The 2023 edition of Springbank 18 Year Old, the older end of the distillery's core range, bottled at 46% ABV. This year's vatting leaned towards sherry wood, with a share of rum casks that gives it a darker, fruitier cast than many earlier 18s.
About This Whisky
Springbank changes the cask recipe for its 18 Year Old from one year to the next, so each release has its own character. The 2023 bottling was built from roughly 65% sherry casks, 20% bourbon casks and 15% rum casks. The sherry brings red fruit and dates, the rum adds a dark, slightly sooty sweetness, and the bourbon wood keeps some lift. As always, it is bottled at 46% with natural colour and no chill filtration.
Tasting Profile
- Nose: Smoky red fruit, dates and raisins, demerara sugar and a salty, wet-pebble note, with gentle Springbank peat underneath.
- Palate: Cranberry and blackcurrant over dark chocolate, fig jam and freshly turned earth, with a creamy, coffee-like middle.
- Finish: Long, with digestive biscuit, cocoa, a little smoke and a steady sweetness.
Serving & Food
Pour at room temperature into a tulip glass and taste it neat first; water pulls out a nuttier side, with toasted almond and hazelnut. It sits well beside Christmas cake, venison with a berry sauce, or a slab of mature Cheddar.
How to Enjoy
Springbank drinkers tracking the 18 Year Old from year to year, and anyone who likes sherried malt with a coastal edge.
Product Details
Producer: Springbank Distillery (J&A Mitchell & Co.)
Country: Scotland
Region: Campbeltown
Style: Campbeltown single malt Scotch whisky
Age Statement: 18 years old
Release: 2023 edition
Cask Composition: About 65% sherry, 20% bourbon, 15% rum casks
ABV: 46%
Proof: 92
Volume: 700mL
About the Distillery
Springbank stands on the site of an illicit still once worked by Archibald Mitchell, and when it took out a licence in 1828 it became the fourteenth legal distillery in Campbeltown. The Mitchells had arrived in the town from the Lowlands in the 1660s, and some of the family were already maltsters. Two of Archibald's sons, John and William, took over in 1837, and John later brought his own son into the business, which is how the firm came to be called J&A Mitchell. The company still runs the distillery today, nearly two centuries on.