Love Irish whiskey? Here’s what you’re missing…

For centuries, the island of Ireland has been a premier source of some of the world's finest whiskeys. Today, Irish whiskey is seeing a huge resurgence, capturing the hearts and minds of whiskey lovers everywhere. Join the Club free now – it's the only way to get your hands on the Club's exclusive, award-winning Irish whiskeys.

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10 of the best Irish whiskeys

Best Irish whiskeys released by The Whisky Club

Bushmills 2010 Double Moscatel Cask

A fitting winner of the Club’s 2024 Whisk(e)y of the Year, this was both the first double cask and the first fully Sherry-matured whiskey in Bushmills’ very, very sought-after Causeway Collection.

Finished in Moscatel casks from both Spain (Valencia) and Portugal (Setúbal), the triple-distilled spirit developed for 13 years before being bottled exclusively for the Club at a natural cask strength of 49.1% ABV. Small wonder it received 98/100 points and Double Gold at the San Francisco World Spirits Comp in 2024 too.

NOSE: Rich warm honey, deliciously fruity with waves of peaches in syrup, grapes and floral aromas.

PALATE: Layers of juicy sweet strawberries, mandarin with hints of walnut rolls into enticing bold jammy fruits and gentle allspice on the finish.

Read more about Bushmills 2010 Double Moscatel Cask, Created Exclusively for The Whisky Club.

Redbreast PX Edition

First released in 2021, the 2024 Edition of this ripper won Double Gold in San Francisco alongside huge names like the Benromach 40YO ($3,200 RRP) and the Ardbeg 25YO ($1,850 RRP).

The magic begins with locally-sourced Irish unmalted and malted barley, already creating that porridge-like mouthfeel with depths of honey and all spice that brought Redbreast 5 x Double Golds at San Francisco World Spirits Competition last year, and 7 this year! The spirit is plunged into first-grade 200L Bourbon barrels and 500L Oloroso Sherry butts, before luxuriating in a full 12-month finish in Bodegas Paez Morilla’s Pedro Ximénez hogsheads. We nagged exclusive rights for to this batch in Australia, just for our Members.

NOSE: Decadent layers of sultana, vanilla butterscotch biscuits, cinnamon, chocolate and nougat.

PALATE: Deeply elegant, bursting with luscious fruit toast, blackberry jam, baking spice and an incredibly long, satisfyingly rich finish.

Read more about Redbreast PX Edition, the Club's Whisk(e)y of the Month for June 2025.

Dunville’s 13 Year Old Cigar Malt

One of the early titans of the Irish industry, Belfast-based Dunville’s were the toast of the north for over a hundred years before a series of family disasters saw the distillery shuttered.

Resurrected in 2012 by The Echlinville Distillery, they’ve since won an absolute swag of awards for rich, sherried whiskies, and this is no exception: matured in a combination of Pedro Ximénez Sherry, Palo Cortado Sherry, and ex-Bourbon casks – and featuring a nice amount of overaged liquid – it took out Best Small Batch Irish Single Malt at the World Whiskies Awards 2025.

NOSE: A lovely rich nose of custard, blackberry, bread and butter pudding, dark-roasted coffee bean, and allspice.

PALATE: A lovely rich nose of custard, blackberry, bread and butter pudding, dark-roasted coffee bean, and allspice.

Read more about Dunville’s 13 Year Old Cigar Malt, Created Exclusively for The Whisky Club.

Yellow Spot 12 Year Old

Another Single Pot Still whiskey produced at the New Midleton Distillery, Green Spot is made for independent wine merchants Mitchell & Sons who used to age the spirit in ex-Sherry barrels. With sherry casks being so hard to come by these days, currently the sherry casks only make up around 25% of the blend with the rest being American oak ex-bourbon.

Why is it called Yellow Spot? Mitchell’s used a colour coding system to identify the age of their casks and dabbed a splash of paint in the appropriate colour on the casks to indicate their age.

NOSE: Nutmeg, green tea, sweet honey and peaches with cracked pepper.

PALATE: Flavours of fresh coffee, red apple, & crème brûlée with a sophisticated finish of red grape & dry barley.

Read more about Yellow Spot 12 Year Old, released at the Club as a St Patrick's Day special.

Method and Madness Single Pot Still

Every now and then, the master distillers at Midleton are allowed off the chain and given the chance to get a little experimental. The result of this is the Method and Madness range, released in 2023.

