Malt Fascination

Almost two years ago a whisky friend hosted a blind tasting of one whisky through the Usquebaugh Society. The idea was to taste and analyze the whisky, answer some questions about it and whoever got most answers right won something.

At that time I only found the time to write an email to say I participated, but since we were doing some major reconstruction in our then new house, I didn’t have time to do the tasting. Last week I did…

This one was drawn from an Oloroso sherry cask at 47%.

Nose:
Very nice European oak with furniture polish and some leather. Nothing too much though. These scents are accompanied by dried peaches and maybe some prune. A nice hint of anise. Delicious combinations of all you want in an old whisky!

Taste:
Quite some high quality wood with a hint of salt. The sweetness wins, though. Quite dry with fruit. Thick peach syrup. Very mature, bottled at the right time.

Finish:
The finish becomes, if at all possible, even more beautiful. Overripe fruits with a vary clearly present cask. The flavours of the sweetened sherry wood are very good.

This is one cracking dram! I absolutely love the ‘old style’ flavours it has and it has been quite some time since I tasted something like this. All flavours and scents match perfectly and are interesting enough to leave me wanting more. Lots more!

Bunnahabhain 31yo, 1976, Murray McDavid Mission, Oloroso Sherry Cask, 47%. Available from Weinquelle in Germany for €192.

Nose: 10
Taste: 9
Finish: 10
Overal experience: 10
Price/quality: -1

Total: 38 points

A whisky known by two names, of which Shackleton’s is the most famous. Its actually called Mackinlay’s Highland Malt but I don’t think Whyte and Mackay mourn the wrong name much.

The original (of which this one is a recreation) was found in Ernest Shackleton’s hut on the antarctic about 5 years ago. It wasn’t dug out until 2010 under strict supervision of all kinds of organizations. Richard Paterson, Whyte & Mackay’s charismatic master blender recreated it after carefully taking a sample from one of the defrosted bottles.

I organized a Bottle-Share of this one whisky which filled up quickly to some 40 samples sent out. Unfortunately for some a number of samples turned up broken at the participants’. The Dutch mail, while spending humongous amounts of cash on new stamps, name changes, increasing the price of everything and sacking about half their workforce, thought it necessary to lower what little service they offered and decided to smash quite a number of samples. In the past I have received many a sample packed less carefully without problems, but those times have gone.

What I learnt of this is that I will never send a sample through regular mail again. Parcels are the way to go, since they throw those around less, I guess. Plus you can put WAY more bubble wrap in the boxes!

The tasting notes then. While I admit right away that I am no star in tasting blended whiskies, I’ve done my best… Blended whiskies tend to be quite complex in their flavour profiles because they mix a high number of different malts and grains together.

Nose:
As I pour my sample I immediately get a scent of red apples and ‘blended whisky’. Not bad, mind you, just typical. A light smokiness and some minerals with a hint of vanilla and a touch of wood. The minerals are on the verge of tasting a bit like metal.

Taste:
The flavour is rather fierce and sharp with a bit of alcohol burn in it. I find it hard to get specific flavours out of it, it feels a bit closed to me. Again a slight hint of apples and vanille. With water I get some smokiness and slate. That’s probably the mineral thing again. A lot smoother with water.

Finish:
The finish smoothes out quickly but has some spicyness in the back of my throat. A warming flavour of dried apples and cinnamon lingers very long.

A dram to think about, that’s for sure. Although I am not a huge fan, I do find a high quality blend. I think mister Paterson has done a wonderful job of this whisky. I’d love to compare it to the original, but that’s not going to happen.

The packaging is not up for discussion, that’s a straight A without a doubt. The case in which it comes has that real ‘expedition’ feel to it. The extra cork is a nice gimmick and the booklet is very well presented.

I do find it a bit steep at € 130 and, as always with such releases, there is a lot of money spent on marketing and packaging. It looks nice, but in the end its what in the bottle that counts.

Mackinlay’s Rare Old Highland Malt Whisky, about € 130 at selected retailers.

