Balblair means "the farm on the moor," and it has stood near Edderton on the Dornoch Firth since 1790 — one of the oldest working distilleries in the Highlands, with local accounts suggesting illicit distilling on the site by 1749 and a ledger archive reaching back to 1800. John Ross founded it, his son Andrew joined him in 1824, and the Ross family ran it for a century. Ross is still the county's dominant surname; the distillery has employed two John Rosses at once in recent years. When wine merchant Alexander Cowan took over in 1894, he had the distillery rebuilt half a mile up the road to sit beside the new railway — but the water near the new site wasn't as good, so Balblair still draws from the original Allt Dearg burn today. Just up the road stands the Clach Biorach, a 4,000-year-old Pictish standing stone. Inver House Distillers bought Balblair in 1996 and has run it as a small, unhurried operation: a single pair of stills, six Oregon pine washbacks, long fermentations, and a deliberately slow distillation that produces a bright, honeyed, citrus-led Highland malt. In 2007 the distillery famously replaced age statements with vintage years, then reversed course in April 2019 with a core range of 12, 15, 18, 21, and 25 Year Olds, all at 46%. Ken Loach filmed The Angels' Share here, and the visitor center followed.

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