The flavours wrought out from the finish in French Chestnut casks is almost too good to be true – and certainly worth deviating from usual, puritanical method of whisky maturation. Winning gold medals at both the International Wine and Spirits Competition as well as the International Spirits Challenge, it’s no wonder the judges went nuts for this unconventional cask finish.

NOSE: Lychee, papaya, tobacco, ginger and clove.

PALATE: Ripe banana, baked apple and cinnamon toast, finished with spiced fruits, raw sugar and rich wood.

Read more about Method and Madness Single Pot Still, brought to Club Members as an Add In in late 2024.

Dunville’s 21 Year Old Palo Cortado Cask Finish

A winner of Ireland’s Best Single Malt Whiskey at the 2023 World Whiskies Awards and 2024’s Best Irish Whiskey at the Irish Whiskey Awards? You bet. But none of that is hugely surprising, given how it’s crafted: 14 years in first fill ex-Bourbon casks, before it’s re-casked into fresh first fill ex-Bourbon casks for another two years, then a whopping five more years in Palo Cortado Sherry casks (and Palo Cortado is the literally the rarest variety of Sherry you can get).

Oh, and this lauded, luxurious, high age statement came to Aussie shores exclusively with the Club.

NOSE: Apricots in syrup, stewed plums, raisins and dark chocolate.

PALATE: Candied orange peel, panettone pudding, roasted hazelnuts and fig jam, with a roasted coffee beans and sweet cigar rolling tobacco finish.

Bushmills 2012 Burgundy Cask

The finale in the legendary Bushmills Heritage Casks trilogy, our Bushmills 2012 Burgundy Cask has taken the world by storm. It’s in such high demand that whiskey lovers overseas are paying silly money to get their hands on a bottle. One went under the hammer at auction for $2,000! It took the Club by storm, too — our Members voted it 2022's Whisky of the Year.

Bushmills Master Blender Alex Thomas calls "one of the best whiskeys that Bushmills have produced to date."

NOSE: Wonderfully fragrant, sweet vanilla and classic tropical fruits melds with stewed orchard fruits and cooked spices of clove, cinnamon & nutmeg.

PALATE: Ripe red apples, fresh raspberry sweetness and strawberry jam develop into rich black cherries, then a rich and juicy finish of Neapolitan ice-cream and rocky road.

Read more about Bushmills 2012 Burgundy Cask, Created Exclusively for The Whisky Club.

Bushmills 2011 Banyuls Cask

Made by multi-award winning Master Blender Helen Mulholland, it was distilled in 2011 and initially matured in Oloroso Sherry and Bourbon casks, before a final maturation in fresh Banyuls dessert wine casks, aka 'French Port.' This is a rich and triumphantly delicious malt masterpiece from one of the pre-eminent whiskey makers of the modern era.

Not only was it the biggest Irish single malt to ever hit Australian shores at cask strength, but our Bushmills 2011 Banyuls Cask was also the last Bushmills release with Helen’s name on it.

NOSE: Deep, rich and enticingly fresh and fruity with ripe mandarins, dried apricots, raspberries and strawberry jam, along with sherbet and hint of anise.

PALATE: A mouthwateringly juicy explosion of citrus, blackcurrants and baked peaches, with glazed pastries, pecans and walnuts, followed by a long and satisfying finish.

Read more about Bushmills 2011 Banyuls Cask, Created Exclusively for The Whisky Club.

Bushmills 2006 Marsala Cask

The history-making Bushmills 2006 Marsala Cask, made exclusively for Whisky Club Members, sent a massive kaboom through the whiskey world. The first release from Bushmills’s brand-new range of curated limited-edition single malts, our Marsala Cask made its way onto auction sites across the globe demanding up to $2500.

This bottle became an instant Club legend, and we still get people asking us about it. Those of you lucky enough to try it know why.

NOSE: Raisins, cinnamon and fresh orange peel mixed with delicate toffee apple.

PALATE: Smooth and richly honeyed with caramelised brown sugar, vanilla, almonds and spiced fruit, finishing strong and slightly dry.

Read more about Bushmills 2006 Marsala Cask, Created Exclusively for The Whisky Club.

Jameson Single Pot Still Five Oak Cask Release

By far the best-selling Irish whiskey in the world, Jameson built its fame in the 1700s and 1800s as a single pot still whiskey.

