Where does a Glenfiddich 18 drinker turn when they want a night off?

The 18 itself is a Speyside single malt, and it reads like autumn in a room with a fire going. The nose folds oak and fresh apple into barley and cereal, with a dried-fruit sweetness and a hint of toffee sitting underneath. The palate keeps the cereal note, then turns to sweet fruit cake and Christmas pudding with a warming thread of cinnamon. It is a complex nose on an extraordinarily smooth body. That is the whole appeal: layered, but never asks anything of you.

The 15, for its part, leans fruitier and a touch brighter. Cooked plums first, then blueberry and stewing rhubarb, with sultana and sweet dried fruit behind delicate, scented edges. The palate carries the same fruit but adds grip and a little fresh acidity to hold it up. Approachable is the word.

What to pay. Glenfiddich 18 is $180 at Dan Murphy's this week. It usually sells around $175, and across what we've seen it has sat in a narrow band, from $170 to $180. So this week is the top of its own range and barely a step above its usual. That works out to about $8.14 a standard drink, roughly 22 of them in the bottle — a tidy way to think about a pour at home.

Now the interesting part: what would the drinkers of the bottles nearest Glenfiddich 18 pay for it, each starting from what they pay for their own? An Aberlour 14 drinker would put it at about $132, which is 82% of what their own bottle costs them. They mark it down mostly for being older than theirs and for the name on the label. Turn it around and a Glenfiddich 18 drinker rates Aberlour 14 at about 84% of their own bottle, marking it down for not being from the Highlands and for being younger than theirs. Across the drinkers of the bottles nearest it, the answers run from $83 to $330. At $180, this week's price sits inside what those drinkers would pay.

If you do want a change of scene, three stand-ins hold up.

Glengoyne 15, usually around $162. Sherry-led: vanilla, ginger and toffee, with that worn old-leather note the sherry casks leave behind. To a Glenfiddich 18 drinker it gives about 95% of what their own bottle does, for 90% of its price. The closest like-for-like here, and the cheaper of the two.

Glengoyne 18, usually around $276. A generous share of first-fill sherry, and it shows — milk chocolate, vanilla and melon up top, then grapefruit and fruitcake, with cinnamon and orange marmalade on a long, easy finish. About 90% of the Glenfiddich 18 for a Glenfiddich 18 drinker, at 153% of the price.

Glengoyne 21, usually around $361. Older and deeper, built on a creamy maltiness, with honey, cookie dough and soft citrus and apple rounding it out. Clean and polished. About 92% of the Glenfiddich 18, at 201% of its price.

So who is each one for?

If Glenfiddich 18 is already your bottle, nothing here unseats it — $180 this week is close to what you always pay, and the smoothness is the reason you keep reaching for it. If you want the same hand at a lower price, the 15 from the same distillery is the straight line. If you came up through Aberlour and its orange-and-honey style, the sherried Glengoynes will feel like home ground, the 15 to stay near your usual outlay and the 18 if you want more cask behind it. And if you simply want the best night Glengoyne can give and the budget is there, the 21 is the one to sit with slowly.