By Richard Thomas Rating: C+ New Zealand Whisky Company is presently engaged in bottling the stock from what had been the country’s sole whisky distillery, Willowbank. This rather aged example is a blend drawing on a most unusual cask profile. 70% malt and 30% grain whisky, it was aged in ex-bourbon barrels for six years before being transferred to French ...

By Richard Thomas Rating: B+ New Zealand Whisky Company is unique among independent bottlers because it exists in a country with no active distilleries, and their stock in trade is whisky made by a single distillery, Willowbank, that was shuttered in 1997. The Oamaruvian story starts with Dunedin DoubleWood, which in turn began with 200 ex-Bourbon barrels of grain whisky. ...

By Richard Thomas Rating: B Whisky-making is a feature of the Anglophone world, forming a complete circle when Australia changed its laws in the 1990s and allowed whisky distillation. Across a deceptively vast expanse of ocean in New Zealand, however, they had been up to it off and on since the 1860s. Ironically, the last distillery in New Zealand, Willowbank, ...

New Zealand might not be the first place that comes to mind when sourcing great single malt whisky, but thanks to Scottish settlers in the 1830s a whisky tradition was born in a place you’d least expect. Beginning this month, thanks to importer Anchor Distilling Company, the award-winning New Zealand Whisky Collection, comprised of the oldest and rarest whiskies produced ...