Hello everyone. I have been enjoying your posts for several months now and want to say thank you to everyone for sharing such helpful knowledge and insight on the topic of single malt whisky!
I am interested in purchasing a bottle of 30 Year Old whisky (preferably from Scotland) to commemorate my 30th birthday next month. This particular bottle will be something that I would like to have in my collection for several years, even a decade or more, and enjoy solely at celebratory occasions with family and friends. It will not remain sealed and it is not to be viewed as an "investment" in any way. It will only be enjoyed by myself and those who share a mutual appreciation for good whisky! I would like to spend no less that $1,000 USD.
For those of you who have had the opportunity to taste 30 year old whisky, is there a particular bottle that you would recommend? If so, would you be kind enough to elaborate on why?
I understand that personal taste preference is a major factor. Personally, I have been able to find enjoyment in almost every scotch whisky I have come across from the heavily sherried A'bunadh from Aberlour to the Octomore range from Bruichladdich. Yes, there are some whiskies I consider to be "a personal favorite" but for the purpose of this purchase, I am open to anything!
Some bottles I am considering:
-Balvenie 30 -Highland Park 30 (Horst, I really enjoyed your YouTube review of this one!) -Talisker 30 -Caol Ila 30 -Glenfiddich 30
I realize that in many instances, the evolution of flavor and character in whisky is somewhat negligible after 21-25 years. The age of this particular bottle is intended to be symbolic but if any of you prefer the 25 Year expression of these malts or any other for that matter, I am open to hearing your input.
Hi Glenben, I have been in very similar shoes as you are a couple weeks ago. After some online research, I have bought a bottle of 30yo Talisker vintage 2007.
I have not tried it myself yet, but if it's anything like the Talisker's I had so far (10yo, Distiller's Edition, 18yo), I will not be disappointed.
I recommend you follow course and do your research online before purchase. Hope this helps.
I have to say, the best, most expensive whisky was the Black Bowmore. HP 30 was really nice as well. Have a look at the Glen Grant 50 expressions. In Germany they are below 1000€/$.
For me, Ballantines 30YO was unexpectedly wonderful even though it's a blend (but I like good blends). Highland Park 30YO was also quite outstanding. Glenfiddich 30YO didn't impress me as much. And I haven't tried the rest from your list.
By the way, I was invited to a tasting in December and had a glass of Royal Salute 62 Gun Salute. That was the most wonderful and complex whisky of all I've tasted so far (and yes, it's also a blend). But as far as I know, it's much more expensive in Europe than in Russia (don't know about Chicago). In our boutiques you can purchase it for less than 2000$ but in Europe it costs 3000$ and above. But if you want a whisky for a very special occasion, this one is surely the one I'd recommend without hesitation.
Thank you to everyone for your help. There are some great suggestions here.
Ben - I saw the video tasting of the Black Bowmore. Truly mouth watering! The Glen Grant 50 is very intriguing although I cannot seem to find a retailer selling it for less than $1,000.
Fortunately, a local retailer has the Highland Park 30 Year (new release) available for $600 and I was able to locate a retailer in the UK selling the Talisker 30 Year vintage 2009 (full cask strength) for the equivalent of $400 shipped.
"ben" wrote: It's really stange how the prices vary from country to country.
may be someone should put a post up with say 10 or 20 whisky's and there price and people from different countries should put the price from their country would be interesting to see the difference
Yes it comes down to personal preference. Old ones can and do get oaky due to time in the barrel some tannins too. Good old ones are balanced and are not too heavy on any one aspect. HP 30 was a good choice IMHO. I have the HP 25 (excellent) but not sure if I will go 5 more years or not but the Vlog sounded really tastily. Good luck and enjoy . Just picked up the Tomatin 36 yo on-line at a good price at MOM.
We use cookies and website technologies to customize information and improve your shopping experience all around whisky. We use technically necessary cookies to ensure the general functionality and features of our website. With your consent we also use cookies and iframes of third party providers to present our social media content to you and make use of functional tracking and analysis tools to identify errors and continually improve your user experience.
