Ahh, the NAS debate again. Jura Superstition was one of the first wave of NAS malts: whiskies created by combining a single distillery’s output from several different ages without revealing the ages on the bottle. Along with Ardbeg Uigeadail and Aberlour abunadh, Superstition stands for the original intention of the category: to expand the ability of master blenders to release malts that showcase what’s best about a brand by allowing them to use young malt for intensity and fresh fruit and floral notes, and older malt for balance and depth. With an NAS expression, a distillery doesn’t have to try to sell something that has a price befitting its average age of, say, 15 years with a label that (by law) only reveals the youngest malt in the vatting – perhaps 5 years. It’s a laudable goal, but fraught with potential for abuse. Any old profit-driven distillery (cough) with an eye towards gouging the current spike in whisky popularity could release an $80 bottling of primarily young malt without any kind of legal backlash. In fact, when Compass Box recently tried to flip the system and release an NAS blend with the age of all of the components prominently displayed, it was slapped with threats of litigation. The NAS market is, certainly, one where the buyer must beware.