In the past, Wiser’s 18 Year Old advertised itself as a Limited Release bottling totaling only 3500 bottles for each batch produced. Last year I noticed that the whisky had undergone a subtle brand change as well, and it is now listed as J.P. Wiser’s 18 Year Old Canadian Whisky. As part of the brand re-identification the bottle no longer contains any information on the label with respect to the batch size.
Whether any real substantive change in the whisky inside the bottle has occurred is unknown to me; but since we know that we can expect the whisky to change from batch to batch at a minimum, I usually look at this brand each year and write a new review if I notice any substantive change. (It turns out, there was very little change from last year to this year.)
Here is a link to the Number 5 Canadian Whisky in my Rum Howler Countdown of the World’s Best!
#4: J.P. Wiser’s 18 Year Old Canadian Whisky
Stay tuned as the countdown continues tomorrow with the Number 3 Canadian Whisky.
Chimo!
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* You may follow my 2016 Canadian Whisky Countdown by bookmarking this link:
The Rum Howler – Top 50 Canadian Whiskies of 2016
The Brugal Distillery was founded in 1888, by Andrés Brugal Montaner. Over the next one hundred and twenty years the company grew steadily, and it is now one of three large Rum Distillers in the Dominican Republic. The original family which founded Brugal is still in the control. George Arzeno Brugal, is the current chairman, and most of the board members are direct descendants of the original company founder. In fact, the Brugal Distillery has become an institution in the Dominican Republic.
Just about every friend of mine who has visited this the Dominican Republic has a vivid tale to tell of their amazing bus ride to the distillery, and another tale to tell of how much fun it was to sample the Brugal Rum. Brugal Titanium Rum is a triple distilled premium white rum produced primarily for the domestic market (and in parts of Europe) as a high-end cocktail spirit meant to compete with ultra premium Vodka.
However the tipping point for the category seems to have been the year 2010, and the brand which (in my opinion) which helped the most to bring about a this change was Wiser’s Legacy.
It was during this time that Lemon Hart 151 Demerara Rum became a relatively famous cocktail rum. In fact, the rum is called for by name in many of Trader Vic’s and Don the Beachcomber’s tiki recipes. The rum is a 100 % Guyanese rum blend with rum distilled and aged in Guyana. It is currently bottled in Canada by the Newfoundland and Labrador Liquor Corporation (NLC) for the brand owner Mosaiq.
Highwood produces two well aged whiskies under their Century Distillers label, Century Reserve 21 Year Old & Lot 1525 ( blend of 15 to 25-year-old corn whiskies). I have noticed that the flavour profile of these two blends has began to merge in recent years to the point that this year when I did some blind tastings, I could no longer tell which whisky was which. (It could be that after tasting 70 Canadian Whiskies for this countdown, my palate was beginning to shows signs of fatigue.) 
The Rum Howler Blog 