Laphroaig’s 10th annual batch of their cask strength 10 year old single malt promising power and copious amounts of that iconic funky peat the Islay distillery has become known and loved for.
Nose: The darkly roasted skin of a chicken that was marinated in cola and spices. But where is the peat? There are thin hints of it behind everything else. This is atypical but nevertheless good. (8.5/10)
Palate: The baked crust of a smoked cheesecake without the actual cheese cake filling. Salty on the surface of the tongue but smokey and sweet everywhere else. (8/10)
Finish: All the flavors tended to spread low and wide in my mouth before things are heating up right at the edge of the throat. After a while the more smokey components finally descent into my chest and shortly thereafter the hot spot expands downwards as well. A sweet savoriness like the flavor of traditional ratatouille coats my entire mouth. (9/10)
Balance: A bit disjointed at first but it all comes together eventually as all the glory contained in this whisky slowly unfolds and properly re-assembles itself on the finish. Give this one time and you will be rewarded! (8.5/10)
A delicious single sherry butt cask strength bottling of a single malt from one of Speyside less known distilleries, Dailuaine, which mostly produces component whiskies for Diageo’s portfolio of blends and rarely gets bottled as single malt, comes to us courtesy of Douglas Laing.
Nose: A friendly neighborhood flower shop that stocks nothing but pretty meadow flowers on the main floor. Though I get a sense that they’re keeping a few buckets of roses stashed away in a backroom somewhere. And I’m fairly certain the owner had grilled Branzino for lunch. Much later there are passing whiffs of freshly watered grass in the sun. (8.5/10)
Palate: A hot wave spills through my mouth and finally breaks, foaming with bright and tangy notes more reminiscent of top shelf oranges than flowers. Quite lovely. (8.5/10)
Finish: Echoes of orange juice and bitter herbs are hovering high above a growing and comforting heat right behind my sternum. Ultimtely the warmth doesn’t last all that long but it’s wonderful while it lasts. (8/10)
Balance: Very pretty but not as timid as one would expect. A mellow, pleasant late spring and early summer filled with plenty of joyful times. Very nice. (8.5/10)
A K&L exclusive single barrel cask strength bottling of a delicious single malt distilled at one of the lesser known hidden treasures among the numerous Speyside distilleries.
Nose: Every so often I encounter a whisky where I have an absurdly hard time identifying specific notes. There’s stuff. And also a few things. Mostly stuff though. Both are good. Hah! Finally! A faint note I can put a name on that seems to permeate both the stuff and also the things. It’s cola. Oh and then some old furniture that was rubbed with cola. Anyway, it’s somewhat static but I like it. A drop of water flattens the nose beyond recovery. (8/10)
Palate: Ah, much more going on here. A big bold hit, at first spatially contained but continuously inflated with each subsequent sip. I still can’t really name specific notes here. Very, very nice though. Oddly enough a drop of water converts this from water of life to oil slick of life. I like that. Too bad adding water ruins the nose. (8.5/10)
Finish: Deep and warm. I just love a whisky that fills my chest cavity with flavor and heat. Apparently I have olfactory receptors buried in my lungs. I still can’t name notes though. Maybe my brain has finally short-circuited. Luckily I’m still capable of immensely enjoying this. Water dials back the warmth which makes me sad. (9/10)
Balance: Somehow this whisky defeated my ability to name flavors. But it is great. Seriously. I really liked the palate with water but the cost in terms of losing the nose and the warmth of the finish is just too high as far as I’m concerned. Don’t put water into this. Unless you want to know sadness and regret. (9/10)
Glenrothes’ “Whisky Maker’s Cut” is the only NAS release in the Speyside distillery’s 2018 Soleo Collection series. The whisky was matured entirely in 1st fill sherry casks.
Nose: Sticky sweet sherry syrup oozes through my nose leaving behind a thin crust of brown sugar. Not too complex but nice enough. (7/10)
Palate: This is where the money is. Quite rich, not as sticky sweet as the nose, satisfyingly expansive. Some interesting bright sparkles flicker about the back of the roof of my mouth. Once again simple but good. (8/10)
Finish: Immediately coats the back of the upper throat with lots of gooey sherry flavors only to vanish on its way down leaving nothing much but a faint hot spot in the lower regions of the chest. Quite nice, actually, but I wish it was reaching deeper. At long last some bitter residue layers up between tongue and roof of mouth. That bit is… interesting but not exactly pleasant. 8/10
Balance: Quite nice and surprisingly bold for a mid-range Glenrothes, many of which have turned out to be… uninteresting… at times. This is a very respectable offering albeit slightly simplistic except for the finish. (8/10)
The legendary beast, the one whisky to rule them all, the holy grail of Islay single malts. In this reviewer’s mind anyways. The first experience of this whisky, years back, was a knee-buckling, bar-clutching spell of the vapors followed by an exclamation not well suited for public discourse. It remains among my top 3 whiskies of all time. I could say it’s number 1 and it wouldn’t be a lie but the real truth is that there is a range at the top of the charts where direct comparison and relative ranking of whiskies ceases to make sense. Sometimes different is not better or worse but just different. In any case this was the inaugural release of Bruichladdich’s new line of heavily peated single malts matured in warehouses located in Port Charlotte. The whisky was named in memory of a distillery once located there and named the same as the place, which was closed all the way back in 1929. Supposedly the new spirit was distilled in homage to the original 1881 distillate. It is long sold out save for a few bottles hidden away by savvy store owners which occasionally pop up for a high price and for private bottles surfacing in various whisky auctions here and there.
