2x Boomsma Single Cask Genevers, by King Cask

Posted on 7 September 2023 by Sjoerd de Haan-Kramer

Normally, Boomsma keeps all their spirit to themselves for bottling. However, Joris Dam, the man behind Dam Dranken and King Cask managed to get hold of several casks and has been bottling them recently.

The first ever independent bottlings from Boomsma in their 140 year history are a reality!

In this case, it’s an eleven year old Bourbon cask matured Genever, and a 6 year old from Bordeaux cask. Both bottled at cask strength, with no additional additions and tweaks. Are we in for the good stuff?

Boomsma Genever 6yo, Bordeaux Barrel, 52.8%

Image from Moutmolen

Sniff:
There is a LOT of wine cask. A bit of oak, but a lot of wine and rancio. The genever’s spices are present, but way behind the cask. A hint of juniper, orange, chocolate.

Sip:
A punchy palate with slightly more spices and wood notes. A lot of wine and red fruits behind those. Dry spices, juniper, orange, slightly pithy. Cocoa nibs.

Swallow:
The finish is largely the same as the palate. Quite long, quite dry.

A very interesting and dangerously drinkable thing, this. But, if you are trying to figure out the spirit style of Boomsma, this might not the one to go to. Although, one of the things Genever has going for it is it’s range. There’s a lot of different things you can do with it, in regards to distillate, macerations and maturations. This one is a very fine example of that!

86/100

Boomsma Genever 11yo, Bourbon Barrel, 55.6%

Image from Moutmolen

Sniff:
Lots of gentle aromas. Typical white oak bourbon cask scents. A bit of vanilla, some coconut, lemon curd. Very restrained on the spices. A bit Auchentoshan-like.

Sip:
A dry palate with oak shavings, coconut husks, a bit of banana too. A white peppery heat, sawdust, juniper in the background.

Swallow:
The finish is similar, but slightly more gentle and sweet. Banana bread, sweet coconut.

This one is slightly less cask-influenced than the wine cask. But of course, 11 years in oak will alter a distillate’s profile in not minor ways. This is quite a lovely, and as drinkable one as the previous one. I personally prefer the slightly more gentle cask influence of the bourbon cask. Maybe also because it’s a bit closer to whisky.

87/100

Concluding, I think Genever is a far more interesting drink than we give it credit for. By now we know it of whisky by trying things beyond Famous Grouse, Teacher’s and Johnny Walker, but there’s a lot more happening in the Lowlands spirit than we know by our grandfather’s drink at the end of a birthday get-together.

I won’t say I’ll be switching to Genever now, but I’m going to try and keep my eyes more open to it. I know of several producers in The Netherlands that are trying to get the spirit out of the slumps, and they’re doing by producing quality instead of just marketing the hell out of it. Good stuff!

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Ardnamurchan 5, Bottled in 2022, Oloroso Octave, 61.5% – Warehouse Release

Posted on 6 September 2023 by Sjoerd de Haan-Kramer
Image from Whiskybase

Arnamurchan is one of those distilleries that goes for quality first and foremost. As in, that is what it seems like. Almost, if not all, bottlings so far have been very drinkable at least, if memory serves. That is, the ones I’ve tried, and taking in account that the oldest whisky from the west coast distillery is about seven years old now.

This one was brought back from Scotland by whisky buddy EH (or EE, on Facebook). I got a sample of it and tried a while ago. At five years old, from an octave, there should already be quite some wood influence, and I think the sherry that previously occupied the vessel won’t go unnoticed either!

Sniff:
Surprisingly forward with notes of vanilla and barley. Lots of pastry, and very old fashioned. Quite intense for a five year old, with some baked apple in the background.

Sip:
Drying and rather hot. A leathery texture with old apples, peach stones, oak shavings and a hint of pencils (so, cedar and graphite?).

Swallow:
The finish is a bit more sweet again and veers back to the pastry notes.

Not overly complex, but a good baseline for Ardnamurchan (and many others). Quite enjoyable, but lowering the ABV won’t hurt too much. It’s interesting how much more noticeable the oak is compared to the sherry. It’s mostly woody notes, and not as much the fortified wine and dried fruits that come with that.

