Whisky News — 25 February 2026
Murray
🥃 DRAM MASTER DAILY — Tuesday, 25 February 2026
BENRIACH RELEASES THE SMOKY TEN — A PEATED SPEYSIDE AT £45 BenRiach has released The Smoky Ten, a permanently available peated expression from its Speyside distillery. The expression highlights BenRiach's long history of producing peated spirit alongside its traditional unpeated style. Matured in virgin oak and ex-bourbon casks. Bottled at 46%, non-chill filtered. Murray's Take: Peated Speyside remains one of the most interesting and underexplored styles in Scotch. BenRiach has been doing it longer than most and knows exactly what they're doing.
CANADIAN WHISKY WINS BEST BLENDED AT WORLD WHISKIES AWARDS 2026 Crown Royal's Noble Collection Blenders' Mash has won the World Whiskies Award for Best Blended Whisky. The award marks a continued strong year for non-Scotch whiskies at the annual competition and has renewed debate about the criteria for "world's best" designations across categories. Murray's Take: Canadian whisky deserves more serious attention than it gets from the Scotch-focused community. This award is a good reason to start paying attention.
ELGIN DISTILLERY COMPLETES BIOMASS HEATING CONVERSION An Elgin-based distillery has completed a full conversion to biomass heating for its production process, reducing its natural gas consumption by 90%. The project, supported by Scottish government green transition funding, is being cited as a potential model for other distilleries facing carbon reduction targets. Murray's Take: The industry has a long way to go on emissions, but concrete progress from individual distilleries is how systemic change actually happens.
215 words · ~3 min listen
