I just got to try this one at Zeewijck in IJmuiden, which happens to be a great shop, run by a great guy, who also organizes last week’s Whisky & Rum aan Zee festival. Which is also great.

Anyway, last week he recommended I try the truffle cask finished ‘French’ single malt from Perigord Distillerie in the Dordogne. I didn’t, mostly because my memory was turning to crap already and I am really, really bad at following recommendations.

As a good copy of the American NDP (Non-Distiller Producer) stuff that’s been going on, the label states this whisky is produced by Perigord, but it doesn’t say they distilled it. Producing a whisky can also be buying whisky, finishing it and bottling it. Even just bottling it would be a product of your own, technically. Anyway, the confusing thing is that Perigord actually is a distillery, but the label nicely states that it is Scotch whisky in the bottle. Finished in truffle casks.

What the heck is a truffle cask? I guess in this case it is a cask used to give something a truffle infusion. I’ve a hard time finding out what it actually is. I get some related products online, most also from Perigord, and it is a spirit, but I guess it’s some kind of an infused brandy or so. If someone has more info, please help me out here.

Lascaw 12 year old

The whisky then. As I was just standing in the shop collecting my bottles I didn’t really write tasting notes, but I do have some general finding.

The whisky is pretty decent. It’s not overly complex, it’s only 40% and I wouldn’t be surprised to find caramel coloring in it either. Of course, the website doesn’t give me much info either.

On the nose you don’t pick up anything strange. It’s a very smooth and gentle dram, that shows the slightly fruity characteristics of a Speyside dram. A bit in range of Tamdhu, or Deveron/Macduff. It’s on the palate that you get a very slight savory note, like when your paste has some truffle on it.

I was afraid that this would turn out to be a truffle oil with alcohol instead of the whisky that it is. Some chefs overuse the stuff which can turn out really hideous. Some oils have too much of it too. In this case they kept it to a minimum. Just enough to notice.

I actually quite liked this dram. Not on a level that I’m going to get my hands on a bottle of it, since I don’t think this is something you’d enjoy long enough to finish a bottle of. Although, if I was on holiday in the area, I’d sure buy a bottle since it would then be a very tasty souvenir as well a decent bunch of booze.

So, something rather interesting. Not as bad as I would have guessed when someone would’ve just told me I’d be having a truffle cask finished whisky. On the other hand, you do taste something different, but I would never have recognized it as truffle.

Thanks to Richard of Zeewijck for letting me try this!

A bottle should set you back a little over € 40.