Nose: 7
Taste: 6
Finish: 8
Overal experience: 8
Price/quality: -1

Total: 28 points

 (only just made 4 stars, though)

A while ago I organized a Bottle-Share with 8 bottles from Bladnoch, of which one was an original bottling and seven were bottlings for the Bladnoch Forum. Since these bottlings have an occasional gem between them, and they’re dirt cheap compared to other bottlers and whiskies of the same age, it sounded like a good idea!

The Bottlings were quite varied from all kinds of (former) Diageo distilleries that usually are used for blending purposes. You don’t see many Glenburgies and Benrinnes bottlings arounds, and even less distillery bottlings.

So, here’s the chart, as yesterday, counted down from 8 to 1.

• 8: Teaninich 27 – 50.7% (18 points / 2 stars)
• 8: Benrinnes 25 – 51% (18 points / 2 stars)
• 6: Balmenach 26 – 52.8% (24 points / 3 stars)
• 5: Glenburgie 26 – 53.7% (26 points / 3 stars)
• 4: Inchgower 28 – 50.7% (33 points / 4 stars)
• 3: Bladnoch 18 – 55% (4 stars)
• 2: Cragganmore 19 – 53.8% (34 points / 4 stars)
• 1: Cambus 24 – 52.7% (37 points / 5 stars)

When comparing notes to the other Bottle-Shares I have organized, I find that there are a lot of whiskies in the middle range. There are no overly ‘bad’ whiskies bottled, well, at least not those I picked up. On the other hand, there aren’t many exceptionally good whiskies either.

So, the drawbacks of the Bladnoch Forum bottles are that they’re not always as good as you’d like them to be. On the other hand, you really can’t beat a 24 year old cambus at € 60,- and cask strength.

That said, I kind of cheated with the Cambus, since I had tasted that one before and just HAD to get it in here. It is one of the best grain whiskies I have ever tried, especially at this age. Usually the good grains that pop up are forty something years old and you don’t encounter many in their twenties.

My conclusion of this Bottle-Share was that I had good fun doing it, but I’m not likely to go for Bladnoch bottles again anytime soon. There are too many mediocre whiskies in their mix. The next Bottle-Share will be somewhere in October, I think.

After taking my sweet time to review the 8 different whiskies from The Whisky Exchange’s 10th Anniversary that were released in 2009 I finally managed to write my notes on all of them. The first one was published last year, while I was still blogging in Dutch.

Now, finally, all the results are in and as I usually like to do is compare incomparable whiskies in a list from low to high scores. So, here goes nothing:

• 8: Amrut – 63% (4 points / 0 stars).
• 7: Hakushu 1989 – 62% (27 points / 3 stars)
• 6: Glenglassaugh 1978 – 44.6% (31 points / 4 stars)
• 5: Islay Whisky – 58.5% (32 points / 4 stars)
• 4: Linkwood 1973 – 49.7% (36 points / 5 stars)
• 2: Longmorn 1969 – 57.7% (38 points / 5 stars)
• 2: Karuizawa 1982 – 56.1% (38 points / 5 stars)
• 1: Clynelish 37 – 46% (39 points / 5 stars)

A very well done set of bottles, if I may say so. Many a good dram and apart from the Amrut I wouldn’t consider any of those a bad buy. As seen above, I really loved the Clynelish and I regret not getting it in time… The Longmorn was quite a bit more expensive and a little over my budget. The Linkwood was a tremendous dram as well, but also long gone. Only the Glenglassaugh is still available from the Whisky Exchange, but I guess most bottles will pop-up in an auction every now and then.

A big thank you to the guys at The Whisky Exchange and the Belgian Forum ‘Gedeelde Vreugde‘ for organizing this Bottle-Share! Tip: They still have a lot of sets from other Bottle-Shares available!

The final leg of the Whisky Exchange’s Anniversary bottlings. This Karuizawa was distilled in 1982 and bottled 26 years later. It was released in a period in which many great Karuizawa saw the light, think of the Noh series, or the “Wait la Mazurka“.

