The Bodega Series was introduced by Diageo in 2018 as a sequence of ultra-aged Talisker releases finished in casks sourced from distinct sherry houses. This 41 Year Old is the first in that series and carries Manzanilla casks from Delgado Zuleta, the oldest bodega in Sanlucar de Barrameda, founded in 1744 and renowned for its La Gitana Manzanilla.
Manzanilla is a fino-style sherry matured on the Atlantic coast at Sanlucar, where the flor yeast thrives in the humid sea air and the resulting wine carries a dry, saline edge that sits remarkably close in profile to Talisker's own coastal signature. Bottled at 50.7% ABV and distilled in the mid-1970s, the whisky had already spent four decades in refill casks before its Manzanilla finish was applied.
Only a small number of bottles were released worldwide at launch, presented in bespoke packaging designed to evoke the slatted crates of sherry bodegas. The pairing of extreme age, coastal spirit and coastal sherry is unusually coherent: rather than dressing the whisky in something foreign, the Manzanilla amplifies what was already there.
At this age Talisker softens without surrendering, the pepper pulled back, the salt pushed forward, the smoke reduced to embers. A rare and considered bottling from the old warehouses at Carbost.