Details & Settings
Necessary cookies (always active)
Necessary cookies
The following cookies and technologies are required for the core functionalities of our website and online shops.
Necessary cookies (always active)
Name
Provider
Lifetime
Type
Name
_fe_typo_user
Provider
Whisky.com
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie is necessary for logging into the Whisky.com community and using the community functions.
Name
sid
Provider
Whisky.com
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie is necessary for the basic provision of the shop functions.
Name
sid_key
Provider
Whisky.com
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie is necessary for the basic provision of the shop functions.
Name
cookie_consent
Provider
Whisky.com
Lifetime
12 months
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie is necessary to save the settings in this Consent Manager.
Name
adventcalendar_clicked
Provider
Whisky.com
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie is necessary for the correct display of the open doors in the Whisky.com advent calendar.
Name
language
Provider
Whisky.com
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie is necessary for language control on our website.
Name
BannerImpressions
Provider
Whisky.com
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie is necessary to limit the banner ads on our website.
Name
datamints_http2push
Provider
Whisky.com
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTTP2
Description
This cookie is necessary to improve the loading speed of our website for a better user experience.
Name
datamints_http2push_shop
Provider
Whisky.com
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTTP2
Description
This cookie is necessary to improve the loading speed of our website for a better user experience.
Name
datamints_shopselector_hasdismissednote
Provider
Whisky.com
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTTP
Description
Necessary functionality to determine whether the shop selection has already been made if the geolocation of the IP address does not match the shop country.
Name
hasUserHash
Provider
Whisky.com
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTTP
Description
Necessary functionality to determine whether a shop user exists.
Name
Vanilla
Provider
Whisky.com
Lifetime
1 Month
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie is necessary to use the forum functions in the Whisky.com community.
Name
Vanilla-Volatile
Provider
Whisky.com
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie is necessary to use the forum functions in the Whisky.com community.
Name
Vanilla-Vv
Provider
Whisky.com
Lifetime
24 hours
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie is necessary to use the forum functions in the Whisky.com community.
Name
__vnf
Provider
Whisky.com
Lifetime
13 months
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie is necessary to use the forum functions in the Whisky.com community.
Name
preferred-country
Provider
Whisky.com
Lifetime
12 Monate
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie is necessary to save and restore the country setting in the language and country selection.
Name
preferred-language
Provider
Whisky.com
Lifetime
12 Monate
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie is necessary to save and restore the language setting in the language and country selection.
Functional cookies
The following cookies and technologies allow us to anonymously analyze consumer behaviour on our website to detect potential errors and continually improve the user experience.
Name
Provider
Lifetime
Type
Name
__utmz
Provider
Google, LLC
Lifetime
13 months
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie records whether a user is redirected to our website by a search engine (and if so, which search term was used), a specific link or if he was not redirected from a previously visited page (e.g. opening the website via a bookmark).
Name
__utma
Provider
Google, LLC
Lifetime
24 months
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie records the number of visits, timestamp of your first visit, the previous and current visit.
Name
_ga
Provider
Google, LLC
Lifetime
24 months
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie is used by Google for user differentiation.
Name
_ga_UA******
Provider
Google, LLC
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie is used by Google Analytics to limit the amount of data recorded on websites with high user traffic.
Name
_gid
Provider
Google, LLC
Lifetime
24 Months
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie is used by Google to track and store the visited page history.
Name
_gat
Provider
Google, LLC
Lifetime
10 minutes
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie is used by Google for tracking.
Name
__gads
Provider
Google, LLC
Lifetime
30 days
Type
HTTP
Description
The __gads cookie is associated with the DoubleClick for Publishers service from Google. It serves purposes such as measuring interactions with the ads on our domain and preventing the same ads from being shown to you too many times.
Name
_gat_commercetracker
Provider
Google, LLC
Lifetime
30 Tage
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie is used by Google Analytics to track and evaluate e-commerce applications.
