A NORTH Yorkshire dad is approaching the end of a unique year-long challenge.

Ben Bowers has reviewed a different dram of whisky every day for the last year, to raise money for a children’s heart surgery charity - inspired by his daughter’s best friend, Vaughn Pearce-Storm.

By the end of the challenge Mr Bowers, from Hemingbrough, near Selby, will have tasted and created video reviews of 366 whiskies from 366 different distilleries around the world and has already raised more than £3,600 for the Children’s Heart Surgery Fund in Leeds.

Mr Bowers said he had been worried about the number of samples he would need, but the response had been “absolutely fantastic”.

He said: “ It would be easy to do 366 different whiskies from some distilleries. To start with, I wasn’t sure there were that many in the world, but it turns out 366 is a drop in the ocean considering what’s out there.

“I also didn’t know whether anyone would be willing to send me 25ml in the post, but I’ve had some from Germany, the US, Finland and a guy in London sent me 57 samples, and someone else sent about 36. Luxembourg sent me about 20, and they were really obscure, tiny distilleries from that region.”

Mr Bowers - whose third child was born during the challenge - said time had been the biggest challenge he had faced, between helping to look after his children, researching, filming, editing and publishing the videos, but he had enjoyed finding out more about the drinks he has tasted.

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He said: “Famous Grouse surprised me most. I haven’t had it in years, and thought it was cheap and nasty, but when I came to it with a completely open mind, it was a lot better than I thought.

“I’ve learned no two whiskies are the same. Some have been good, some have been bad some have been absolutely fantastic, and one or two were borderline undrinkable. They have all been different and there’s so much to learn, I don’t think you can ever get to the bottom of the whisky market.”

Mr Bowers will taste his final three whiskies - Bruichladdich, Laphroaig and Ardbeg - at a fundraising event in the Oak Room of the Principal Hotel from 7pm on Saturday, with samples also available for the audience to taste along with him.

He said: “I’m going to do them live with the audience and live stream and film them for the next three days.

“I’ve also arranged an auction on the night with 25 bottles and other whisky-based prizes which have been donated - including some bottles from the 1980s - and all proceeds will go into the charity pot.”

To catch up on A Dram a Day go to followed on facebook.com/adramaday or @adramaday on Twitter, and to buy tickets for Saturday's event email adramaday@outlook.com

For more information, including the video reviews, go to youtube.com/adramaday366 or dramaday.tumblr.com/listofwhiskies