Orkney single malt Highland Park has announced its oldest release in eight years – Highland Park 50 Year Old, drawn from two ex-Sherry hogshead casks and priced at US$15,000/£13,500 a bottle.
Only 274 bottles of the new expression will be released, drawn from a pair of ex-Sherry hogsheads laid down in 1964 and ‘discovered’ at the back of a warehouse in 2008, according to Highland Park owner Edrington.
Whisky from the two casks was combined and married for a further eight years, along with a ‘small amount’ of liquid from Highland Park’s 50-year-old release from 2010.
The whisky was bottled at 42.5% without chill-filtration or artificial colour, with each bottle numbered and signed by Highland Park whisky maker Max McFarlane.
Highland Park 50 Year Old is described as ‘sweet at first, with notes of ripe black cherries and muscovado sugar, giving way to dried autumn fruits and warm, toasted wood’.
The whisky comes in an oak box made by Scottish designer and master craftsman John Galvin, which contains a bottle of Highland Park 50 Year Old, a crystal decanter and a leather book about the whisky’s development.
Released from September 2018, Highland Park 50 Year Old is priced at US$15,000/£13,500 a bottle.
