Chief’s Son ‘The Aiden 2016’

After rave reviews from its initial release in 2021 and members wanting more, we have an Australian stunner of a whisky special release – the Chief’s Son ‘The Aiden 2016’ all the way from the multi-award winning distillery on the beautiful Mornington Peninsula in Victoria.

With these credentials it will take pride of place in your collection.

• From one of the oldest casks at Chief‘s Son
• The first of the special ‘Family’ casks ever to be released
• Casks originally coopered in France and used for Red Wine then Sherry
• Re-coopered for whisky casks by none other than legendary cooper, Andrew Young from Seppeltsfield Estate
• Each individually numbered bottle is individually laser etched

We are super excited to offer an exclusive whisky made with family foremost in mind by Chief’s Son Distillery.  In fact, this whisky is all about family – make way for the Chief’s Son ‘The Aiden 2016’.

This whisky is out of one of the oldest casks in the Chief’s Son bond-store. Hand filled in 2016 by Stuart’s son, Aiden – and made available exclusively to the Single Malt Whisky Club.

Born in 2011, Aiden is the 1st son of twin boys for Stuart and Naomi McIntosh. In early 2016 at the age of 4, Aiden filled his first whisky barrel, THE AIDEN 2016. This family tradition is now carried out by all three of the McIntosh kids in January each year. THE AIDEN 2016 is one of the oldest barrels in the Chief’s Son’s barrel inventory.

We are so very pleased to have been allowed access to this whisky that holds such a special place in the hearts of the McIntosh family. This is the very first release ever of one of these special ‘Family Casks’.

The French oak barrels were originally coopered by the Tonnellerie Sirugue cooperage in France, who utilise natural air drying of oak and open oak fire bending of staves. Used for both Red Wine and then Sherry/Apera, the used barrel was then acquired by YNOak based at Seppeltsfield Estate in Barossa. Legendary Australian master cooper, Andrew Young, has re-coopered this barrel for use as a spirit barrel, including first toasted and then charring to a heavy level craft char.

On top of all this – to make this bottling truly special, we have had our logo as well as the name of the whisky and bottle numbers laser-etched into the bottles themselves.

Nose: Some mustiness at first but the sweetness soon materialises in the form of maple syrup, with a touch of bubble gum thrown in, some apricots and delicate leathery notes.

Palate: Lovely rich oily mouthfeel here. A sweet yet nutty palate – with scorched almond brittle, caramel and slightly burnt toffee to boot. There’s also a suggestion of liquorice with just a little pepper at he back of the mouth.

Finish: More nut brittle, pepper and oak swirl over and around each other in a flurry of rich caramel syrup.

A lovely balance between the roast nuts and sweet caramel here – not too sweet but definitely not dry. Interestingly, on sharing my tasting notes with the Chief’s Son crew, it was revealed to me that their stills are electrically heated and they do get a lot of caramelisation of sugars onto the internal heating elements – hence the caramel notes. This whisky is just so very more-ish. I bet you’ll have poured another before the finish has run it’s course from the first dram!