Name
CONSENT
Provider
Google, LLC
Lifetime
max. 2 Jahre
Type
HTTP
Description
This cookie stores user consent information.
Name
NID
Provider
Google, LLC
Lifetime
6 Month
Type
HTTP
Description
When creating a Google account or logging in, NID cookie is stored on the computer in order to remain connected to your Google account when you visit its service again. While you are logged in and use plug-ins from other websites, such as Whisky.com, Google uses these cookies to improve your user experience.
Social Media cookies
The following cookies and technologies are required for displaying Social Media content of third party providers like YouTube, Instagram, etc.
Name
Provider
Lifetime
Type
Name
yt-remote-cast-installed
Provider
Youtube, LLC
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTML
Description
Stores user settings when accessing a Youtube video embedded on external websites.
Name
yt-remote-connected-devices
Provider
Youtube, LLC
Lifetime
Persistent
Type
HTML
Description
Stores user settings when accessing a Youtube video embedded on external websites.
Name
yt-remote-device-id
Provider
Youtube, LLC
Lifetime
Persistent
Type
HTML
Description
Stores user settings when accessing a Youtube video embedded on external websites.
Name
GPS
Provider
Youtube, LLC
Lifetime
1 Day
Type
HTTP
Description
Registers a unique ID on mobile devices to allow geographic GPS location based tracking.
Name
VISITOR_INFO1_LIVE
Provider
Youtube, LLC
Lifetime
179 Days
Type
HTTP
Description
Attempts to calculate the user's network bandwidth on pages with embedded YouTube videos.
Name
YSC
Provider
Youtube, LLC
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTTP
Description
Registers a unique ID for storing statistics on YouTube videos watched by a user.
Name
yt-remote-fast-check-period
Provider
Youtube, LLC
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTML
Description
Stores user settings when accessing a Youtube video embedded on external websites.
Name
yt-remote-session-app
Provider
Youtube, LLC
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTML
Description
Stores user settings when accessing a Youtube video embedded on external websites.
Name
yt-remote-session-name
Provider
Youtube, LLC
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTML
Description
Stores user settings when accessing a Youtube video embedded on external websites.
Name
_fbp
Provider
Facebook/Meta
Lifetime
1 Month
Type
HTML
Description
Facebook Tracking via Facebook Pixel
Name
csfrtoken
Provider
Instagram, LLC
Lifetime
1 Month
Type
HTML
Description
Are set as soon as an Instagram plugin is embedded in our website. Enables the correct functionality of these Instagram plugins, such as embedded Instagram posts. Instagram cookie information: help.instagram.com/1896641480634370.
Name
ig_cb
Provider
Instagram, LLC
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTML
Description
Are set as soon as an Instagram plugin is embedded in our website. Enables the correct functionality of these Instagram plugins, such as embedded Instagram posts. Instagram cookie information: help.instagram.com/1896641480634370.
Name
ig_did
Provider
Instagram, LLC
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTML
Description
Are set as soon as an Instagram plugin is embedded in our website. Enables the correct functionality of these Instagram plugins, such as embedded Instagram posts. Instagram cookie information: help.instagram.com/1896641480634370.
Name
mid
Provider
Instagram, LLC
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTML
Description
Are set as soon as an Instagram plugin is embedded in our website. Enables the correct functionality of these Instagram plugins, such as embedded Instagram posts. Instagram cookie information: help.instagram.com/1896641480634370.
Name
rur
Provider
Instagram, LLC
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTML
Description
Are set as soon as an Instagram plugin is embedded in our website. Enables the correct functionality of these Instagram plugins, such as embedded Instagram posts. Instagram cookie information: help.instagram.com/1896641480634370.
Name
urlgen
Provider
Instagram, LLC
Lifetime
Session
Type
HTML
Description
Are set as soon as an Instagram plugin is embedded in our website. Enables the correct functionality of these Instagram plugins, such as embedded Instagram posts. Instagram cookie information: help.instagram.com/1896641480634370.
