Enjoying: Whisky Magazine Top 10 whiskies of 2025

Filey Bay Orange Wine Barrique Among 2025’s Best.

Whisky Magazine editor and taster Bradley Weir names Filey Bay Orange Wine Barrique one of his favourite drams from 2025.

We respect tradition, but we aren’t afraid to innovate, and this release shows exactly what happens when you do things differently. Four ex-orange wine barriques were used for this deliciously different special release. But this isn’t the skin contact orange wine you’d expect to find on the list of your local artisan wine bar.

“Vino Naranja del Condado de Huelva” comes from a very specific part of Spain, taking the sunshine and oranges that the south is famous for. Made in a similar way to other fortified wines but with a key difference: the grape spirit used to fortify the base wine has been aromatised with orange peel before being matured. Matured for just over 7 years, firstly in ex-bourbon casks for 3 years and 3 months, to soften the spirit, before being reduced to 50% abv and then re-racked into orange wine casks for a further 3 years and 10 months. Over the years the abv has slowly slipped away as the angels took their share. In this very rare example, the strength in the bottle of 46.2% is the strength that the whisky reached in the cask all on its own with no final reduction before bottling.

Here’s what Bradley had to say:

“This is a GREAT whisky! It has character in abundance and whisks you away to a beach on a hot summer’s day.”

A great English whisky! There was no surprise that orange wine barriques were involved in this whisky’s maturation, given the wonderful tropical notes on full display. This is the summer whisky of all summer whiskies.

On the nose, banana milkshake. Warm pineapple, mango, passionfruit. On the palate, strawberries and cream, ripe bananas, mango with lime zest. On the finish, long with a subtle raisin and hazelnut note. 

Read the full article HERE. 

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