After checking out the mildly disappointing Glenlivet Cpatain’s Reserve let’s have another Glenlivet to balance the scales. In the last year we’ve seen a few interesting releases coming from an unnamed Speyside distilleries, and some are rumored to be from Glenlivet. They have similar age and strength so maybe they are coming from the same casks parcel?

One of those releases is the Dramfool special bottling for Spirit of Speyside 2019, named Elderly Elvis Tilting

Bruce, the man behind Dramfool love words game and anagrams. We reviewed a Lagavulin called Like a Villian and there was another Glenlivet called Give n Tell. Anyway, given those facts you can easily find out that the bottling name is an anagram for Glenlivet Distillery.

So we have a 25 year old Glenlivet from ex-bourbon barrel. Only 109 bottles at 51.2% were released, non-chill filtered and no caramel was added.

Dramfool Elderly Elvis Tilting (Glenlivet) 25 Year Old (51.2%, £135)

Nose: Clean and richly sweet, green apples and pears, sweet barley, pink grapefruit, melon, pear drops and red apple peels. After a few minutes more tropical fruit and extra grapefruit juice. Continue reading →

The review today checks out the latest Glenlivet core line addition (from August 2018) – The Glenlivet Captain’s Reserve. The name comes from Captain William Smith Grant who was the great grandson of Glenlivet’s founder George Smith.

It’s a NAS offering (at 40% and probably chill filtered), matured in ex-bourbon barrel and sherry butts and then finished for a short time (6 months) in Cognac casks. Cognac cask finish isn’t too common in the industry, especially for mainstream core line release, so I’m quite intriguing to try it.

The Glenlivet Captain’s Reserve (40%, £46.95/€35,50)

Nose: Weak and thin, showing some youth as well, sweet green grapes, golden apples, oak sweetness, cereals porridge, cream. After a few minutes anise and concentrated oranges juice from can. Continue reading →

We’re familiar with the Glenlivet range of products and the changes in the line up such as the introduction of Glenlivet Founders Reserve and the (seems to be temporary) pull of Glenlivet 12 year old from certain markets to ease the pressure on matured stocks.

But some special yet official Glenlivet has popped up late in January in a certain ‘hot’ whisky market – A sherried 13 Year Old Glenlivet was released exclusively for Taiwan market.

Thanks to a friend, I was fortunate enough to get a bottle and check out how a 40% and chill-filtered sherried Glenlivet tastes like.

Glenlivet 13 Year Old Sherry Cask Matured (40%, Taiwan Market)

Nose: Soft nose, dried dark berries, slightly caramelized, brown sugar, dark chocolate, plums compote, heavily sweetened black coffee with cardamon. After a few minutes there’s dark chocolate and coffee with a bit of dried fruit, sprinkle of cinnamon and nutmeg. Continue reading →

It’s been close to four years since I last tried Glenlivet Nadurra Oloroso. I tried it when it first came out to the market and I didn’t like it much back then. But since 2014 there were more batches and not only those bottled at 48% for Travel Retail market but also some that are bottled at cask strength.

Since Nadurra Oloroso Cask Strength OL0816 (bottled 08/2016) was available at the recent Whisky Live 2018 in Tel-Aviv, it was time I’ll grab a dram at the Glenlivet stand and check it out.

Glenlivet Nàdurra Oloroso Batch OL0816 (61.3%, £42.90/€51.95)

Nose: Young malt at first, then sweet dried fruit, soaked raisins, vanilla and honey are strongly felt lurking behind. After a few more minutes canned cherries and milk chocolate. With a few drops of water gentle wood spice, much more chocolate and less vanilla. Continue reading →

Earlier this week I participated in an Glenlivet event that brings Tal Brody’s (ex-basketball player here in Israel) immortal words “We’re on the map and we’ll stay on the map” to mind. And you probably ask why and the answer is: We (the Israeli market) has grown up. We buy and drink more single malt than ever and we were finally noticed enough in Scotland to garner an exclusive single cask from Glenlivet – the first ever distillery single malt official bottling that was bottled exclusively to our market – the Glenlivet Single Cask Edition “Carn Ealasaid” 15 Year Old.

Rani Cohen (Senior Executive of Glenlivet importer, Tempo) led a series of 3 tasting events in Tel-Aviv to launch this exclusive bottling and using the occasion to educate and promote single malt whisky in Israel. I was also delighted to hear that the current Nadurra bottlings (Oloroso, First Fill, etc) are finally coming to our shores – expect them in stores from May 2017.

But why review this single cask alone? Let’s review also the “Pristinus”, another 15 year old single cask that arrived to our market a year and a half ago and was also a big star in those events.

Glenlivet Single Cask Edition “Pristinus” 15 Year Old (59.7%)

Nose: Oh a barrage of green apples, feels almost like an applies cider with bubbles-like feeling due to the high ABV, vanilla and lemon, very fruity with tropical edge. With water it’s getting spicier and a pineapple note is added. It has a rich, crisp and bold – really an excellent nose. Continue reading →

It’s time for a new series on the blog – the Headbangers! No, this is not a series of posts on the WWE wrestling duo or heavy metal band, but a series of posts where we’ll put 2 whiskies in the boxing ring and we’ll see which one fares better, get the laurels and maybe get our approval.

Although it’s a series, I will publish regular posts in between as ‘snacks’ and interludes so you won’t get bored of this too fast.

Anyway, time for the first round – we’ll pit the recently released Glenlivet Founders Reserve against the previous core range lowest offering, the well known and best seller Glenlivet 12 Year Old.

As with other releases in the last year, which some will be covered in this series, Glenlivet released Founders Reserve due to the acute problem of high demand for whisky and not enough good casks for single malt. So we get a new offering, NAS of course, that allows Glenlivet to reduce the consumption rate of those older casks they have in the warehouses. The bad news? Glenlivet Founders Reserve was almost instantly was declared as the replacement of Glenlivet 12 in some key markets such as UK and Germany. Other markets get to keep the 12 Year Old (such as the USA and other European markets) so the question is are they fortunate or maybe the Founders Reserve is a worthy replacement? Continue reading →