Equally annoying is that the whisky doesn’t quite live up to the spectacular single cask bottlings I’ve had over the last couple of years – they’re all rather good, with the Rowan Tree and Madeira Finish coming in as my favourites of the evening, but none quite as rich and complex as the ones that I’ve found at the SMWS. Whisky Gandalf Darren, the man behind Whisky4Movember and random chap for Master of Malt, had done some looking around and brought us four moustache related whiskies to try. Next up was one of their Icons of Arran bottlings – The Rowan Tree, the follow-up to the Peacock that I have in the cupboard. However, Harold Currie (former director of Chivas) founded Arran distillers, with the distillery opening in 1995 in Locranza.

Howcroft Estate Limestone Coast Merlot 2006 (Tesco, Australia): Grabbed from my step-dad’s wine rack due to the word ‘turkey’ being in the ‘goes with’ list on the back, this was a nice light Merlot, full enough to battle with the dark turkey meat as well as not being too strong as to drown out the (admittedly dry) white meat. On the nose there was initially a hit of baby sick, but this faded after pouring into sweet peat and muddy grass. I feel that although this Whisky is top tier in quality, the flavour profile is somewhat intense and likely better suited to experienced whisky drinkers. Water brought out more sugar, raisin cordial (not that I’ve tried raisin cordial, but it’s what I imagine non-alcoholic PX to taste like) and butter. Being so young a distillery it’s quite difficult to have a wide range of whiskies at traditional ages.To taste it’s thick and syrupy, with red grapes, spicy wood and a chunk of tannin, rolling towards a buttery apple finish. Amid closures and overproduction, you’d think the last thing any investor would do would be to open a new whisky distillery in Scotland, never mind opening one on the Isle of Arran. Been wanting to try Arran 10 for a while now after all the hype of it winning the Online Whisky Awards 2022.

This one was slightly disappointing – not so influenced by the wood as the last one, but still a really good dark ale with more fruit and less vanilla than the Ola Dubh. The St Magnus comes in at 55% ABV and on the nose had punchy sherry fruit, mulchy peat, almonds and marzipan, and a hint of farmyard mixed in with a meatiness that spread from the nose down to the back of the mouth. This whisky feels like a well-aged, more expensive bottle and although it lacks the complexity of more ancient single malts, there’s enough going on to give it a wide appeal.It definitely needed some time to breathe, having a harsh edge, but it quickly softened (especially when poured through my newly acquired wine aerater [thankyou Dave’nLet] which worked much better than we had imagined) and was a nice, spicy, fruity wine, complimenting the pud better than expected. They mention that it's the most palatable sweetest whisky ever, with lots of flavour and it' s not chill filtered either.

If you’re looking to try something different, their cask finish series uses the likes of Sauternes casks and Amarone casks to provide unique and interesting flavour profiles. I’m a fan of slightly brighter/grassy, citrus fruit stuff, or full on smoked whisky’s over the sherried end of things, and this is a great, non peated/smoked, whisky. This is bottled at 50% and consists of whisky matured for 8 years and then finished for 10 months in madeira casks.A night of sherry, whisky and food at east London Galician restaurant Trangallan, which I’ve been meaning to visit for a while?

So, having stuck my name on the mailing list I waited for his next London event, which came up rather fortuitously – a tasting of the range of the Arran distillery‘s whiskies, led by Céline Têtu.Although it’s a no-age-statement single malt, if you enter the unique five-digit code online, the batch recipe will be revealed! We moved on to another moustachioed bottle, this time last year’s Master of Malt Movember bottling – M’Orkney.