Springbank is of course famous for its single malt, but the award-winning Campbeltown Loch is also made here: a so-called “blended malt”, which means that it is a mixture of different single malts. There is no grain whiskey in it, and therefore the quality is also towering. In fact, 5 different single malts from the town’s three distilleries are included: Springbank, Longrow and Hazelburn from Springbank Distillery as well as Kilkerran and Glen Scotia.
The whiskey is aged in both bourbon casks and sherry casks, and bottled at the classic 46%. It is a whiskey with fantastic value for money – and it has absolutely lots of “Springbank magic”
Colour: Amber.
Smell: Very distinctive Campbeltown smell with notes of sea breeze, cold butter, British Christmas cake and toasted nuts. A small touch of smoke completes the scent – fantastic!
Tasting notes: Creamy on the tongue with notes of freshly roasted coffee, salted caramel, dates and brown sugar. Completely soft, mild smoke in the aftertaste, which is long and complex.
Serving suggestions: Enjoy neat.
At Springbank, 3 distinct types of whiskey are produced, which differ on a number of parameters. The classic Springbank has a light peat smoke. The smoke level is indicated (somewhat imprecisely) with a measurement of phenol in the finished malted barley and is approximately 10-15 “parts per million” (the malt is dried for 6 hours with peat smoke and 30 hours with hot air). Springbank is also distilled 2.5 times. “Longrow” – a strongly smoked variant was first made in 1973. Here the smoke is up to 50-55 ppm, the malt is dried for 48 hours with peat smoke, and it is distilled twice. The newest variant, Hazelburn, saw the light of day in 1997 when they first tried completely unsmoked and triple-distilled whiskey. Of the approximately 175,000 liters the small Campbeltown distillery produces per year, 80% is Springbank, approximately 10% Longrow and 10% Hazelburn.
Regardless of which variant you’re after, Springbank is worth getting to know. It is the favorite distillery of many whiskey geeks and for good reason! As the only distillery in Scotland, they malt all the barley they need themselves. Color is never added and the whiskey is not chill-filtered.
