While whiskey of all kinds has huge momentum right now, the trajectory of Irish whiskey is particularly bright: Its sales grew by 140 percent from 2010 to 2020, and the Irish whiskey category is projected to overtake scotch in the U.S. market in less than a decade. Brands like Tullamore D.E.W., Proper No. Twelve and, of course, Jameson have reaped dividends from the increased interest in Irish whiskey, but one distillery has been curiously quiet: Bushmills.
It’s strange because Bushmills has all the hallmarks of a truly great distillery: It’s got centuries of history, a noteworthy location in Northern Ireland and a devout dedication to making just one type of whiskey, single malt, which it does with near perfection. For decades in the 20th century, when Irish whiskey production had shrunk to just two distilleries, Bushmills steadfastly held the line, keeping the door open long enough for other producers to step in and eventually generate a renaissance of the Emerald Isle’s proud whiskey legacy. As newcomers like Teeling, Walsh Whiskey and Waterford have garnered a surge of interest, Bushmills has largely sat back, continuing its usual production but making few waves beyond a handful of limited releases that rarely hit the U.S.
There’s a bright new star on the horizon, however, and her name is Alex Thomas. The County Antrim native was born just ten miles from the distillery and was recently named master blender for Bushmills. She comes to the job with over a decade’s experience in the timber industry, where she became an expert in all things related to wood, and after 17 years of working at Bushmills in a variety of roles, most recently as master blender for The Sexton. (You may recognize it as the hexagonal black bottle with a goth skeleton motif, but more importantly it’s the best quality-to-price Irish whiskey on shelves right now — proof positive that Thomas knows her stuff.)
First up for Thomas in her new role: Launching Bushmills 12-Year-Old ($60), which joins 10, 16, and 21-year-old siblings as part of the distillery’s core range of single malts. While there has been a 12-year-old offering available as a distillery exclusive for the last couple of years, this whiskey is different, and it’s coming to the U.S. Triple-distilled, like all Bushmills malts, it spends 10 years in American oak bourbon and European oak sherry casks before being married and finished for two years in European oak marsala casks. The double impact of European oak, Thomas says, enriches the house character of orchard fruit and light nut flavors.
“You’re going to get those beautiful caramelized apples coming through,” she says. “On the taste you’re going to get that warm ginger, you’re going to get a little bit of spiced pear… That nutty flavor is going to be emphasized much, much more than it would’ve been if there’d been a higher percentage of the bourbon cask in there.”
On the heels of the launch — which also debuts a new look for the bottle — will come the second release in Bushmills’ Rare Cask series, a 29-year-old single malt finished in Pedro Ximénez casks. The debut whiskey in the series, 28-year-old Cognac Cask, came out in the fall of 2020 with under 500 bottles at $500 each — an extremely fair list price for its age and provenance — and got snapped up so fast that it instantly became one of the most collectible whiskeys on the market. If you want to find a bottle now, it’s going to cost you: Cask Cartel has it listed at $7,000, in the same band as Pappy 23, Macallan 30 and Michter’s Celebration.