86/100

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Speyside 18, 1995-2013, 56.1% – Berry Bros. & Rudd

Posted on 5 September 2023 by Sjoerd de Haan-Kramer

It’s not just my own reviews that I get around to with a huge delay, but also Tom’s. So, this one he wrote about half a year ago, and I’m only posting it now. There’s one more in the pipeline that has been flagged in my inbox for months, but that’s for sometime next week.

Funky Speyside from an excellent sherry cask

Speyside must be the most unluckily chosen name for any distillery in Scotland. A name so connected to a region, and also associated with a particular light and accessible style, you could argue it brings a certain broadness that is difficult to overcome. Lord knows they have tried themselves. Their core ranges have been far and between with illustrious names like Glen Tromie, Drumguish and the infamous Beinn Dubh, a retarded cousin of the already questionable Loch Dhu. To confuse things more, is the fact that these days there are a lot of “secret Speyside” around.

Nowadays the Speyside Distillery bottles their output in beautifully shaped bottles under the name Spey. A visit to the distillery near the little town of Kingussie is certainly worth your time. The distillery itself is a gorgeous operation. If only the whisky itself could get some more spotlight (and I don’t mean marketing). Upon my only visit there, during Spirit of Speyside in 2019, I was able to taste some expressions. None of them memorable.

Image from Whiskybase

Once, at an Amsterdam whisky festival, I happened to stumble upon a single cask bottled by Berry Bros & Rudd. This independent bottler is to me one you can trust blindly. In the case of the subject of today, I was surprised to learn its origins. A revisit was long overdue after finding a bottle, so here it goes.

Sniff:
The quite rusty color could influence you in a certain direction, but there is an unmistakable red fruit component. Cherry, strawberry, grapes both red and white. Underneath it all there is a more spicy note, like you would expect from a herbal Ben Nevis. Leather polish, tobacco, dry leaves. Very complex and rather luscious. Truly lovely.

Sip:
One would expect a fruity arrival but no, that’s subdued. There is juicy cigar smoke and mouthwatering chocolate of the dark kind. The maturation was in a sherry cask, upon tasting there is no doubt this was an excellent oloroso cask. There is restraint in wood influence, and the spirit and 18 years of quiet maturation did the rest. Beautiful balance, unbelievable this is one single cask.

Swallow:
A bit edgy on the finish but then a fruity and smoky warmth linger on. There is a bitter note that is a tad too dominant. This is where the Speyside loses a few points.

An extremely quaffable whisky. I did not play with water. Redemption for Speyside Distillery or just a very lucky batch of (sherry) casks? When researching the vintages on Whiskybase, the middle 90s output seems to score rather well. If I was at the helm of the Speyside Distillery, I would source these casks and give new energy to the brand. On quality, not just presentation and a pretty façade.

88/100

About Tom van Engelen

I’m a writer in a variety of fields and have a soft spot for whisky, mainly malt, mainly from Scotland. In other times I enjoyed a stint as editor-in-chief of one of the first whisky magazines in the world. When not sipping a good glass I like to write some more, read, watch 007 movies or listen Bowie music. I’m married to Dasha, I have a sweet daughter and I live somewhere between the big rivers in the middle of The Netherlands.

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Glenfarclas 8, bottled in 2019, 40%

Posted on 4 September 2023 by Sjoerd de Haan-Kramer
Image from Whiskybase

About a year ago I hosted a tasting at work in which I tried to showcase the differences between things on labels on bottled of Scotch. So, young versus old, sherry against bourbon and peated as a contrast to unpeated whisky.

The older version was a Glenfarclas 25, and the younger was a Glenfarclas 8. This way I could keep the other variables to a minimum, and show what proper maturation does to a spirit.

There’s not an awful lot to say about this whisky, so let’s just dive in!

Sniff:
There’s a whiff of yeast from the sherry casks used, but it’s mostly rather spirity barley scents. As in, this is indeed quite young and (to me) it shows that Glenfarclas is meant to be older than this. Very spirity indeed.

Sip:
The palate is quite harsh, even after some other drams. It’s a bit raw, with a lot of the sharper notes from oak influence, but not the integration and roundedness it gets after more years (with Glenfarclas 15 seems to be the number). There’s barley, some pepper, a bit of resin. Sawdust, and yeasty spirit.

