A lost 34-year old Islay treasure aged in French oak makes a triumphant return.
“It’s like opening that bag of old sweets that your grandpa had, and leathery, old cigar smoke—my grandfather was a cardiologist, so whenever I get to a whiskey like this and I smell it, it reminds me of opening up his leather bag and getting out the stethoscope and putting it around my neck. That all comes flooding back to me,” Jackie Thompson reveals across the Zoom timeline direct from the Ardbeg distillery in Islay, Scotland.
“It makes you really want to dive in, doesn’t it?”
We’re currently sniffing a dram of Ardbeg The Abyss, an incredibly rare and in-demand single malt born from one of the Islay distillery’s most legendary bottles: Ardbeg Corryvreckan. Originally released in 2008, the limited-edition Corryvreckan started from some of the first juice distilled when Ardbeg re-opened in 1989 after an eight-year slumber.
The whisky aged for an unspecified time in ex-bourbon barrels before being transferred to very particular French oak casks. Heavily toasted to an exact specification, these “ultra-active” casks lent the double-barreled whisky a unique profile that resonated with whisky fans worldwide, creating something with the peated single malt that had never quite been made before.
Almost all of these truly singular casks were bottled, sold and drank when the Corryvreckan went on sale in 2008. Almost all—a lone few were pushed to a cold, dark corner of the distillery where they’ve been maturing another 16 years, slowly growing in complexity, evolving and transforming into another spirit that simply will never be repeated.
From those last surviving barrels Ardbeg The Abyss was born.
“The colors are beautifully evocative, very autumnal. I think they say it’s ‘deep Autumn sunset,’ but for me, it’s a wee bit more mahogany than that — I mean, it’s lovely, dark, rich,” says Thompson as she holds up her dram to the light streaming from a window. “You can see immediately the word rich come shooting at you—and it’s raining outside, so it’s again even more evocative.
“It’s immediately enticing and kind of a mystery, because you’re not quite sure what you’re going to get when you stick your nose inside.”
When the time is finally right, we are allowed to sip on this treasure. Neither of us speaks for a moment as we try to process the flavors swirling in our palates.
“It’s a kind of chewy, toffee with wood shavings. There’s a little bit of that baked brown bread, with sugar kind of bubbling away when you’ve got a pan of toffee and you chuck in some bons in the fire,” the eminently charming Ardbeg Ambassador says, lost in the kaleidoscope of flavors. “It’s quite bonfire, but with that sweet crisp edge of marshmallows when you’re toasting them. It is just gorgeous.”
Soon other flavors come to the forefront, including crème brûlée, pecan pie and more leather, with a thick and indulgent treacle sweetness sweeping in at the end—or “orange marmalade on brown bread,” as Thompson so eloquently adds.
To create a package as wonderful and evocative as the spirit inside, Ardbeg tapped American comic-book artist Tradd Moore to not only pen the labels, but also an entire graphic novel that reimagines the legend of the Corryvreckan whirlpool—a fathomless vortex located in the narrow strait between the nearby islands of Jura and Scarba. The ancient legend tells the story of the Viking prince Breacan, of love and loss.
“Ardbeg The Abyss is the stuff of Ardbeggian legend,” adds Dr. Bill Lumsden, Ardbeg’s esteemed Director of Whisky Creation. “Formed from the rare heart of that original, sought-after 2008 limited release of Corryvreckan, this 34-year-old whisky has been transported by time into a new world of flavor…its 400 bottles contain mysterious depths of toasted marshmallows, dark chocolate, pecan nuts and leather—a rare taste of an Ardbeg icon revived, and reimagined.”
Bottled at cask strength (48.4% ABV), Ardbeg The Abyss can be found at the distillery itself or via the Moët Hennessy Private Client channel for $27,500.
Follow Deputy Editor Nicolas Stecher on Instagram at @nickstecher and @boozeoftheday.