Over the past few decades Jameson teased us with a handful of very small, limited-edition Single Pot Still batches, not available in Australia and selling anywhere from $500 to $1600 a bottle. That changed in 2024, with the release of the Single Pot Still – a five-cask combo of classic spirit style and intriguing oak.

NOSE: Sweet honeycomb, salted caramel fudge and ripe fruits, laced with cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and orange peel

PALATE: Rich, chocolatey fruits fade gently to multi-layered spices and a silky finish

Read more on Jameson Single Pot Still Five Oak Cask Release launched at the Club as a St Patrick's Day special.

A brief run-down of Irish whiskey types:

The term “Irish whiskey” doesn’t describe a particular style of whiskey – it just refers to a whiskey produced in Ireland, but (historically, at least) there are a few things that separate Irish whiskey from its Scotch cousin. Due to differences in the brewing and distillation process, some feel that Irish whiskey has a smoother mouthfeel and more delicate flavours than Scotch whiskies, but as we’ll see, you’ll find a number of different styles under the broader Irish whiskey umbrella.

Triple distillation

Triple distillation is synonymous with Irish whiskey. While the vast majority of Scotch is double distilled – meaning it’s run through two stills, concentrating alcohol and flavour and stripping out impurities each time – you’ll see a lot of Irish whiskeys proudly proclaiming that they’re triple distilled. The reasoning behind this can probably be traced back to the earlier days of the industry, when – in an attempt to draw more tax revenue from distilleries – the British crown introduced a tax on malted barley.

Some bright sparks quickly realised that they could get around the tax by only using a small amount of malt and filling out the rest of the mash bill with unmalted (and untaxed) barley. The resulting mash (while cheaper) was quite different to a malt-only mash, and benefitted from a third run through the stills to extract the most alcohol and flavour from the grain. Triple distillation became the style du jour, and even with changing laws and the adoption of column stills by many, the unique character of a triple distilled spirit remains a core part of many Irish whiskeys.

Types of Irish Whiskey

There are four main types of the Irish whiskey – single pot still, single malt, single grain, and blended Irish.

SINGLE POT STILL IRISH WHISKEY: Irish single pot still whiskey is made exclusively in Ireland (although other distillers around the world are beginning to experiment with the style elsewhere). The name refers to the fact that it must be made at a single distillery, and only using pot stills – no continuous or column spirit to be found here.

The other key difference in single pot still whiskey is that it uses a mixture of malted and unmalted barley, giving a unique flavour profile. Single pot still whiskey is the pride of Irish distilling, and brands such as Kilbeggan, Green Spot and Redbreast use this method to great effect.

SINGLE MALT IRISH WHISKEY: Irish whiskey’s governing laws are almost identical to those that rule over Scotch whisky. As a result, single malt Irish whiskey must be distilled in a single distillery, using only malted barley, before being matured in oak for a minimum of three years.

Although Irish single malt is produced in a similar way to Scotch single malt, it retains its own unique character, and – unlike in Scotland – single malt whiskeys do not dominate the Irish market. In fact, just two distilleries produce the majority of the country's single malts: Cooley and Bushmills.

SINGLE GRAIN WHISKEY: Ireland is known for distilling some of the finest single grain whiskeys around. Grain whiskeys are generally not as well-respected as malts, but some fantastic Irish whiskeys have managed to change the perception of the spirit.

Grain whiskey is distilled from one or a combination of rye, barley, corn and wheat. Grain distilling is one of the cheapest ways to produce whiskey, and is much more straightforward than using malt. But being straightforward to make and straightforward to make well are very different: a huge amount of knowledge and experience is needed to create a grain whiskey that's complex enough to compete with other types of the spirit.

Top-tier distillers of single grain Irish whiskey include Teeling, Midleton and Fercullen. If you're thinking about trying an Irish grain whiskey, it's well worth making sure you get your hands on something a bit special to ensure you’re getting the best impression.

BLENDED IRISH WHISKEY: Blended Irish whiskey is by far the most popular type of whiskey from the island. Iconic brands such as Jamesons and Bushmills dominate the blend market, but there are plenty of hidden gems to be found if you dig a little deeper (also, the big brands are well-known and popular for a reason!).

The big benefit of blending is that it removes a lot of the restrictions applied to other forms of whiskey, allowing distilleries to produce the exact flavour profiles and characteristics that they're looking for. Blended whiskeys are great options for newcomers and experienced drinkers alike, and are often very affordably priced.

Thirsty? Sign Up Free to the Club to access the next big exclusive Irish whiskey coming to Australia.

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