offers neither, and the challenge for the distiller is to draw flavour without drawing bitterness.
The process is straightforward enough. Malt matured in ex-bourbon casks is transferred to French oak barriques that previously held Chardonnay, where it rests for a secondary period before bottling at 40 per cent. The colour remains pale, closer to the original bourbon-matured spirit than to the sherry or Port finishes in the same range. On the nose there is green apple, lemon peel and honeysuckle, with a faint custardy note from the underlying malt. The palate is light and orchard-fruited, the oak more apparent than the wine itself, and a delicate floral sweetness drifts across the midpalate.
The finish is short to medium, clean and gently spiced. This is not a whisky for those who demand power or pyrotechnics, but as a summer dram or an aperitif it has considerable merit. It also represents a genuinely interesting piece of modern Scotch history, being a product of the period when Glen Moray was testing the boundaries of what a finishing cask might contribute. That it remains in the range three decades later is endorsement enough.