Swallow:
The finish goes straight back to the nose, but adds notes of milk chocolate. It’s not overly long, with some white pepper, oak, and young spirit.

76/100

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Glengoyne 11, 2011-2023, Bourbon & PX finish, 50% – Glaschu Spirits Co.

Posted on 1 September 2023 by Sjoerd de Haan-Kramer

Another new bottler that has made their way into the Netherlands. As in, I don’t see it in shops yet, but it is imported according to the importer. That importer sent me a sample of their 11 year old Glengoyne.

The whisky matured in a bourbon cask but was finished for eight months in a two PX Sherry quarter casks. This sounds quite typical for Glengoyne, at least the sherry bit does.

Image from Whiskybase

Glaschu is a new bottler, with only a few releases to their name at the moment. All four of their whiskies that are entered on/in Whiskybase have finishes, varying from sherry to red wine and Madeira. As with most new bottlers, their whiskies aren’t overly old, but that doesn’t have to be a detriment to quality.

Sniff:
A warming nose, with lots of woody scents. More than I thought there’d be with an 11 year old Glengoyne. Interestingly, the PX is not as noticeable in the beginning. Custard with some cinnamon, some raisins after a while. Some green tree bark too.

Sip:
The palate shows the same woodiness, with even a bitter hint. Fresh twigs, raisin twigs, and grape seeds. The custard is present too, with a creamy note but not too much sweetness.

Swallow:
The finish shows similar notes but leaves the bitterness behind quickly. It’s quite long, woody and shows some grape seeds and green apple.

A bit of a strange one for a Glengoyne, because it’s far less sweet than the distillery’s normal output. A rather interesting dram, though! The quartuer casks make themselves known by amping up the woody notes, with lots of flavors to enjoy.

86/100

Thanks to Robbert van H. for the sample!

Currently available in Scotland for £ 79

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Islay Single Malt 13, 2009-2023, 53.3% – Michiel Wigman

Posted on 31 August 2023 by Sjoerd de Haan-Kramer

This entire thing I’m doing (and many others with me) of whisky blogging is really fun, quite a bit of work and sometimes utterly confusing. Sometimes you try something that you expect everyone to love and it just falls flat. Sometimes it’s the other way around.

Some of these situations, but not many, can be attributed to shit samples that have been tainted in some way. Sometimes a whisky just takes more than a little 2cl sample to get through, or to make sense.

This is one of them.

I initially tried this after Michiel sent me a sample and I was not over the moon about it. Of course it was good, but not stellar. And stellar is something it had to be based on everyone else’s rave reviews. I chatted about this with GvB and he kindly gave me another sample, also stating how wrong I was. How he generally doesn’t care for Islay whiskies but bought two bottles of this and so on.

Image from Whiskybase

Oh, before I forget. It’s an Ardbeg whisky. It doesn’t say on the label, but this knowledge isn’t very hard to come by on the internet.

Of course, doing my due diligence, I tried it again, with the following result.

Sniff:
It’s quintessential Islay with lots of grass, seaweed, salinity, and pepper. Slightly ashy with a rather intense peatiness. If you’d imagine heavily peated Rosebank, this’d be it. There is soot and some oak shavings too.

Sip:
The palate is highly consistent with the nose, but packs a surprising punch. The notes of white pepper and harsh woody notes are amped up. Accompanied by apple, straw, salinity and brine. Also, quite intensely smoky, and quite intensely coastal. Charcoal, walnut shells and ash.

Swallow:
The finish is, again, consistent. Very clean, very smoky, very spirit driven. Lots of white pepper, lots of straw.

I really don’t get how I didn’t seem to understand this whisky at first. Especially since it’s the style of Islay whisky that I really enjoy but haven’t encountered for ages. The ‘heavily peated, slightly briny Lowlands’ stuff that this one has going on in oodles. This is what Islay whisky used to be all about in years long gone. Maybe I had forgotten? Maybe my palate took a sick day without telling me?

Anyway, of course it’s long gone, especially since Serge Valentin gave it 92 points. That means they fly off any shelf they’re on regardless of price. Initially this went for € 250, but currently it’s only available in the secondary market for € 600…

91/100

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Westport 21, 1999-2020, American Oak Hogshead 800075, 43.8% – The Whisky Cellar

Posted on 30 August 2023 by Sjoerd de Haan-Kramer

This is, as whisky fanatics tend to know, a Glenmorangie. With Glenmorangie being a bit more expensive as a brand, it seemed like a good call to pick up a bottle of this, sometime during the pandemic. Glenmorangie 18 is about the same price as this, and this being a single cask made it even more interesting.

