How coincidental that SMWS releases a 20 year old Laphroaig from a bourbon barrel just a few months after Laphroaig released their 21 year old FOL. Hmmm. Good timing. Before I delve deeper into this I want to point out that from the SMWS website and emails and tweets, this specific bottling was advertised as being from a first fill bourbon barrel. Which is also strikingly similar to the profile of the Laphroaig 21. However, this was an error. The 29.169 is from a refill ex-bourbon barrel which can be easily verified by looking at the label.

Anyway, regardless of the similarities to the 21, this particular bottling has got enough going for it to be exciting for all of us. Independently bottled Laphroaig’s are not super common, it’s even less common to find one 20 years old or above and at cask strength and for less than 100 quid. So yeah with these powers combined this is one cool cat.

Bottler: SMWS

Distillery: Laphroaig

Age: 20 years old

Cask: Refill Ex-bourbon

Number of Bottles: 205

ABV: 56.5%

Date Distilled: 4th Apr 1995

Outturn: October 2015

Price: £84.50

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