What better way to end the year than to sit down in the Diggers cellar with the owner, tuck into some drams and go through some of the best whiskies we've had this year.

We look back at what's been an amazing year for the podcast. We've had some great guests, had access to distilleries and hosted some really fun events.

We also look ahead to an exciting 2026 for Kev with the soon to be launched 'Diggers 2' down in Leith (name pending).

Thanks to everyone who's been part of the podcast for the last 12 months.

Happy New Year and here's to 2026 and plenty more drams and shenanigans.

Merry Christmas!

We had a quick Christmas catch-up in Diggers for a couple of drams (Ross had already had a few before he got there...) to lead into our North British Distillery Podcast recording.

We were given a very special gift from the guys at Royal Mile Whiskies which is something to look forward to in the new year and Ross gave us his top whiskies of 2025.

Hope you're having or had a great Christmas and Happy New Year.

Thanks for listening.

Cheers!

This week we have Pal of the Pod Cameron Ewen in for a chat about his now job, Christmas drams and whiskies of 2025.

We were back in the Dug Oot at Diggers for this one enjoying some drams, and festive whisky chat with Cam.

Cam talked us through his new role at Diageo and some of the amazing whiskies he gets to work with. Including old Brora and Port Ellon bottlings.

We also discuss what whiskies we'll be drinking over the Christmas festivities.

Enjoy

Raymond is the man behind the iconic Glencairn whisky glass and changed the way we drink whisky.

He isn't just Whisky Royalty, he's an absolute gentleman as well.

Spending time with Raymond and hearing his whisky stories was amazing.

In this episode we hear about how he started out, what made him decide to design a glass for drinking whisky, and the journey it's taken him on.

We also enjoyed a good few drams while we were at it!

Enjoy

This one was a lot of fun to record.

Sam Simmons was one of the first online whisky bloggers with his blog Dr Whisky starting back in the early 2000s.

That took him from writing about whisky to selling it, becoming the Global Brand Ambassador for Balvennie to becoming Head of Whisky for Atom Brands.

He's responsible for putting out releases to over 1 million people around the world. Looking for cool whisky concepts, bottling it and selling it.

Sam brought in some of his own projects with him for us to try including Wormtub 10 and the famous Dalry Milk North British bottling.

There's some great whisky chat in this podcast as well as plenty of laughs and good drams.

Enjoy

We were all back in the Diggers Vaults for a recording and a catch up with Chuck, Angus, myself Ross and Scott Moore.

Ross had literally just jumped off the plane returning from his trip across the pond to see his current mother and father-in-law and our USA Brand Ambassador was about to leave from his epic whisky trip to Scotland.

There were loads of drams on the barrel for this one. With plenty of whisky chat from Scott's trip, we had whisky samples sent over and lots of catching up to do.

We chatted about our trip to Glencadam Distillery as well as our epic Edinburgh Whisky Pub Crawl.

Loads of fun and nonsense on this one. Enjoy!

How do you start a distillery on tiny island off the coast of Scotland?

We sat down with Isle of Raasay Co-founder and Master Distiller Alasdair Day and UK Sales Manager Gregor Hunter to hear the story.

Alasdair talks us through how he got into whisky through his family history connections and how things sparked from blending to distilling.

We also talked about life on the island and what the distillery is doing for the local economy and growing the island population.

The lads also brought in some fantastic drams for us to try including Isle of Raasay newmake and the first ever peated single grain whisky to be bottled.

Enjoy!

It's our birthday and to celebrate we put on a BIG Birthday Bash last Friday night at Uno Mas.

And what a night it was!

We had 55 guests, 6 brands and 7 whiskies on the lineup. There were party games and Ali Baxter Whisky Stories Bingo.

And we even had our own cask of whisky which was rolled in and hand filled on the night in the bar.

A huge thanks to everyone for coming along and being part of the special occasion and to our brands.

Woven

InchDairnie

Holyrood

Tri-Carragh

Glengoyne

Woodrow's of Edinburgh

This is a wild one. Enjoy

We were invited along to have a look around at the Woodrow's of Edinburgh warehouse with Pals of the Pod Woody and Megan.

It's always nice to get an invited into a bonded warehouse and last night we were treated to some great drams straight from the cask.

We were also sampling some whisky which will be our next Exclusive Whisky Stories Bottling!!

Woody and Megan were great hosts and as always gave us great chat and quality drams.

Arthur has been in the whisky industry for over 20 years. He's been the buyer of Scotch Malt Whisky Society and then worked his way up to Managing Director of Royal Mile Whiskies.

There's not a cask that Arthur has bought that he doesn't remember.

He's been involved in buying and selling some incredible whiskies throughout his career.

Being part of the growth of the SMWS and Royal Mile Whiskies has made him one of the most influential people within the Scotch Whisky Industry. He was responsible for what RMW would buy and how they would sell it.

