Ardmore 12 Year Old Port Wood Finish Review

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Not long ago I tried the Laphroaig Brodir which is a Port finished peated whisky. It wasn’t a successful experiment so we gonna try similar whisky from the lesser known member in the Beam Suntory protfolio: Ardmore.

Ardmore is under a strong marketing and branding push in the last few years, a process which intensified under Suntory Beam hands. A couple of new releases were released in 2015 and the latest of them is the one we review today, the Ardmore 12 yo Port Wood Finish.

This whisk was matured in American oak ex-bourbon casks before finished in Port Pipes. So let’s check if they did here a better job than Laphroaig did on Brodir.

Ardmore 12 Year Old Port Wood Finish (46%, £45.75/€54,95)

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Balvenie Triple Cask 25 Year Old Review

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Lately I tasted a few Travel Retail exclusive expression that left me unimpressed with their quality. Luckily there were a few that bucked that trend, but when you factor along the news on more NAS whiskies coming up, dropping standard age-statement whiskies from the TR market, you can not but worry about the overall change we’re witnessing at the Travel Retail channel.

Although big conglomerates as Diageo and Pernod Ricard drop the age statement from new Travel Retail releases with Mortlach Special Strength, Glenfiddich Casks series and many other examples, the smaller players in the Travel Retail market kept age statement for their Travel Retail releases, like Balvenie did with their Triple Cask range, Bacardi with their “The Last Great Malts” and others.

But we know that age statement doesn’t guarantee quality. Especially not when you’re in the Travel retail market with large captive audience looking for some whisky purchases before going on a plane. Could it be that Travel Retail market is playing itself into a separate game-field with new rules thus making it a less relevant market for whisky aficionados?

The Balvenie Triple Cask 25 Year Old (along with the other expressions in the series: 12 yo and 16 yo), have been matured in three kinds of casks: refill casks, first-fill ex-Bourbon barrels and Oloroso sherry butts (Hence the Triple Cask name for the range) and then were vatted together and were left to marry in a tun for around six months. As the high end offering from Balvenie in the Travel Retail it should teach us a lot on how we should treat that market.

Balvenie Triple Cask 25 Year Old (40%, £355 (TR)/£381)

balvenie-triple-cask-25-year-oldNose: There’s that soft fruits and nuts notes so synonymous with Balvenie, but it does feel thin and watery at first. Thankfully over time it develops and we get a lots of honey, coconut, yellow fruits (mirabelles anyone?), sugar icing, sweet cookie dough, hazelnuts and gentle oak wood spices. Continue reading →

Arran The Bothy Batch 1 Review

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2015 was a packed year for Arran with a lot of releases and the last one, released last October, is Arran ‘The Bothy’ which is a homage  to the use of small casks used for whisky back in the 18th & 19th centuries.

Arran ‘The Bothy’ is initially matured in first-fill ex-Bourbon barrels which should impart some good and juicy fruit notes and then finished in quarter casks (for spiciness and vanilla notes) for a period of over 18 months.

12,000 bottles were made and it was bottled at cask strength of 55.7%

Arran The Bothy Batch 1 (55.7%, £54.45/€59,99)

arran the bothy batch 1Nose: Starts with a pleasant fruity, sweet and cream nose. A lot of pears and a dash of apricots. There are also hints of wood spices and pepper . Also showing up: honey and green oak barks. With additional time in the glass it gets more malty with barley and cereals, additional youth notes and vanilla. Continue reading →

Auchentoshan 1998 (Malts of Scotland) 51.9% Review

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Personal taste is what makes tasting whiskies so interesting. One can like a whisky a lot while the other looks at it disgusted. Is that a familiar scenario to you? Sometimes, it’s even going beyond a single whisky and it’s a distillery lineup which you find yourself too often than not, wondering why people like it.

I admit that in my personal notebook Auchentoshan is such a distillery. Based on what I tasted to date, I think most of the Auchentoshan official lineup is meh or OK at best. However, that’s true for the OBs I’ve tasted but if you go outside that range, I encountered some good and cracking Auchentoshans. What makes the difference here? I think that at least in my case it’s the ABV that makes the big difference and makes Auchentoshan taste great. I have tasted a few cask strength Auchentoshans and they were excellent! It’s like that watering it down to 40-46% makes it a too mellow and sad whisky for me to enjoy it. Maybe my palate is not sensitive enough or maybe it’s the OB profile they strive to maintain that I don’t like, the bottom line is: pump up the ABV and there’s a good chance for kick-ass Auchentoshan.

