This year Diageo created its Special release as a second edition of the Spirited Xchange theme. It is still a cask strength series which revolves around uncommon cask types. We start with Talisker, usually a reliable component – it appeared over twenty times in this series already.

For the Talisker 8 Year Old ‘Tidal Churn’ (as a non-native English speaker I had to look that up) they used stone-spun and lightly re-toasted cask. Quite an elaborate description. The barrels’ original char layers were polished away by rocks and water, but I’m not sure how to understand this exactly. I believe wet stones go inside and then the cask rotates, creating gentle erosion. Afterwards they re-toast the oak to bring out fresh vanilla and fruit flavours.