Announcements
Introducing Spirits Castle’s First Bottling Series
We have been keeping quiet about our first bottling series – Mahjong – as there were so many other events previously. Since all these events are now over, let us turn our gaze to Spirits Castle’s Mahjong series.
Mahjong is a predominantly Chinese game, where four players sit around a table and pit their wits against one another. Popular during festivals such as the Chinese New Year, it is a game favoured by both the young and old. Born as a gambling game amongst the Chinese, Mahjong has gained a reputation of sorts in recent times as a game useful in delaying the onset of dementia in elderly folks. While we do not know the truth to that claim, Mahjong has indeed become popular in some countries out of the dominant Chinese nations such as China, Taiwan and Hong Kong.
Spirits Castle works with three other companies to bottle the Mahjong series. As you would already guess, the three companies come from China, Taiwan and Hong Kong as Mahjong is a popular game in these countries. Therefore, you will see the logos of all four companies on each bottle of our Mahjong series. At the moment, we have already released eight bottles.
We laser-engraved the Mahjong tiles onto the glass bottles so that you can feel the texture of the tiles when you hold the bottle. It is to replicate the feeling of playing Mahjong and of course, make the glass bottles look amazing on your tables and shelves. Even the box is custom-made to ensure that our buyers can display the glass bottles after finishing the whiskies in them!
First Eight Bottles of Mahjong Series
The series started with the first four bottles in April 2019. They are:
- Benriach 2011 6 Years Old (Peated) – The corresponding tile is 一萬
- Drumblade (Alisa Bay) 2008 8 Years Old – The corresponding tile is 一筒
- Aultmore 2008 9 Years Old – The corresponding tile is 一索
- Highland Park 2005 12 Years Old – The corresponding tile is 紅中
These four bottles are from Duncan Taylor’s famous Octave casks. Young, dynamic and full of flavours, these four bottles have drawn praises from many who bought and tried it. Two particular favourites in Singapore are the Benriach 2011 and the Highland Park 2005.
The next four bottles come in spurs. They are:
- Craigellachie 2007 10 Years Old – The corresponding tile is 東風
- Glen Garioch 2011 7 Years Old – The corresponding tile is 二萬
- Invergordon 2007 10 Years Old – The corresponding tile is 三萬
- Caol Ila 2008 10 Years Old – The corresponding tile is 二筒
The new bottles came in July 2019, with the last one – Caol Ila – landing only on 27 July. Out of the four, the first three are also from Duncan Taylor’s famous Octave casks. As expected, the Octave casks gave added dimensions to the whiskies, and all of them tasted older than they are. The most surprising is Invergordon 2007. As a young single grain, the flavours from the Octave cask gave it more complexities than you would expect.
Caol Ila 2008 deserves a special mention because it is the first cask bought from Signatory Vintage. As a young whisky that is fully matured in a single bourbon cask, it displays fantastic flavours from the spirit character, and yet gives a distinctive bourbon influence. It was also one of the most popular expressions among all eight bottles.
All eight bottles are still available for purchase over at our shop. Do head over to the shop to take a closer look!
Moving forward, we will slow down the releases as we understand that it can be quite taxing on the wallet. Nonetheless, grab these eight bottles first before they sell out and look forward to our next bottle!