That was the case with the 18th and last dram of the BTC 2015 competition, although there was a catch here as it was sherried and as such, erased any real chance detecting the proper region and distillery. Once again I miserably failed detecting it but sure I did enjoy that Auchentoshan.

Auchentoshan 1998 Malts of Scotland (51.9%, 287 bottles)

auchentoshan 1998 malts of scotland christmas 2014

Photo credit: whiskybase.com

Nose: Very sherried and sour-oaky at first with dried fruits, raisins, nutmeg, a sprinkle of cinnamon, licorice, bread dough, sour berries. With additional time in the glass: sweet raspberry and overall feels sweeter. With water pepper spice rise up to the front and lovely cigar leafs.
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Littlemill 23 Year Old (WhiskyBroker) Review

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You don’t need to know much about the indie bottler WhiskyBroker except for the facts he’s bottling interesting whisky and does so with very fair prices. Even closed distilleries bottlings can be found for good prices, just like this Littlemill.

Littlemill distillery is a lowlands distillery that had a lots of up and downs during its life before closing down at 1994 and then finally dismantled at 1997. This Littlemill was distilled on 16th March 1992, put in cask 493, and was bottled on 24th August 2015 for an age statement of 23 years and total of 228 bottles.

Littlemill 23 Year Old by WhiskyBroker (53.8%, 228 bottles)

Littlemill 23 yo whiskybroker 1992 (cask 493)Nose: Very grassy, hey and straws, Vanilla and honey, some wet clothes and a bit of pungent, whiffs of nails polish and color thinner and overall a lots of greenery.
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BenRiach Latada 18 Year Old Review

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After previously reviewing the first two whiskies in the BenRiach heavily peated wood finished series (Albariza which I liked a lot and Dunder which I didn’t like much), it’s time review the third offering in the series, BenRiach Latada.

The Latada (named after the trellised vine system on the island of Madeira) was matured in American oak casks and then finished in Madeira casks for unspecified time. Only 4001 bottles were made (gotta love the non-round number!), bottled at 46% ABV, natural colored and is non chill filtered.

BenRiach Latada 18 Year Old (46%, £79.99/€105.00)

benriach latada 18 year oldNose: Light and sweet gentle smoke rises up, sweet peat, cured meat in sweet fruit sauce, canned apricots with vanilla topping. With time, it gets fruitier with more apricots and also peaches with whipped malt cream. I must admit the nose is great.
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Laphroaig Brodir Batch #002 48% (Port Wood Finish) – Whisky Review

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I would like to state it’s been a while since I last posted a Laphroaig review but this is not the case after reviewing Laphroaig 16 earlier this week 😉 But as a Laphroaig fan I’m trying to taste and review as many Laphroaig whiskies, good and bad (or less good?) as I can, and I got one more for you this week.

Today the victim is the European Travel Exclusive Laphroaig, Brodir (Which means ‘Brother’ in old Norse language), Batch 002 which was bottled in 2015. Brodir is a NAS bottling, matured in Ex-bourbon casks and then is finished for unspecified time in European Oak Ex-Ruby Port casks before being bottled at 48%.

Laphroaig Brodir Batch #002 (48%, Port Cask Finish, €99)

Photo credit: thewhiskyexchange.com

Photo credit: thewhiskyexchange.com

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Whisky Tour – Glenmorangie Distillery and Glenmorangie 15 Year Old Review

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Earlier today I published some big Glenmorangie news and I thought it merit a self-punishment of sitting down and finally completing the cobwebs-coated blog post detailing my visit at Glenmorangie last August.

Like I said, I visit Glenmorangie last August, but it wasn’t a planned visit and I didn’t book a tour. We were on the way south to from Old Pulteney (my visit recap is here) toward Dornoch Castle and then Inverness. It was rainy and foggy on the coastal road but just as were near Tain, the skies were mostly blue with a few scattered clouds and then there was a big sign leading to Glenmornagie distillery.

