This article is taken from the April 2023 issue of The Critic. To get the full magazine why not subscribe? Right now we’re offering five issues for just £10.

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Near Auchterarder, not far from the banks of the Tay and within sight of Loch Balloch and Loch Laich, stands the majestic Gleneagles Hotel. This imposing pile, built in the baronial style, bears testament to the confidence and conviction of its original commissioners, the Caledonian Railway Company.

Conceived as a country house hotel, Gleneagles opened in 1924 and soon secured a reputation for healthy exercise and dance bands — sport by day, saltation by night. They say that the band leader, Henry Hall, had a hand in its decoration, concocting a style collision between Sir Walter Scott and Agatha Christie.

In the sweeping driveway a Rolls Royce Silver Cloud is parked ready to convey home those who have approached their evening with overmuch enthusiasm. On the entrance steps stand sentinel two sturdy retainers, all kitted out in kilts and tweed. The long lobby, full of ferns and exquisite vases, sensuously designed and appointed, leads up to a grand oak reception.

This imposing pile, built in the baronial style, bears testament to the confidence and conviction of its original commissioners

For those whose priority is to keep out the cold without resort to a hip flask, the Hawick Cashmere concession provides a ready remedy. Therein you will find some of Scotland’s most chic, and snug, designs to add cachet to your wardrobe and insulation against the elements.

If the tartan and the twill seem all rather Rob Roy, the Century Bar is pure Poirot. At its centre, flanked by four carmine columns and behind a bar of white marble, a crystal cabinet full of liquor climbs like the Chrysler building from a mini Manhattan. There, the resident mixologists can make whatever you fancy. The rest of the room is RKO 1933. Art deco plafonniers light the pistachio walls and curtains and the comfortable furnishings in russet and red.

Its clientele, comfortable in every sense, lean markedly across the Atlantic, if the yardstick used is the prevalence of Brooks Brothers shirts and baseball caps. This is presumably why there is a smaller, though still sumptuous, “American Bar” tucked away in the other wing to which more serious swillers can repair if the card games or the cribbage in the Century Bar are not sufficiently illuminating. Our American cousins like not just to work hard and play hard, some like to get lit up too.

However, the bar is not solely star-spangled. Several saltires can be found there also, particularly in the persons of my pals Alistair Snowie and Ian Macmillan. Proud Scots both, they know their history. They also know their cigars and their whisky. If Havanas and humidors give you a high, Alistair is your man with the cutter. If you want to talk phenol parts per million or confer about the role of conjoiners, Ian should be your confrère.

Yet whether your weakness is Connecticut broadleaf Bolivars or malt Balvenie, both men are clear that the best blended whisky in Scotland is Johnnie Walker Black Label. Made from a number of whiskies and matured for at least three years, JWBL is a premier blend both in terms of palate and price. My expert friends are agreed that a brief toffee-like tease on the tongue gives way to a warm smoky finish as, having waved farewell, the liquid takes the high road home.

Should you favour fitness over fare, you can swim, you can gym or you can rejuvenate in one of the twenty treatment rooms

Not a barfly? Well down the hall in the Strathearn dining room, from where damask banquets in powder blue afford a magnifi cent view across the lawns towards Ben Cleuch, the Auld Alliance is forged afresh in a fusion of Highland hospitality and French cuisine.

And if guéridon service is not to your taste, there are nine other restaurants to choose instead. Should you favour fitness over fare, you can swim, you can gym or you can rejuvenate in one of the twenty treatment rooms at the spa. Yes, I think Gleneagles offers something delightful to everyone discerning. Now is there anything else I may have forgotten? Did I mention the golf?