He also loves talking about the history of whisky and some of the myths that surround it. He has a YouTube Channel with Dave Broom called The Liquid Antiquarian.

There's a lot of good whisky industry chat in this one.

Enjoy!

Dougal Gordon is the Brand Ambassador to Scotland for one of the best selling brands in the world, Glenfiddich. But he's also the 6th generation of the Grant Family to work in the business.

This is an episode I've been trying to make happen, and it was worth the wait.

In this episode, we get the full family history, stories of how Glenfiddich moved into becoming the top selling single malt all over the world, building distilleries against time lines and sponsoring F1 teams.

Plus Dougal was very kind not to come along empty handed as well!

Pour a dram and enjoy this cracker!

We’ve never had a wrestler on the podcast before. 

I didn’t think there were many connections between whisky and wrestling. Until I met Sam Barbour a few weeks ago who explained that he is a sales exec for La Martiniquaise who own Glen Moray and Cutty Sark. 

We’re HUGE fans of Glen Moray on the podcast.

And have talked a lot about the distillery, the variety of different cask releases and the quality of whisky and price. 

So when we got Sam on, we thought it would be a great opportunity to talk about Cutty Sark as well as his alter wrestling ego - SBX. 

He flogs whisky through the day and wrestles in the evening.

Sam is a wrestler who takes part in special wrestling events throughout Scotland. And he’s invited us along to his up coming charity wrestling night ‘WrestleMonia!’ Which is rising money for Movember. 

Angus might even put his favourite leotard on for this one!

The fact that we can seamlessly talk about wrestling and whisky shows just how far this podcast has come over the last 100 episodes. 

Sam also brought in snacks and we got a sneak peak and taste of the soon to be released Glen Moray Forbidden Fruit Calvados Cask. 

A lot of fun recording this one.

This was the big one for us. Episode 100!

It's crazy to think that we've been doing this for so long already, but we made it to a century of podcast episodes.

Angus, Ross and I were back in Diggers in the cellar drinking drams and chatting nonsense.

We had some cracking whisky on this weeks episode which included some American Single Cask Single Malt as well as sampled of the new 2025 Ardnamerica Release.

Ross brought some goodies as well to celebrate the big occasion.

We answered listener questions as well which ranged from what whisky we would use to fight off a bear to our best and worst whisky we've had since starting the pod.

Another cracking night chatting about whisky and enjoying some good drams.

This was a cracking night.

We were joined by Pal of the Pod Fraser Souness who was taking us through a 6 dram G&M lineup.

Recorded in front of a 'live studio audience' in Diggers, we had special guest appearances from listener Launce Morgan and his 'current wife' Sandra.

Big Cameron Ewen was also in the audience with his whisky lad Ross Barr.

Drams on the night:

This week, we were back out and about and heading west! We haven't ventured too far west in the two years of the podcast, so we decided to jump on a train to Helensburgh for the Lomond and Clyde Whisky Festival.

But instead of just rocking up with a lanyard and enjoying some drams, we decided to team up with the Collector Club Competitions lads, John and Scott, to do some giveaways of our own.

So, we packed our dartboard and wheel of fortune and came up with some challenges for people to try and win some whisky!

The good news is that nothing got broken and no one got injured! This episode has a bit of everything: we recorded our first-ever podcast on the train through and back, we caught up with Glen from Whyte and Mackay who chatted about Dalmore and Fettercairn, and we got a sit-down dram with Marcos from Brave New Spirits.

A lot was going on in this episode, but it's well worth a listen and was a load of fun to record.

We were back out and about for this episode on our Ian Macleod big day out.

Not only were we given full access to the distillery and taken on our own tour with Gordon Dundas, we were also treated to The Malt Master Experience and hosted by good Pal of the Pod Jake Adcook.

Jake is part of the blending team for Ian Macleod Distillers, which means he knows a thing or two about how to blend Glengoyne.

He talked us through his processes of blending whisky while we had a go at blending our very own versions of Glengoyne.

We put our efforts to the test had to select our own favourites blind.

Who do you think would be the best Master Blender of the Whisky Stories Podcast?

Hoose Drams with Mark Thomson!

This is the first time we've ever recorded in someone's house before!

When Angus and I saw Mark Thomson had put his house on the market, we were desperate to get in for a wee look around. So we turned up with a camera, a couple of mics, and some drams.

This one was a lot of fun. Mark reflected on his career, which has taken him from working in female fashion, Cafe Mambo in Ibiza (didn't know that about him), working as a Brand Ambassador for Glenfiddich, and an Independent Bottler.

Mark's got some great stories, but he also gave us a great insight into the whisky industry and the challenges that brands are facing. We spoke about the importance of a Brand Ambassador and what's involved in working for a major brand like Glenfiddich.

