The Luxe Review podcast: A week of wine and whisky crossovers

Welcome to The Luxe Review podcast — where the whisky is limited, the Chardonnay has opinions about geography, and the listening bar is apparently a lifestyle now.

Anne: The team has been covering a lot of ground this week — cask innovation, distilling heritage, a global wine competition, and a collaboration that pairs high-fidelity audio with Japanese whisky culture.

Robert: Let’s start with the wine casks and competition results.

Wine Competition And Cask Finishes

Anne: Two releases this week sit at the intersection of cask craft and competition results — one a new limited Scotch, the other a blind tasting that reshuffled the Chardonnay world order.

Robert: Lochlea’s Red Wine Cask 2026 is the Scotch: first-fill Bourbon maturation, then a finish in Sangiovese casks from Tuscany, bottled at 46% ABV. The tasting notes promise “red berries, baked apples, and notes of honey with gentle spice.”

Anne: And Lochlea grows its own barley on-site — one of only two Scotch distilleries to do so — meaning every stage from grain to bottle happens in Ayrshire. Available May 28 at £55.

Robert: Meanwhile, the Greatest Chardonnay Showdown at the London Wine Fair handed the top prize to Tolpuddle Vineyard 2023 from Tasmania — a long way from Burgundy’s comfort zone.

Anne: Eighteen judges, more than two-thirds Masters of Wine or Master Sommeliers, tasted thirty wines double-blind. The post’s conclusion is pointed: “great Chardonnay is no longer defined by geography alone.”

Robert: England took third with Danbury Ridge from Essex, which is the kind of result that makes French sommeliers stare quietly at the ceiling.

Anne: That’s the shape of it. Which brings us to the Scotch producers still doing things the old way.

Traditional Scotch And Distilling Heritage

Anne: This segment is about craft under pressure — specifically, a production method so labour-intensive that fewer than twenty Scottish distilleries still use it.

Robert: The Wormtub Single Cask collection, released through Master of Malt, celebrates those holdouts: five sherry-matured expressions from Knockdhu, Glen Elgin, Mortlach, Craigellachie, and Balmenach.

Anne: Sam Simmons, who curated the collection, frames it plainly: “In a world increasingly shaped by efficiency and automation, there is something quietly radical about a distillery still doing it the hard way, and something deeply satisfying about the liquid it produces.”

Robert: What worm tub condensers actually do is reduce copper contact during distillation — the result is a heavier, meatier spirit that modern shell-and-tube systems simply don’t replicate.

Anne: Outturns are tiny — as few as 93 bottles for the Craigellachie 13 Year Old, up to 386 for the Glen Elgin. Prices run from £79.95 to £199.95 for the Balmenach 24 Year Old.

Robert: The culture around rare Scotch keeps expanding — which connects neatly to what’s happening on the events side.

Whisky Culture And Listening Bars

Robert: This segment is about whisky as ritual — not just what’s in the glass, but the whole atmosphere built around drinking it carefully and listening to music just as carefully.

Anne: Toki-O Nights is a collaboration between Technics and Suntory Toki, running from June through December across London, Manchester, and Edinburgh. The series is modelled on Japan’s kissaten listening bar tradition — intimate spaces where music and conversation share equal weight.

Robert: Technics brings the SL-1200GR2 turntables; Suntory Toki brings the highball. Frank Balzuweit describes it as “Technics has long been rooted in precision sound and authentic listening experiences, making this partnership with Suntory Toki whisky a natural fit and extremely exciting.”

Anne: The whisky side gets equal attention. Raffaele Di Monaco notes that “the beauty of the Highball lies in its precision; it’s crisp, refreshing and seemingly simple, but every detail matters.” Each venue creates its own Toki Highball interpretation.

Robert: So the premise is: a meticulously calibrated sound system, a meticulously calibrated cocktail, and a room full of people who take both seriously. That’s either a great evening or a very competitive one.

Anne: Events are a mix of free DJ nights and ticketed sessions, launching June 3 at Spiritland Kings Cross. Elsewhere in whisky culture, Kingsbarns Distillery has released a golf-inspired limited single cask — The Dunvegan — tied to St Andrews’ famed 19th hole ritual.

Robert: And Hackstons in Knightsbridge has acquired a collection of American unicorn bottles — Van Winkle, Weller, Buffalo Trace — described as a once-in-a-lifetime grouping on the secondary market.

Anne: Add to that the House of Hazelwood’s Charles Gordon Collection, four new expressions drawing on nearly half a century of Speyside maturation. Rare whisky, it turns out, is its own category of culture.

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Robert: Worm tubs, Sangiovese finishes, Tasmanian Chardonnay beating Burgundy — it’s a good week to have opinions about fermentation.

Anne: The thread running through all of it is craft under scrutiny — whether that’s a blind tasting panel, a single cask with 93 bottles, or a highball prepared to exacting specification.

Robert: More from The Luxe Review next time.