Teeling asks over right across its range, the grain least

That is the headline, so it is worth being plain about it. The model sets each Teeling against its crowd, the ten drams nearest it on flavour, and reads the gap in dollars and as a percentage over that crowd. The brand's middle price is $97. Not one of the five comes in at or below its flavour-peers. This is a range that charges a consistent premium for the Teeling name and its cask-forward house style, and the only real decision is which premium you mind least.

Some brand context explains the shape of it. Teeling is a young operation that brought distilling back to the centre of Dublin after a long gap, and it built its name on cask experimentation: wine finishes, stout casks, rum casks, a revival of the old pot still style. That restlessness is the appeal, and it is all over this shelf. It also costs. A range built on finishes and limited runs prices like one, and the model's read is consistent whichever style you pick up — the whiskey is likeable and the tags run ahead of the field.

The gentlest on that measure is the Single Grain. At $88 against a crowd near $64, it is about 38% over, the smallest gap in the lineup. Grain whiskey usually drinks light, and this one is finished in red-wine casks, which pulls it somewhere more interesting: soft and fruity, cabernet-tinged, apple and blackberry over a mellow grain base. It is the easy-drinking member of the family and, this week, the one that asks the least over its field. If you want a Teeling to pour without thinking too hard about the tag, start here.

The flagship Small Batch is next up the range by value, $86 against a crowd near $54, about 59% over. This is the bottle most people have had: a rum-cask finish gives it a sweet, creamy character, toffee and tropical fruit with a soft rum warmth. It is a genuinely good introduction to modern Irish whiskey. The premium over its peers is wide, though, because the drams the model files beside it are a fair bit cheaper, so you are paying up for the house style rather than finding value in it.

The Single Pot Still is Teeling's nod to the traditional Irish style, and at $97 it sits right on the brand's middle price, against a crowd near $57, about 70% over. Pot still whiskey has a particular texture and this one carries a fragrant, slightly exotic profile: melon and grape, a floral rose note, cinnamon spice and orchard apple. It is characterful and a little different from the rest. It is also priced well clear of its flavour-crowd, so the interest comes at a cost.

The Single Malt is the dearest by ticket at $112, against a crowd near $80, about 40% over. It shares the soft berry-and-orchard fruit of its stablemates, apple and blackberry and a red-fruit sweetness, with a richer, more tropical cask character underneath than the grain shows. A polished malt, and its gap over its peers sits in the middle of the pack rather than at the extreme.

The widest gap of all belongs to the Small Batch Stout Cask, $102 against a crowd near $54, about 89% over. This is the collaboration bottling finished in stout-beer casks, and it is the one bottle in the range with no own tasting notes in our data, so I will not put words in its mouth: the model reads it as sweet and tropical, leaning hard on a rum-cask-style richness, and that is as far as the evidence goes. What is clear is the price. At nearly double its flavour-crowd, it is bought for the novelty of the cask and the label, not for value against the shelf.

Across the five, the story does not really change: Teeling makes likeable, cask-driven whiskey and charges a steady premium for it. The gap narrows toward the grain and the flagship and widens toward the pot still and the stout-cask special, but nowhere does it disappear.

So the buying guide is about managing that premium. For the keenest Teeling on the shelf, the Single Grain at $88 is the pick, light and fruity and the least over its crowd. For the classic introduction, the Small Batch at $86 is the one most people should own, with the premium accepted as the cost of entry. The Single Malt at $112 and the Single Pot Still at $97 are for drinkers who want those specific styles and do not mind paying up for them. The Stout Cask at $102 is a curiosity buy, worth it only if the novelty appeals. There is no bargain in this range this week, but there is a clear order, and it starts with the grain.