Since this bottle was added to Whiskybase by my whisky buddy Erik, I presume the sample also came from him. Memory gets foggy with all these samples, and all this alcohol (making that joke before anyone else does).

Generally I really like Bruichladdich and Port Charlotte. Octomore, not so much, but Bruichladdich is a distillery I have highly ranked. However, that is mostly in regard to their bourbon and sherry casks and slightly less so with their plethora of weird wine casks. Of course, there has been good booze from those as well, but it’s far less reliable.

Let’s see where this one ends up. I tried it blind, with only a Whiskybase ID on the label, so that makes the assessment as honest as I can, I think.

Sniff:
This smells very young. There are definitely some notes that hopefully will iron out with some more maturation time. Very feinty, wet hessian, soil and some crude oil. Some gasoline/petrol like scent too. Strange. A bit of a pickled walnuts kind of sherry going on as well?

Sip:
The palate has a flavor of warm walnuts. There’s a dry heat coming through right after that, but with the heaviness of a sherry cask, a bit of brine, some smoke too. A certain ‘rot’ sweetness after a while.

Swallow:
The finish continues mostly down the same line. There are notes of feinty diesel or petrol. Quite heavy on the backdrop of a sherry cask with hints of walnuts and hessian.

As wine casks tend to go, this one is a bit weird. It smells far younger than it is, and is very funky. With Campbeltown having anything to do with it, that’s not overly surprising in hindsight, but still. The wine casks manifests in a strange way with a vinegary approach of nuttiness. The slightly industrial notes are quite nice, but that’s also not overly surprising from someone who tends to enjoy Islay drams.

84/100