Penderyn Single Casks MasterClass | Belfast Whiskey Week 2021

Name: Belfast Whiskey Week 2026
Start: 2026-07-24
End: 2026-08-01
Location: Belfast

Filed: 24 Jul 2021
By: Belfast Whiskey Week
Read: 3 min
Ref: BWW/21/156

When Belfast Whiskey Week 2021 extended its welcome beyond the island of Ireland, one of its most unexpected and rewarding gestures was Session 96 — a late-night MasterClass dedicated entirely to Penderyn, the jewel of Welsh whisky. Six cask-strength single casks, several bearing SMWS provenance, and a starting time of 21:45: this was a session for the devoted, and it rewarded them handsomely.

About This Event

This tasting includes 6 x 50ml Samples and will take place on the 24th @ 21:45.

This stunning tasting comprises of 6 limited edition cask strength single casks:

Bourbon Matured Single Cask Single Malt 57.2%, Bottle 69 of 77, Cask 11/2008
Ex-Ruby Port Single Cask Single Malt 59.4%, Bottle 26 of 400, Cask PT255
Tawny Portwood Single Cask Single Malt 60.5%, Bottle 150 of 752, Cask PT260
SMWS 128.11 1st Fill Ex-Ruby Port Barrique 13 Year Old Single Malt 60.5%, 275 Bottes, "Welsh Giant in the Jamaican Blue Mountains"
SMWS 128.8 1st Fill Ex-Bourbon Cask 7 Year Old Single Malt 60.9%, 221 bottles, "Fruity Delight"
SMWS 128.7 1st Fill Barrique 5 Year Old Single Malt 61.1%, 288 bottles, "Down The Old Fruit Mines"

Tasting packs will be posted out to you, but may not arrive in time for the tastings. If you wish to collect the pack in Belfast to ensure you have it in time, please contact grace@belfastwhiskeyweek.com after you order.

Looking Back

Wales and Belfast might seem an unlikely pairing at a whiskey festival rooted so firmly in Ulster's dúchas — its cultural inheritance — but the uisce beatha has always had a way of crossing sheughs, real and imagined. Penderyn distillery, nestled in the Brecon Beacons, is one of the great modern whisky success stories: a single-still operation that has quietly built a reputation for delicate, fruit-forward spirit that takes to wood with impressive generosity. Session 96 made the case for Penderyn with six drams that left very little room for scepticism.

The line-up was genuinely extraordinary by any standard. Attendees worked through six 50ml samples, each at cask strength, beginning with a Bourbon Matured Single Cask at 57.2% — bottle 69 of just 77, a near-ghost of a release — before moving into a pair of Ruby Port influences: the Ex-Ruby Port Cask 11/2008 at 59.4% and the SMWS-bottled 128.11, a 13-year-old 1st Fill Ex-Ruby Port Barrique at 60.5%, drawn from 275 bottles. The port-influenced expressions carried that unmistakeable warmth of ripe dark fruit tempered by Penderyn's characteristically light, almost floral spirit — a combination that made for richly layered drams without ever tipping into heaviness.

The SMWS selections gave the evening a particular seanchas all of their own — each name a small piece of storytelling. "Welsh Giant in the Jamaican Blue Mountains" (SMWS 128.8, a 7-year-old 1st Fill Ex-Bourbon at 60.9%, 221 bottles) brought an aromatic brightness that lived up to its billing, while "Fruity Delight" (SMWS 128.7, a 5-year-old 1st Fill Barrique at 61.1%, 288 bottles) was exactly as generous as the name promised, all orchard warmth and grain sweetness. Closing with "Down the Old Fruit Mines", a Tawny Portwood Single Cask at 60.5% from 752 bottles, the session ended on something richer and more contemplative — a fitting finale for a room that had been drinking seriously for the better part of an hour. Slàinte to that.

What made this MasterClass stand out in BWW 2021's packed programme was its timing as much as its content. A 21:45 start on 24 July placed it firmly in the realm of the committed — the kind of session where the noise of the day has faded and the conversation around each dram can breathe. For those who had already explored the festival's Irish heartland through events like the Bushmills History MasterClass or the deep dive of the Bushmills Causeway Collection MasterClass, Session 96 offered something genuinely different: a window onto a whisky tradition still in the process of writing its story.

Penderyn is a distillery that rewards attention, and Belfast Whiskey Week gave it the stage to demonstrate exactly why. Six casks, each one a limited chapter in a young but serious whisky canon — this was a session that reminded everyone in attendance that the world of uisce beatha is wider and more wonderful than any one tradition can contain. If you want to explore more of what BWW 2021 had to offer, the Whiskey Map traces the full geography of the festival's remarkable range.