June 2021 – W.D. O’Connell

Waterford Whiskey Society were delighted to welcome W.D. O’Connell to their sixth tasting event of the year which was hosted by their founder Daithi O’Connell. The company was setup in April 2019 as an independent whiskey merchant.

They are currently developing their new facility in Kilmacthomas in Waterford which will contain a vatting/blending and bottling line, a bonded warehouse, and a visitors centre with the expectation that it will open in early 2022.

All their releases so far have been small batch and ranged from an 18YO CS Single Malt to their peated Bill Phil and recently they have also launched a range of cask shares.

Upcoming releases will include a Bruichladdich bottling in July, an imperial stout finish later this year, a Bill Phil CS B2 in July, and a 6YO PX next year.

All expressions went down very well on the night, and it was a great insight in some existing releases as well as distillery samples of what’s to come in the future.

The Whiskeys tasted

• Single Grain – 48%: 10-12 YO bourbon finished with 1 cask of Rye whiskey added. 600 bottles in total.
• 2020 Double Distilled Single Malt @ 60.75% 15 Months Old (Distillery Sample):
• New Make Pot Still distillate sample @63% (Distillery Sample): 50:50 mash bill
• 2016 Peated Pot Still @ 61.48% (Distillery Sample): 1 year in a Bill Phil CS barrel.
• 2020 Peated Single Malt @ 62.20% 8 Months Old (Distillery Sample): 55PPM, normally divide by 3 to get the final PPM level of the whiskey once distilled.
• Bill Phil B2 Triple Distilled Peated Malt @47.58%: B3 is due for release in the USA this year, with B4 for Europe and B5 for Ireland.

All the best WWS