If it seems odd to consider air an ingredient, you have to stick your nose in a glass of Islay single malt. Along with all the other components, a savory whiff of salty sea breeze is unmistakable.

The sense of mystery in the terrain is palpable as well. “As you explore you can see how it compresses its secrets into tight parcels: dune-fringed beaches, remote hills, cliffs, caves, peat bogs, standing stones, lost parliaments, abandoned townships and Celtic memories,” Michael Jackson wrote in “Whiskey: The Definitive World Guide” (DK, 2005). “It is a tapestry of geographical and historical treasures through which whiskey runs like a golden thread.”

It’s this air of mystery, along with a reputation for the smokiest, most robust and challenging malts, that seems to set Islay apart from Scotland’s other whisky regions. Most experts, however, agree that whiskies can no longer be classified geographically. Production methods have become so homogenized that they no longer reflect local eccentricities as much as they do a distiller’s predilections.

The smokiness comes from the tradition of using peat — bog soil made of decomposed vegetable matter that was harvested to fuel kilns used for drying barley. Assertive peating has long been a trait of famous Islay malts, like Laphroaig, Lagavulin and Ardbeg, but it is not exclusive to Islay. And just as much a part of the Islay tradition are gentler malts like Bunnahabhain (BUN-na-hah-ven) and Bruichladdich (brook-LAD-dy), which are lighter in body and more floral than peaty. Another tradition, shared throughout Scotland, seems to be names that are impossible to sound out phonetically.

Our 20 Islay single malts included bottles from each of the eight working Islay distilleries. Indeed, two of the eight, Bruichladdich and Ardbeg, were dormant for years, only to be reawakened to distill again. The revival of another distillery, Port Charlotte, is planned.