The bottle itself makes up for some of the money, and apart from that, it wasn’t too expensive compared to some of the others.

Nose:
Quiet some wood, but not too much. Sweet coffee and a hint of cocoa. Fresh herbs and tropical fruit with some pine wood.

Taste:
Quite some alcohol burn at first with a very thick and viscous mouth feel. Quite spicy but also a lot of sweet peach. There are some of those ‘typical whisky flavours’ as well, quite waxy, wood, leather. That kind of stuff.

Finish:
The finish is very soft and gentle. Very long with some cocoa again. Light fruits and less heavy than you’d expect.

This is a very nice dram. Quite different than the Hakushu. Judging by the colour you’d expect a heavy tropical fruit bomb, but it tastes a lot lighter than that. All flavours are there with some nice crisp touches to it. Tremendous stuff!

Karuizawa 1982, 26yo, 56.1%, The Whisky Exchange. Used to cost around 150, but Karuizawa’s prices have been known to go up like a space shuttle.

Nose: 9
Taste: 9
Finish: 9
Overal experience: 10
Price/quality: +1

Total: 38 points

Recently a video about Port Ellen Maltings has been released on Youtube.

Since Port Ellen distillery closed down in 1983 it has been transformed into one of the largest suppliers of peated barley in Scotland. It has only been open to the public a few times, and even then it was a very limited visit (or so I am told). In the video below you can see the inner working of the factory on the isle of Islay.

The youngest one of the bunch, I guess. The label of this smoky beast doesn’t give much information. No age, no distillery. Just the ABV and that its from Islay. The stated it was a whisky from a “south-coast distillery very rarely available as an independent bottling”. The first thing that came to my mind was Lagavulin, but I am far from sure on that one after tasting it.

Nose:
The nose is big on hay, salt and fishing nets. Quite some iodine. Very typically Islay, but it gets more coarse after a while. Starts singing your nostrils a bit. Quite a fiery dram.

Taste:
This is a bit sweeter than I expected it to be. It does build up some strength when you keep it swimming for a few seconds. Very nice, usually its the other way around. I get quite some vanilla and maybe some cactus? A crisp creamy feeling.

Finish:
The finish is also quite fiery with a load of ash in there as well. Dry peat smoke with most of what I got on the nose popping up again. Dried heather.

The first time I tasted this, I wasn’t too thrilled. Maybe because I expected a more Lagavulin-like flavour pattern, but this seems to me to be Ardbeg. A little more often available as an indie. Although they sold some casks to Adelphi that I know of (I have a 9 and an 11 year old).

Now I’ve taken my time to taste it properly again, I am quite charmed by this little belter.

Islay Whisky, 58.5%, The Whisky Exchange 10th Anniversary. Used to cost about € 50

Nose: 8
Taste: 7
Finish: 7
Overal experience: 8
Price/quality: +2

Total: 32 points

Already 5 down, 3 to go with this being the sixth. Another bottling for The Whisky Exchange’s 10th anniversary since opening their webshop. So far it has been a very good ride with some really really nice whiskies. The Linkwood, Longmorn and Clynelish being absolute top drams!

It has been some time since I tasted this dram, so the tasting notes are not from the top of my head… I hope they still make sense to me 😉

Nose:
Quite a fierce dram, with a bitter spiciness. I got some old wood, if tasted blind I would have gone for the white oak variety. I would have gone wrong there… I also thought to get some fenugreek.

Taste:
The taste is better, with lots of tropical fruit. There is a crisp edge to it which I really enjoy. Peach, mango but not too sweet. Here I’d go for sherry wood.

Finish:
The first feeling of the finish is a rather cloying sweetness, rather unexpected. Its a bit of  medium length and is very fruity again, with banana in the background.

A very nice, but slightly confusing dram. Some unexpected flavours which I like quite a bit, but there might have been a bit more consistency.

Glenglassaugh 1978 – 31 years old, 44.6%, The Whisky Exchange 10th Anniversary, € 150

Nose: 7
Taste: 8
Finish: 8
Overal experience: 8
Price/quality: 0

Total: 31 points