Queen Elizabeth’s Longstanding Love Affair With Scotch Whisky, Explained

In 2017, it was reported that Queen Elizabeth consumes up to four cocktails per day—as many as 28 tipples per week. If you are to believe the words of her former chef, she kicks off the early afternoon with her favorite cocktail: gin and Dubonnet. Then it’s on to a wine-based aperitif on the rocks. This is all before lunch, by the way, which she accompanies with a dry martini. In the evening she pairs mealtime alongside a glass or two of champagne.

She even recently found time to release her own spirit; a gin flavored with handpicked botanicals from the royal garden in Buckingham Palace. Quite a nifty schedule for a nonagenarian.

And it turns out the monarch might also have quite the penchant for single malt scotch. Evidence for the love affair stretches back at least until 1980 when she received her very own cask of Bowmore from the storied distillery on Islay. None of it was bottled until 2002 and each year since she’s donated three to charity—out of 648 total. The most recent auctioning just ended, with a bottle of the ‘Queen’s Cask’ fetching nearly $36,000.

In 1984, Her Majesty awarded a Royal Warrant to The Famous Grouse—a blended scotch. She’s hardly alone in her adoration of that particular producer; for forty years it has been the top-selling brand within Scotland.

But all of these esteemed beverages likely play second fiddle to her low-key liquor of choice: Royal Lochnagar. Built in 1843, this distillery has a longstanding connection to the Crown. Just five years after Lochnagar came online, Queen Victoria purchased Balmoral Estate, directly across the River Dee.