The Pagoda at Glenmorangie Distillery

The Pagoda at Glenmorangie Distillery

That’s the kind of signs you shouldn’t ignore, right? Besides, I have a soft spot for Glenmorangie 10 which was one of my first purchases, so we turned left to the road toward Glenmorangie and told ourselves we’ll just stroll around for a while and visit the visitors center. The distillery was packed with buses and tourists but when I asked if there’s place on the next tour that was supposed to start in 2 minutes (and was the last tour of the day), we were surprised to find out that indeed, there’s place on the tour and a minute later we joined the crowd to start the tour. Continue reading →

Whisky News: Gelnmorangie Tayne & Gelnmorangie Talogan and Glenmorangie Travel Retail paradigm shift

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Seems like today is Glenmorangie Day on the blog. We have some big Glenmorangie news (With massive thanks Tom for delivering the news!) and later today we’ll have another blog post with a review and short recap (and many photos) from the distillery visit last summer. But first things first: the news!

First of all, there’s a new Glenmorangie Travel Retail bottling out there called “Glenmorangie Tayne“. Yes, it’s Tayne and not Tain (Tayne is an older form of Tain).

glenmorangie tayne in TR

Glenmorangie Tayne is whisky matured in amontillado casks, without an age statement, bottled at 43% ABV and currently is priced at £54.99 for 1 Liter bottle.

The back story of Tayne is related to the Spanish Aramda during the England invasion back in 1588 as a Spanish galleon running away from the England fleet ran aground in the Dornoch Firth (at the time Firth of Tayne).

glenmorangie tayne stand and ship

In addition, there will be another Travel Retail bottling out around March/April 2016 named Glenmorangie Talogan. Talogan will replace Glenmorangie Dornoch as both are limited editions.

The third news item of the day and I think it’s the biggest and important of them all: Glenmorangie Duthac and Tayne will become permanent additions at Travel Retail replacing the  trio of Nectar Dor, Lasanta and Quinta Ruban. Yes, you read it just fine: Replacing. That trio will still be available at normal retail chains (supermarkets, shops, etc) but not at Travel Retail. Is it a new way to partially relieve the stress on older aged stock?

 

 

In addition to the big changes in the Travel Retail segment, there’s also the imminent release (this week) of the 7th Glenmorangie Private Edition expression (after all, it’s January on the calendar). We already know it’s called Glenmorangie Milsean according to the filling in the TTB Database.

Milsean, pronounced “Miel-sjoan”, is the Gaelic term for “sweet things”, and it was extra matured in casks containing formerly Portuguese red wine. The wine barrels were retoasted to strengthen the sweeter tones.

Glenmorangie-Milsean-packshot1
As can be seen from the picture above, we can assume it will be a whisky for the sweet tooth lovers. Expected price in Europe is €100.

Whisky Review – Laphroaig 16 Year Old (Travel Retail)

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As part of their 200th anniversary celebrations, Laphroaig released multiple exciting expressions in 2015 – from the “hero coming back home” 15 yo, through the 21 yo and up to the 32yo. The last Laphroaig expression from 2015 not yet reviewed is the 16 year old that is targeted exclusively at the Travel Retail market and it’s time to amend this!

Laphroaig 16 is the second expression this year that is bottled in half size bottles of 350ml (35cl). The first one to do so was the 21 yo that was available for FoL members and the decision deemed smart as it allows a larger crowd to buy, enjoy and take part in the 200th celebrations. Just a reminder, 35cl of 21yo would set you back £99 while a full sized bottle would be about £200 which I think would put it outside the reach of a large portion of Laphroaig fans. I know of at least 4 people who went ahead and purchased one but wouldn’t do so for 70cl and £200.

As it’s priced right now, A full size bottle of Laphroaig 16 would cost €92 which is inline with existing prices (similar to the 15 yo price), so this raises troublesome questions: is it where we’re heading for further releases from Laphroaig and the  Scotch industry? Is it a scheme to hide current and future price raises?

Or maybe it’s just a way to differentiate it from the 15 yo bottle? Bah, I have no answers so I’ll stop the rant and let’s go ahead and review it.

Laphroaig 16 Year Old (Travel Retail, 43%, ~€46)

laphroaig 16 travel retailNose: very Laphroaig-y, medicinal, sooty and sweet peat, hints of lemon, semi-dry, oak and honey. It’s not very smoky or much fruity at first but slowly the smoke get stronger intertwined with stronger honey and fruit notes and if you let it rest in the glass even further: strong and harmonized honey and fruit notes with a dash of smoke. Continue reading →