Tonight’s bottle is Australian: Morris Rutherglen Australian Single Malt Whisky — cream box, embossed glass, and that little wooden stopper ready to come off. Morris of Rutherglen (est. 1859) is better known to a lot of people for fortified wine, and this malt leans hard on that heritage: whisky matured with their prize-winning fortified barrels in the mix.
This isn’t my first meeting with Morris. I tried their whiskies earlier in a taste-test sample session with the distillery itself — a Zoom tasting lined up through The Whisky List — and the profile stuck with me. Their range is genuinely unique. Not a Speyside clone, not a peaty coastal number. Something else.
Brief profile
- Style: Australian single malt whisky
- Producer: Morris of Rutherglen, Victoria
- Heritage: Family name on fortified wine since 1859; whisky distilled, aged and crafted in Rutherglen
- Cask influence: Fortified-wine barrels — deep dried-fruit character, body and substance rather than sugar-sweetness
- Strength: 40% ABV (700 ml)
- Best for: Anyone after Australian malt with a rich, dark-fruit profile and real weight in the glass
What Morris tastes like
From that distillery tasting — and again in this glass at home — the through-line is the same: beautiful, rich, deep, ruby-toned, full-bodied dark fruit. Not sweet. Body and substance. Delicious.
Colour in the bottle is a warm amber-gold with that ruby depth when the light hits it. On the nose: dark fruit, fortified-cask weight, nothing thin or green. First sip is full-bodied — cocoa, dried fruit, depth from the wine barrels — and a finish that keeps the richness without turning sticky-sweet. That uniqueness across their whiskies is what sold me at the sample session; opening a full bottle at home was the natural next step.
Seal cracked, first proper home pour, box still standing beside the bottle. Morris earned the shelf space. I’ll sit with this one and enjoy how that dark-fruit body opens up glass by glass.
Also on the shelf: Craigellachie 13, Robert Burns, and The Whistler Bodega Cask.