After a long hiatus here (except for the Feis ile 2023 bottles annual post) and finally settling down in a new and exciting job, it’s time to resume activity here, albeit I cannot promise it will be too ordered or frequent.
In the coming months, I’ll post some tasting notes as usual but I will also write posts about a long, fantastic and magnificent pilgrimage trip to Scotland I took last October with my good friend Michael (of Malt And Oak Blog), starting with this post.
And what a trip it was… It probably felt even better going on this grand our, after all the delays COVID-19 caused us. The trip was originally planned for April 2020 and was commenced last October, 2.5 years later. We had everything planned perfectly, with flights and accommodations booked and then a world crisis hit us. We slightly revised the plans but basically we followed the original plans: 2 weeks and a lot of distilleries.
We were asked: why do you need to visit so many distilleries? Isn’t it boring to hear (and see) over again and again how whisky is created? The tools and ingredients are the same after all!
My answer: once you’re a serious whisky geek, the slight differences in the whisky creating process and tools do matter as you pursue deeper understanding of this ‘magic’. Also, the visiting experiences are different from one distillery to the other and we were curious to see how whisky tourism progressed and recovered in the last few years.
So we started the trip with a quick stop at Glen Garioch but it wasn’t a full pledged visit – just a quick stop to say hi and the real first visit of the trip was at Glendronach distillery.
I was very excited to visit the distillery as I couldn’t fit a visit there in my previous trip to this area few years ago. the surrounding of the distillery are lovely and peaceful, the distillery is nestled and hidden from the main road and is quite beautiful (perhaps except for the modern look of the still house) Continue reading
Nose: A fruity bomb, layer of stone fruits with ripe peaches and apricots and on top of that another sherry/wine fruitiness with dried berries, fresh raspberries and strawberries and cranberries juice. Here comes the minerality but it’s less pronounced than the 1st edition, cinnamon, oak spices, caramel, milk chocolate and dark chocolate, medium roasted beans espresso, sweet oak, cinnamon paste, very fresh and lively. 
Nose: Sweetness, sweet peat, sweet grapes and stone fruits, nuttiness,, honey, honeydew melon, red fruits peels bubble up from the bottom, fragrant vanilla filled muffins, bakery, pears and more peaches, soft peat smoke, almonds. a relaxed and settled nose. 
Nose: Chocolaty and creamy, dried berries, Creme Brulee, mocha and cinnamon, earthiness, subtle smokiness and leather. Then I was surprised to nose fresh raspberries and cranberries, nice touch. After a while in the glass, more peat smoke and heather. 
Nose: Nutty and soft in the Balvenie tradition, then there’s the Madeira casks influence with baked fruits, pears, peaches and apricots sprinkled with white pepper. More nuttiness with stronger cinnamon, fruitiness is getting a floral and with perfume-y vibe along with honey (probably from the original bourbon casks, white and milk chocolate. A very nice and pleasant nose even at 43%. 
Whisky Gospel 