Caol Ila – 12 Year Old - Manager's Dram 2021 (70cl, 58%)

Caol Ila – 12 Year Old - Manager's Dram 2021 is a single malt whisky from Caol Ila (Islay). Aged 12 years, bottled at 58% ABV, 70cl. Caol Ila was founded by Hector Henderson in 1846, next to Port Askaig. Later, Henderson was bought out by blender Bulloch Lade who built a pier at the distillery's site. Caol Ila was then taken over by DCL (now Diageo) in 1927 and was in production for several decades before being demolished in 1972. A new distillery was built with six new stills, which led to Caol Ila experimenting with unpeated malt. The 21st century brought many things for Caol Ila, in 2002 the distillery's first official permanent bottling was released, the Caol Ila 12-Year-Old. Revamps were taking place in 2011, with a new mash tun and even more, washbacks were installed, this allowed the distillery's capacity to increase to 6.5m litres per year. Diageo announced plans for a new visitor centre in 2018, created within the distillery warehouse including a new car park, footbridge entry and a bar overlooking the Sound of Islay. This 12-year-old Caol Ila is from the highly collectable Manager's Dram series of single malt releases. The bottles were released to be available exclusively to employees of what is now known as Diageo. Each release was selected by distillery managers within Diageo and bottled at natural cask strength. This malt was matured for 12 years and bottled at the natural cask strength of 58% ABV in November 2021.