I arrive at Vinopolis, in London Bridge, after getting slightly lost having always entered through the store into The Whisky Exchange, never the guest entrance before on a surprisingly mild late October evening in London and am led to the store.

I spend a while perusing the store, forcing myself to suppress the instinct to buy a bottle or few from the 800-plus they have in stock, chatting to a few people as I go, anticipation building with every glance at a super premium whisky, especially those in kept in glass cabinets commanding prices of over five, maybe even ten thousand pounds.

We are led into a large tasting room where tables are laid out with five tasting glasses at each place setting.

I can see the Glen Grant 50 Year Old box, but alas we all must wait until Dennis himself allows us to see and sample the culmination of his own life’s work.

Before I go into the tasting, it is probably a good idea to tell you a little about the man behind Glen Grant 50 Year Old, as it is a fascinating story.

Born on the distillery grounds in 1946, Dennis was destined for a life at Glen Grant. He started his career at the distillery in 1961 as an apprentice cooper at the age of 15 and from there onwards dedicated his life to perfecting the art of whisky-making.

Today, Dennis manages and directs Glen Grant for Gruppo Campari with uncommon passion and unrivalled knowledge of the industry and the art of whisky-making.

Dennis has worked with Gruppo Campari to develop an exceptional Glen Grant range of six delicate, fruity and smooth expressions: The Major’s Reserve, 10 Year Old, 16 Year Old, 1992 Cellar Reserve, 170th Anniversary Limited Edition, Five Decades, and most recently a single malt of distinction, the Glen Grant 50 Year Old.

Most importantly though, he actually hand-filled the cask that has now, fifty years later, been bottled at cask strength to create the Glen Grant 50 Year Old. How lovely that must be, to have seen this come to fruition over a half century of service to the brand.

Back to the tasting, and we are ready to try the range.

We heard stories around how the Grant brothers taught the Chivas brothers everything they knew, tongue in cheek to an extent, and how the brand was massive in Italy for years before Campari bought it and how it had mainly been used as blend fodder over the years until 2006 when it was given a new lease of life by both Campari and Dennis himself.

Lovely stories around provenance and being able to tell a true barley to bottle story, along with a few stats:

• Glen Grant produces 6.2 million litres of spirit a year, working out to roughly £180 million in potential duty being paid to the UK government (from just one distillery; no wonder Mr. Cameron et al wanted to keep this Kingdom United)
• They use 40,000 tonnes of malted barley per year
• 28 million litres of water per year are used to distill
• From 1978 when Chivas owned Glen Grant to 2006 when Campari bought the brand, stock and distillery for £130 million, not one penny was spent on marketing

We tried the Glen Grant 10 Year Old, 16 Year Old, 170th Anniversary Expression and the Five Decades Expression, which were all incredibly unique and interesting in their own way but are not the focus of this article.