Of course, it’s tea-spooned, although I think that’s only an official statement and nothing was really added. I have the strong feeling that that is often just said to make sure the label doesn’t say ‘single malt’ and therefore doesn’t have a distillery name.

Image from Whiskybase

Anyway, Glenmorangie from a bourbon cask. It doesn’t get more classical than that. I think it is true for most of us that this is one of the first single malt whiskies we ever tried, since the regular Glenmorangie 10 was so ubiquitous a decade or two ago. My expectations were that this is a bit less sweet and more complex, so let’s find out!

Sniff:
Dry on the nose with lots of woody spices, a bit of bitterness and some vanilla. Tree bark and milled barley. There’s a hint of sweet white wine, Muscat style. All of this is not unlike typical Glenmorangie.

Sip:
The palate is quite intense with lots of dry barley and white pepper. It’s a bit sweeter than the nose was, with more vanilla and white oak. Some green notes of tree bark and moss, as well as a hint of apples and minerals.

Swallow:
There’s a rather long finish with very similar notes to the palate. Quite some vanilla and pastry sweetness, but balanced out by more oaky notes and spices.

It does fulfil it’s premise with this being a bit less sweet, more wood forward and slightly more complex version of Glenmorangie. I think it could have done with a bit higher ABV, but it might be cask strength and that not being an option. All in all this is a rather tasty and (too) easy drinking dram, that went down quite well!

87/100

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Caol Ila 13, Feis Ile 2023, PX and Oloroso Butts, 60.4%

Posted on 29 August 2023 by Sjoerd de Haan-Kramer

Yet again, Tom gets to profess his love for Islay whiskies!

As a superhero comic book devotee, I really jolted when on 20 July there was a documentary released about the comic book industry, this one being from the DC Comics point of view. I could not help but feel a distinct parallel with the whisky industry coming up when the documentary zoomed in on the great collapse of the late 90s. Comic book sales relied big time on collectability and one commentator states: “At one point there was nobody to flip to anymore.” And that was that.

I collect Caol Ila Feis Ile bottlings since the first one came out in 2009. The 2023 seemed to be out of reach until a dear friend still went to Islay and brought a bottle back for me. The 15th edition, not counting super special bottle-your-owns. Mind you, he visited the island AFTER the festival. Not so long ago, that would mean all bottles would have been sold out. This one was quietly waiting on the shelves. As a completist, I wanted it, but pricing is really crossing into the obscene area. There will always be booze, but a gentle collapse to return to normalcy is not really something I would mind.

Let’s go to the whisky at hand:

Sniff:
At this strength I moved to adding water straight away. That works like a charm, and brings out scents of stables that we loved so much in classic Brora bottlings from the early 2000s. Also some seaweed and wet pebbles. Not overly fruity, which makes me think the PX influence is rather mild. Very clean but complex and compelling. Beautiful peat.

Sip:
There is some sweetness but it’s subtle and kept at good level by the peat. It’s all very straightforward with cigar leaves and dark chocolate. What binds it all together is an amazing balance. I love small batch bottlings, this is a prime example.

Swallow:
Smooth and oily, textbook Caol Ila.

It’s just really good stuff. The price tag is just static on the line.  

90/100

About Tom van Engelen

I’m a writer in a variety of fields and have a soft spot for whisky, mainly malt, mainly from Scotland. In other times I enjoyed a stint as editor-in-chief of one of the first whisky magazines in the world. When not sipping a good glass I like to write some more, read, watch 007 movies or listen Bowie music. I’m married to Dasha, I have a sweet daughter and I live somewhere between the big rivers in the middle of The Netherlands.

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Bunnahabhain Staoisha 7, 2013-2021, Barrel 13000244, 59.1% – Archives

Posted on 28 August 2023 by Sjoerd de Haan-Kramer

Bunnahabhain took a page from the Bruichladdich book by rebranding their different styles into different brands. Where Bruichladdich has the distillery name for the unpeated single malt, Port Charlotte for their peated whisky and Octomore for their liquid ashtrays, Bunnahabhain went with Moine for peated and Staoisha for heavily peated. Although, heavily peated in this case doesn’t mean the same as it does with Octomore.

