When Jack and Stephen Teeling formed Teeling Whiskey Distillery just over a decade ago, it was the first newly opened distillery Dublin had seen in 125 years. John Jameson & Son and John Power & Son, the last of the great Dublin whiskey houses, had closed their city operations in 1975 and 1976 when production consolidated at a new plant in Midleton, County Cork. The Teelings were building something new — but they had a few tricks, and 16,000 casks, up their sleeve.
Ten years on, they have more than 600 international awards, the World’s Best Irish Single Malt title, and a 40-year-old whiskey on the shelf that may be the finest Ireland has ever produced. Back to those casks. How can a 10-year-old distillery release 40-year aged spirits?
When the brothers’ father, John, converted a former state-owned potato spirit distillery (which turns potatoes into industrial alcohol) into Cooley Distillery in the late 1980s, he began distilling and laying down casks. When the family sold Cooley to Beam Inc., the American spirits giant behind Jim Beam bourbon, in 2011, Jack and Stephen walked away with approximately $95 million and 16,000 casks. They would become the foundation of the Vintage Reserve Collection, and the reason a decade-old distillery can pour a spirit four times its age.
The 40-year-old is the collection’s pinnacle: 100% malted barley, aged in ex-bourbon oak, bottled at cask strength without chill filtration, limited to 140 bottles. For Jack Teeling, it marks a beginning as much as anything. “The first ten years were about bringing whiskey back to Dublin,” he says. “The next ten are about pushing it forward.”
The Teeling 40-Year-Old Single Malt retails for approximately $16,000; teelingwhiskey.com