Nose: Huge wafts of smoke from a roaring fire place stacked with quality walnut, almond and sweet butter logs are caught in an ocean breeze carrying notes of seaweed and salt from afar. There is so much going on it’s hard to even pull out specific details. Just beautiful. (10/10)
Palate: Wow. I always forget just how amazing this is. Huge. Mountainous. A raging tempest that on impact instantly fills the entire head space with everything it has to give. Countless tendrils of delicious smoke from that same fire place swirling around and through me while I eat Austrian plum dumpling dough sprinkled with sugar and drizzled with dark browned butter. This is like sucking nectar from the teats of ancient gods. Big. Really big. Utterly and astonishingly beautiful. Beyond words. The mind can only experience this but not hold onto it. Undoubtedly next time it will be a complete surprise again. (10/10)
Finish: The afterglow cannot possibly keep up with the glorious inferno of the palate but, really, it doesn’t need to. Instead you fall gently into an abyss filled with dense, dark and rich smoke and settle into a deep, relaxed state of peaceful content. Bathing, as it were, in that indescribable delicious, all-permeating peat smoke issuing from near infinite stores of glowing embers. Soaking up a deep heat seemingly radiating from everywhere in the universe. I… am. No thought. (10/10)
Balance: Can perfection have a balance? To talk about balance one would have to be able to distinguish parts of the experience. This is a continuous, almost synesthetic, whole body experience that flows gently or violently but always uninterrupted. How can a liquid be this good? I know instantly that I will once again be unable to recall just how good this is until I return to it at some future point in time. And it will be astonishing and glorious all over. The wheels of life and whisky turn in perfect synchronicity. When I die please soak me in this stuff and then burn me. (10/10)
Suntory Holdings via Beam Suntory via Morrison Bowmore Distillers
Distilled
December 1996
Bottler
Douglas Laing & Co.
Series
Old Malt Cask
Style
Single Barrel Single Malt Whisky
Peated
Yes
Cask
Refill Hogshead #HL15197
Bottled
June 2018
Bottles
120
Strength
52.8% (105.6 Proof)
Retailer
K&L Wine Merchants
This bottle came and went quickly at K&L and I had missed my opportunity. Luckily a great friend brought his personal bottle to one of our gatherings and let us try this absolutely wonderful Bowmore. Thanks so much, Andrew! This one made me think deep thoughts.
Nose: A freshly showered mildly bite-y fish, perhaps a low-odor salmon that is resting on a bed of steamed parsley root and other sweet root vegetables. The fish in questions likely swam past Bowmore distillery last year, probably a sightseeing detour through Loch Indaal on the way to the spawning grounds, because there is only the very faintest echoes from far, far away and barely perceptible of that old lavender perfume so typical of the distillery. (7.5/10)
Palate: A sanded unfinished wooden board upon which the fish is going to be served, in anticipation of that happening to it. Perhaps some smoke is rolling in through the windows from one of the other Islay distilleries… it’s hard to tell for sure. Some thin high quality chocolate splinters around the edges. The realization of all the things the wooden board has seen. It has a functional and utilitarian perspective on life. It just does what it does. And I like it. Old school palate. Unapologetic. No frills. (8.5/10)
Finish: Layers in quietly. This wooden board has an unassuming manner that only initially succeeds in hiding its real power and solid structure. I like hanging out with this wooden board. Sitting next to each other on deck chairs, quietly watching the waves roll in under a darkening sky. I want this wooden board to be my friend. I think it likes me. I’m happy. (9/10)
Balance: This just keeps getting better and better and better as it goes though there is a price to pay because eventually the lavender does being to appear on the nose. Not as annoying as usual luckily. The rest is glorious. But not obvious. Who knew stoic, sanded, unfinished wooden boards could be such good friends and companions. (8.5/10)
One of the at least 3 batches of Glenlivet’s Oloroso matured version of their NÃ durra series bottled in 2016. The NÃ durra series of cask strength single malt bottlings from the famous Speyside distillery was introduced in 2005. In 2014 they started to release Oloroso matured batches as part of the series and, finally, in 2015 they added peated batches as well.
Nose: A large, rough and sharp wooden splinter is used to harshly cut through coarse baker’s chocolate. There are hints of dried mushrooms about. This one is a prickly guest that, when agitated, emanates small puffs of sweet peat from their pores. (7/10)
Palate: Licking a very dry wooden plank that was somehow infused with milk chocolate. The experience of the dram is geometrically flat. It clings to the tongue and absolutely refuses to lift up or expand in any direction but sideways until it finally slides in thin sheets over the back edge of the tongue and into the throat where it suddenly explodes into a dense and well defined ball of chocolate infused smoke. (8,5/10)
Finish: The ball of chocolate infused smoke wafts and wobbles about in the back and only descends very slowly from there. Oddly there’s not a lot of warmth generated which is surprising for a whisky this strong. (8.5/10)
Balance: Rather harsh up front but quite nice once you get past that. Ver-ey peat-ey chocolat-ey. (8/10)
The Scotch Malt Whisky Society’s 76th bottling of a Bunnahabhain single barrel single malt from Islay’s North Shore.