Hello everyone. I have been enjoying your posts for several months now and want to say thank you to everyone for sharing such helpful knowledge and insight on the topic of single malt whisky!
I am interested in purchasing a bottle of 30 Year Old whisky (preferably from Scotland) to commemorate my 30th birthday next month. This particular bottle will be something that I would like to have in my collection for several years, even a decade or more, and enjoy solely at celebratory occasions with family and friends. It will not remain sealed and it is not to be viewed as an "investment" in any way. It will only be enjoyed by myself and those who share a mutual appreciation for good whisky! I would like to spend no less that $1,000 USD.
For those of you who have had the opportunity to taste 30 year old whisky, is there a particular bottle that you would recommend? If so, would you be kind enough to elaborate on why?
I understand that personal taste preference is a major factor. Personally, I have been able to find enjoyment in almost every scotch whisky I have come across from the heavily sherried A'bunadh from Aberlour to the Octomore range from Bruichladdich. Yes, there are some whiskies I consider to be "a personal favorite" but for the purpose of this purchase, I am open to anything!
Some bottles I am considering:
-Balvenie 30
-Highland Park 30 (Horst, I really enjoyed your YouTube review of this one!)
-Talisker 30
-Caol Ila 30
-Glenfiddich 30
I realize that in many instances, the evolution of flavor and character in whisky is somewhat negligible after 21-25 years. The age of this particular bottle is intended to be symbolic but if any of you prefer the 25 Year expression of these malts or any other for that matter, I am open to hearing your input.
Thank you in advance for your help!
Hi Glenben,
I have been in very similar shoes as you are a couple weeks ago.
After some online research, I have bought a bottle of 30yo Talisker vintage 2007.
I have not tried it myself yet, but if it's anything like the Talisker's I had so far (10yo, Distiller's Edition, 18yo), I will not be disappointed.
I recommend you follow course and do your research online before purchase.
Hope this helps.
I have to say, the best, most expensive whisky was the Black Bowmore. HP 30 was really nice as well. Have a look at the Glen Grant 50 expressions. In Germany they are below 1000€/$.
For me, Ballantines 30YO was unexpectedly wonderful even though it's a blend (but I like good blends).
Highland Park 30YO was also quite outstanding. Glenfiddich 30YO didn't impress me as much. And I haven't tried the rest from your list.
By the way, I was invited to a tasting in December and had a glass of Royal Salute 62 Gun Salute.
That was the most wonderful and complex whisky of all I've tasted so far (and yes, it's also a blend). But as far as I know, it's much more expensive in Europe than in Russia (don't know about Chicago). In our boutiques you can purchase it for less than 2000$ but in Europe it costs 3000$ and above. But if you want a whisky for a very special occasion, this one is surely the one I'd recommend without hesitation.
Thank you to everyone for your help. There are some great suggestions here.
Ben - I saw the video tasting of the Black Bowmore. Truly mouth watering! The Glen Grant 50 is very intriguing although I cannot seem to find a retailer selling it for less than $1,000.
Fortunately, a local retailer has the Highland Park 30 Year (new release) available for $600 and I was able to locate a retailer in the UK selling the Talisker 30 Year vintage 2009 (full cask strength) for the equivalent of $400 shipped.
It's really stange how the prices vary from country to country.
may be someone should put a post up with say 10 or 20 whisky's and there price and people from different countries should put the price from their country would be interesting to see the difference
why no one mentioned glenfarclas ?
probably due to duty, VAT and purchasing power.
Yes it comes down to personal preference. Old ones can and do get oaky due to time in the barrel some tannins too. Good old ones are balanced and are not too heavy on any one aspect. HP 30 was a good choice IMHO. I have the HP 25 (excellent) but not sure if I will go 5 more years or not but the Vlog sounded really tastily. Good luck and enjoy . Just picked up the Tomatin 36 yo on-line at a good price at MOM.
If it were me I would go for the Benromach 30, HP 30 or Glenfarclas 30. All fantastic options at various price points, you can't really go wrong.