Allt-a-Bhainne

Allt-a-Bhainne stands in the hills south of Dufftown, below Ben Rinnes. It was built in the mid-1970s by Seagram as a working distillery to supply malt for its blends, and it passed to Chivas Brothers, part of Pernod Ricard. The name is Gaelic and is usually translated as the burn of milk.

The distillery was designed as a modern, efficient plant and most of its spirit still goes into blends. Its whisky is generally light and fruity, and it has also produced peated spirit, which is unusual for Speyside.

For years there was little official single malt. Chivas later released a no-age-statement, lightly peated single malt simply labelled Allt-a-Bhainne, which is the bottling buyers meet most often.

Much of what reaches the shelf comes from independent bottlers. Our catalogue lists single casks and small batches from Douglas Laing (Old Malt Cask, Old Particular), Hunter Laing (The First Editions), Signatory Vintage, Gordon & MacPhail, Murray McDavid, That Boutique-y Whisky Company, Master of Malt and Alistair Walker (Infrequent Flyers), often at ages of 20 years and more.