Legendary man’s man Nick Offerman and iconic scotch whisky distillery Lagavulin are in their third year of a whisky-producing partnership, and this year’s Offerman Edition: Charred Oak Cask may be the best release yet in the ongoing series.
Offerman and Lagavulin are calling this third drop the most “steak-friendly” bottle yet because of its added char. Charred Oak Cask is aged in American and European oak casks that were heavily re-charred to deliver flavors of vanilla, red berries, sea salt brine, and Lagavulin’s peaty smoke. The whisky then sat in those barrels for 11 years, minimum.
While 11 years isn’t the most impressive age for scotch whisky, Lagavulin has released some impressive bottles in the last decade that were well shy of their teens. Lagavulin 8 Year was released to mark the 200th anniversary several years ago, and for the Game of Thrones collection of whiskies, parent company Diageo selected a 9-year-old Lagavulin to represent House Lannister in the set. Offerman’s bottles have generally stayed around this age, with his first Offerman Edition release being bottled at 11 years, and his second being an 11-year-old scotch finished in former Guinness beer barrels.
This is the third limited-edition bottling from the partnership between the woodworker-slash-actor and Lagavulin Distillery, but they’ve actually recorded 48 video spots together, mostly under the “My Tales of Whisky” series (you should check out the yule log videos from the past).
The “My Tales of Whisky” series is a fun treasure trove of content, if you haven’t seen it—and many people haven’t. While the Yule Log video has been watched nearly four million times, many of the episodes in the 7-year-old series have less than 100,000 views, mostly because we haven’t mentioned them until this week. The series reimagines Offerman as William Wallace, a secret agent, a distillery owner, and features his family rather heavily when possible.