Anyway, this is the heavily peated version, bottled two years ago by Archives. As far as I know it never really showed up on the website, and according to Whiskybase (which should be reliable in this situation, it being the same company and such), this was a regular release. Not a specific market, so I guess it was one for the ‘Friends of the Base’ and possibly only available in the shop.

I only managed to get a bottle through on of the people more involved in Whiskybase, and shared it two years ago when it came out. Not a lot of people were interested in a very young, heavily peated Bunna, so I ended up with a significant amount for myself. Which leads to the second act.

In the spring of 2022 my friends and I went to Arran for a week of, well, Scotland. We visited the distillery, did some hikes, had some barbecue. Things like that. One of the hikes was all the way up to the summit of Goatfell. By the time we got up there is was still below zero degrees and to warm up I brought a sizeable sample of this. It sure hit the stop and something warming in us, as we stood in the cold looking out to Islay, Jura, Campbeltown and Northern Ireland in the distance.

Image from Whiskybase

So, this one does hold a special place in my heart, just because of that.

Sniff:
There’s a lot of peat on this one. Smoke too, but the earthy notes of peat are not completely burnt off. There’s barley too, and green twigs and mosses. Lichen, even. It’s very reminiscent of the surroundings of Bunnahabhain. There’s a slight leathery scent in the background as well.

Sip:
The palate is very sharp, even after another cask strength dram. It being up there, near 60% is very noticeable. There’s dry peat and soil, lichen and minerals. Some seaweed, barley and moss. A hint of green apples in the background, but the leathery note is gone.

Swallow:
The finish is a big one. It goes down in flames, in a way. It’s slightly more woody, twig like. Quite long too, with dry, mineral-y, lichen notes lingering longest.

This one does things by the book. Everything you expect of a young Bunnahabhain and heavy peat is here. Luckily, it’s not a one trick pony that does just that and nothing else. Quite some flavors are to be discovered and the ‘coastal forest’ thing it has going on is very nice indeed!

A shame it’s gone…

87/100

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Stillbrook 4, bottled in the 1970s, 43%

Posted on 24 August 2023 by Sjoerd de Haan-Kramer

Another rather dusty bottle, but this time from across the Atlantic. This Stillbrook was produced by the American Distilling Company, in their distillery in Pekin, Illinois. Currently the distillery is supposed to be still operating, but they’re not producing whisky anymore.

Apart from that, extra rarity is added to this bottling since it’s from a 500ml bottle, and by looking at auctions and other website with antiquities like this, most of their bottles of the 1970s were a bit larger, and clock in at 114cl, or even bigger than that.

Image from Whiskybase

The sample comes from, without surprise, MvZ, who is known for this kind of old shit. He was able to tell me that the bottling was the same in labelling as the 1960s 750ml bottling, since an image of this one is somehow not available (AFAIK). So, while the image is from the 1960s bottling, the whisky was the 1970s distillate.

Sniff:
Rich and soft on the nose, but with big flavors. The lower ABV makes this very gentle, but the richness is not impeded or watery or thin by any means. There’s oak, peaches, cigars, but also a whiff of glue and paint.

Sip:
The palate is quite big too, but veers a bit more towards the chemical notes I found on the nose too. Keep in mind that this is not necessarily a bad thing. It’s just something slightly unfamiliar to modern palates (Yeah, because people used to drink paint and glue all the time, dude). After a couple of seconds there is some chili pepper coming through, as well as a peach and mango sweetness. Sweet tea too.

Swallow:
The finish is a bit more woody than the palate or nose was. White oak, with hints of coconut. A rather long finish with mostly rich oak, some more dry notes but still fruity.

This was a lovely surprise. I have to keep reminding me that if things have been bottled in the 1970s, they were distilled in the early seventies or even the 1960s. And that means the decline of the American whisky industry hadn’t begun it’s drive to the bottom and a shift to far lighter spirits yet.

So, yes, a really solid old bourbon!

86/100

Posted in - American Whiskey, - Bourbon, American Distilling Company, Stillbrook | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment