After a decent start to the BTC 2017 competition, came day 2 and embarrassed me.

Wolfburn No. 128 was the blind sample for this day and unfortunately (for me) it is one of the few official Wolfburn releases I haven’t tasted, not that I’m sure it would help…

I immediately felt it’s some OB whisky and not independent bottler bottle with a 46% offering (which is where I scored my points), but it felt much older with a gentle offering (no rough and burning liquid here) and matured in some old/weak refill sherry cask so it threw me off the course complexity for age and distillery guesses. I debated between Highlands and Islands regions and finally settled on Highland Park so even though I didn’t get points for this selection,  at least I was very very close geographically!

Wolfburn No. 128  2017 (46%, £78.95/€55)

Nose: Sweet, some caramel and somewhat artificial sweetener sweetness at first that died with time, dried fruit and berries tends to sour, weak sour oak spices, smoke and peat after a while, red berries and cherries filled milk chocolate.

Palate: Gentle peat smoke yet more noticeable than on the nose, sweet red fruit and berries, sour oak spices, milk chocolate, weak nuttiness after some time.

Finish: Medium short length, oak wood sourness, lingering dried red berries.

Thoughts: At first I thought it’s a not good one. But after a while it became very decent with surprising flavors generated from half sized first fill bourbon casks. At £79 the VFM is almost non-existing, but for €55 it’s worth a punt.

Wolfburn Aurora is the second release from Wolfburn Distillery at Thurso. I had the pleasure of visiting there, tasting some spirit and very much liked their first release the Wolfburn Northland.

So naturally I was eager to try Aurora which was released last September. It’s a no-age-statement whisky, aged for three years in 3 different cask types: A minority (about 20-30%) in first fill Oloroso Sherry hogsheads and the rest in refill quarter casks and first fill ex-Bourbon barrels.

Wolfburn Aurora (46%, Bottled 30/8/16, £48.43/€44.95)

Nose: Malty, creamy, with gentle red fruit (strawberries and raspberries) in the background. They do get stronger over time but it never dominates and leaving the stage to the malt. Honey and a few drops of lemon juice, limestone dust just like in their first release (Northland) and a touch of peat, brine and some random whiffs of youth (young spirit). Continue reading →

I’ve been following Wolfburn distillery for a while. I tasted a few spirits and whiskies-to-be and even visited them last summer. But it was all 2015 and now we’re deep into 2016 and Wolfburn whisky turned 3 year old, with the first commercial release already on shelves in many shops.

Let’s dig into the young whisky and see it can delivers us despite its youth.

Wolfburn 2016 Release (46%, £45.45/€44,95)

Nose: Smells nice and despite the youth notes in it, it smells older. Quite solid and dense nose with a lot of dust, citrus fragrance with lemon and a bit of lime, cereals, cookies dough, hints of white pepper and spices, creamy and rich. Continue reading →

2015 is now fully here. The western world has returned to work, winter is upon us and now upon the arrival of weekend which we all need for recovery, I wanted to get back to the posting routine with something special. A preview of a new distillery: The Wolfburn Distillery.

Last year was packed with news and announcements on new distilleries. Some started distilling at last (Kingsbarns Distillery, The Lakes Distillery and Ardnamurchan Distillery) or just plans were announced like Mark Reynier Waterfront Distillery in Ireland.

But some are ahead of the curve, like Wolfburn Distillery.

Located in Thurso at the top of the highlands region (only Orkney distilleries are farther north). Wolfburn distillery was brought to life because of the rising demand for whisky all over the world and because it’s located mere 300 meters from the old Wolfburn distillery which was active there in the 19th century (1821 to 1877) so drawing upon history and the ability to use the same water source (The Wolf Burn) made sense to the founders.

Shane Fraser, formerly the manager of Glenfarclas, was brought to run the distillery, and after construction that took place in 2011 and 2012, and the equipment was installed in place, they started production in January 2013, so in exactly one year (or so) we’ll see Wolfburn’s inaugural release and it’s a great time to look upon the Wolfburn history and what’s waiting for us.  Continue reading →