The episode covers it all, including:

• Delivering training sessions in Nigeria
• Whisky industry trends
• Comparing the value of new distilleries and the older originals
• How to break into the Glenfiddich Blending Room

It's just three people sitting in a kitchen, enjoying drams and having some whisky chat. We brought along the Tomatin 6 year old virgin oak distillery hand-fill, the Glen Moray House Distillery Exclusive, and my bottle of Lindores Abbey. Mark, in turn, opened up his new bottle of Tomatin 18.

There's so much in this episode to enjoy. Sit back, pour a dram, and enjoy!

Get 15% off the following tours and experiences:

Rosebank Reawakening £25 before discount

Rosebank Discovered £50 before discount

Rosebank Rekindled £95 before discount

The Residency: Tamdhu Whisky Maker £110 before discount

Use discount code: WSP15

As part of Whisky Stories x Rosebank, we got a chance to sit down with Gordon Dundas - Brand Development and Advocacy Director at Ian Macleod Distillers.

Gordon is responsible for all of the brands under the IMD umbrella which includes Rosebank, Glengoyne, Tamdhu, Lagan Bay and Una. As well as Edinburgh Gin and the blended brands like Isle of Skye.

We recorded this in the Rosebank Distillery just after our amazing access all areas tour and enjoyed drinking a Glengoyne 18, Tamdhu Distillery Exclusive Hand Fill and a Rosebank 32.

Gordon talked us through his career in whisky from the Whisky Magazine to working in Taiwan as a brand ambassador.

He's travelled the world talking about whisky and gave us a great insight into the plans ahead for the new Islay laggan Bay Distillery as well as the history of Rosebank.

Jake Adcook also joined us to talk us through the whiskies and production which was a great insight.

This episode is a packed-out catch-up filled with incredible news and a whole lot of chat. We're back in our spiritual home at The Diggers and have some major news to share right at the start!

We've secured an exclusive 15% discount for our listeners on tours at the revived Rosebank Distillery. We break down just how good a deal this is, especially with a dram of the 32-year-old Rosebank on offer!

In the episode, we also dive into:

The highly anticipated return of Scapa 16 Year Old and whether it lives up to its legendary reputation.

A lively debate on what makes a distillery "cool," with arguments for Springbank, InchDairnie, and the Thompson Brothers.

A blind tasting of a Mystery Malt from Batch 2! Can we guess what's in the bottle?

A fun fantasy about what our own independent bottling company would be and which distillery we'd approach for casks.

The craziest cask finishes we can imagine, from Irn-Bru to Buckfast.

This is a fun, off-the-cuff episode filled with plenty of laughs and even more great whisky.

Get 15% off your Rosebank tour with code: WSP15

You can also check out our visit to the distillery here:

Rosebank Distillery Tour - A Day with Ian Macleod Distillers

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This is a cracker of an episode, I don't think we've had anyone on who's done as much as Craig has done in his career.

From starting out cleaning toilets at the Glenkinchie Distillery to blending The Famous Grouse and working with Macallan, he's travelled the world and collected some amazing whisky stories on the way.

Craig took us on an incredible journey, sharing stories that prove just how global the whisky industry is. We followed his path from a tour guide at Glenkinchie to working in sales in Canada and even living in Dubai. He also talked about his time as a distiller at the Lark Distillery in Tasmania, where he got to create some truly unique whiskies, like a Christmas Cake Cask!

We talked about his work on both sides of the coin, from the incredible attention to detail that goes into every bottle of The Macallan to the surprising process behind a global brand like Famous Grouse.

We learnt so much and we've left plenty of chat in the tank for a second episode further down the line.

There's also plenty of chat about:

We were back in our spiritual home at The Diggers and had a fascinating chat with Craig Johnstone, a man whose career has taken him all over the world in whisky.

Craig took us on an incredible journey, sharing stories that prove just how global the whisky industry is. We followed his path from a tour guide at Glenkinchie to working in sales in Canada and even living in Dubai. He also talked about his time as a distiller at the famous Lark Distillery in Tasmania, where he got to create some truly unique whiskies, like a cask finished in a beer barrel!

But the real insight came when he told us about his time at Edrington, where he worked as a master blender and whisky maker. We talked about his work on both sides of the coin, from the incredible attention to detail that goes into every bottle of The Macallan to the surprising process behind a global brand like Famous Grouse. It’s a completely new look at how these iconic whiskies are made, and Craig’s straight-up approach means he doesn't hold back. This is an episode you definitely don't want to miss.

You'll want to hear about:

• Craig’s tips for whiskies to drink in 45-degree heat.
• The surprising cask policy behind Famous Grouse.
• How a bartender’s trick can make you look smarter.
• The genius of Australia's most rebellious distiller, Peter Bignell

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.