Nose: I get the canvas but not the burning driftwood from the label. I’m also missing the leather but there is, in fact, some faint shoe polish in there. Also some very mild vanilla flavored wafers. A few moments in someone behind me unwraps a tiny bit of leftover nougat. There is just not all that much here to be honest though much later on a nice autumnal note of drying leaves on trees floats by. (7/10)
Palate: The initial big hit from this beast-strength liquid is quickly subsumed by a velvety, richly buttered dough that is very chewy and thick and that, while not intensely flavorful, sparkles spicily. (7.5/10)
Finish: Again there is not a whole lot of pronounced flavor going on but the whisky does deliver a deep, rich warmth that fills the chest cavity throughout. I can live with this. (8.5/10)
Balance: Everything about this dram is interesting despite being under-powered in terms of strength of flavor. And the whisky ultimately gets lifted up high by the finish. It makes you easily forgive and forget any and all earlier shortcomings. I can barely remember the nose or the palate to be honest. All there is is this deep and cozy warmth everywhere. And I’m good with that. (8.5/10)
Nose: Grape skin bubbles sparkle as they float up into my nostrils and release flowery peat puffs as they pop . Sweet and sour. Quite nice. (7.5/10)
Palate: Not a lot of complexity really. Rather a homogeneous wide and opaque wave on an otherwise dark and quiet pond. Could be more vertically expansive. It barely reaches the roof of my mouth even on its tippy-toes. But, again, quite nice. (8/10)
Finish: Warm. The theme of simplicity and homogeneity continues. The whisky plumbs the depths of my chest about half way before reeling it back in. But right in the back of the throat there are long lasting embers that alight pleasantly on every breath. (8.5/10)
Balance: The nose promises a complexity that the palate and finish just can’t deliver. However, they make up for that inability with comforting hugs and cozy warmth. So who am I to complain. One of the best of the GoT series in my opinion. (8.5/10)
The Tottori is a somewhat controversial and basically fake “Japanese” whisky from Japan’s Whisky Public Enemy #1, Matsui Shuzo. While signs abound that the company is serious about distilling their own product it appears they’ve only even begun to actively distill whisky at Kurayoshi distillery in 2017 after acquiring a license to do so in 2015. The company itself has a long history of making Shochu since 1910 but their legitimacy in the world of Japanese whisky is certainly compromised due to their continued efforts to obfuscate as much as possible the reality of the fact, that the juice they bottle is not at all distilled in Japan. It says “Japanese Whisky” and it “Made in Japan” on their bottles and, while technically correct, that in itself is very much a matter of running a truckload of barrels over the, uh, spirit of the law, in order to follow the letter of the law.
This particular blend was matured in ex-Bourbon barrels, bottled in 2017 and has come to be in my hands as a Christmas gift. I certainly won’t look a gift horse in the mouth. In fact, controversy or not, I’ll be putting this particular gift horse INSIDE of MY mouth shortly.
Nose: Right out of the bottle we have roasted apples. After a minute in the glass warm wood notes emerge suggesting some quality but before you know it you are standing in front of a big stack of bargain pine 2x4s at Home Depot. The ones that twist and bend when you let them acclimatize at the construction site. The first impressions would have warranted at 7 here but, alas, they were fleeting. (5/10)
Palate: The bright, dry pine notes continue on the palate though less irritating than they were on the nose. The contractor who bought the 2x4s either put on a bit of herbaceous cologne in the morning or perhaps he scrubbed his kitchen floors with Pine-scented cleaner. Kinda refreshing. (7/10)
Finish: That pile of cinnamon sprinkled peels over in the corner must be left from roasting apples for the nose earlier. Almost missed them. But after creeping up on me like that the finish is actually building and settling in nicely. Also I feel like having some mulled wine all of a sudden. (7/10)
Balance: A bit all over the place this one. I like the initial nose but not what it turns into. Then I don’t like the initial hit on the palate but I do like what it turns into. Then the finish seems absent but suddenly sneaks up on you and taps you on the shoulder. Now its all comfy on my sofa. But I don’t mind. Or do I? (6/10)
Water: Two drops sort of vaporize the nose into a puff of dried old shoe polish that must’ve been stuck on the 2x4s. The palate does some quite interesting stuff around the edges where some darker notes come into play. Blackberries perhaps? But hints of flat watery cola in the center compromise that experience just for a moment. The berries last into the finish where we now also meet our old friends, the crappy bargain 2x4s, once more. Adding water was worthwhile but I have to say: this is not exactly the most stable dram.
0
We use cookies to optimize our website and our service.
Functional
Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes.The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
We use cookies to optimize our website and our service.
Functional
Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes.The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
