The third pillar of the Milk & Honey Elements range is the Peated edition — and it is, in many ways, the boldest experiment of the lot. The distillery uses peated Scottish malt for this expression and matures the spirit in a mix of ex-bourbon and STR red wine casks, all under the relentless Tel Aviv sun.
The result is a whisky that puts to bed any assumption that peat belongs only on the windswept islands of Scotland. The smoke here is sweeter, riper, almost tropical — a function of the hot maturation that pulls fruit and vanilla from the wood at extraordinary speed. It coexists with the peat in a way that feels distinctly Mediterranean: more grilled-fruit market stall than damp Hebridean bothy.
Founded in 2012, Milk & Honey was Israel's first whisky distillery, and the Peated Elements release proves that the team are willing to push their hot-climate model in every direction. The salinity that runs through all their bottlings is amplified here, lending the whisky an almost coastal Islay quality, but the fruit underneath is unmistakably their own.
Bottled at 46% with no chill filtration, it has the oily texture and aromatic punch you want from a peated malt, without the medicinal sharpness that some new-world peated whiskies fall into. It is a curious, characterful dram that earns its place on any peat lover's shelf as a genuine point of comparison to the Scottish originals.
