Benrinnes 14 Year SMWS Cask #36.37
A little over two years ago I took the plunge and joined the Scotch Malt Whisky Society of America, the American arm of the British SMWS that was founded in the mid-1970s through the efforts of a handful of single malt fanatics led by Philip (Pip) Hills. Since then the Socity has setup branches in countries throughout the world, each offering their own distinct flavor of the SMWS experience. I was motivated to join by virtue of the Society’s bottling ethos: all of their bottlings are single cask, cask-strength, non-chill-filtered whiskies, many of them from distillries that are rarely found as single malts.
The SMWS panel of tasters who select the different casks for bottling feature notable writers and personalities from throughout the world of Scotch, including for instance Charles MacLean who has authored numerous books on Scotch. For each Scotch that is bottled the panel writes a set of tasting notes which vividly, and often humorously, capture the spirit of the particular Scotch. For instance, here are the notes for this bottle from Benrinnes, named by the panel “An Unusual Personality”:
“This distillery was relocated after being de-stroyed in the Muckle Spate of 1829. Though this light maple coloured dram is from a refill butt, the sherry character is muted – indeed it has an unusual personality altogether. The nose has stewed plums, flapjacks, smoky bacon crisps and soft spices. The flavour is big – ham glazed with Demerara, pretzels, charred oak and Manzanilla sherry. Adding water actually seems to enhance the nose, making it sweeter and the taste is likewise rounded out, finding the tang of oranges. Very warming and full-flavoured.”
One of my favorite parts about these tasting notes are the clues that are included in order to help you discern which distillery the Scotch comes from. The SMWS’s agreement with distilleries prevents them from outright stating which distillery each Scotch comes from, and so they use a number scheme for each bottle. In this case the number is 36.37 – 36 being the number of the distillery (Benrinnes), and 37 indicating the SMWS’s 37th bottling of this distillery’s whisky). In conjunction with the numbering scheme they include clues such as “This distillery was relocated after being de-stroyed in the Muckle Spate of 1829.” Depending on the extent of your Scotch affliction, you may have a book on hand such as Misako Udo’s The Scottish Whisky Distilleries, in which you could find that not only was the original Benrinnes distillery destroyed in the Great Flood of Moray in 1829 (as the clue indicates), but that it was rebuilt at Lyne of Ruthrie Farm in 1834-35, and that there was also a fire incident in 1896, after which the distillery was rebuilt again in 1899. Later, in 1955, the distillery was rebuilt and modernised, bringing it to the state it is in today.
It’s the sense of tongue-in-cheek enjoyment of whisky that makes me appreciate the SMWS so much. Well, that and the fabulous scotch. Since joining, I’ve had the good fortune to taste several different bottles of SMWS whiskies, and each one has been very, very good, and a couple simply outstanding. But this is probably the first Society whisky I’ve had that has been from such an unusual distillery.
Benrinnes is located in the central Speyside region, in Aberlour. It is almost never bottled as a single malt, and only by independent bottlers when it is. It’s been part of United Distiller’s Flora & Fauna series, and has been bottled by the Rare Malts series, but that’s about it. Yet, the distillery produces a lot of whisky every year, nearly 1.6 million liters, most of it going into the Johnnie Walker, J & B, and Dewar’s blends.
What perhaps makes the distillery most notable is its use of a partial triple distillation, making them one of only two distilleries using such a production method (Mortlach being the other). This means that instead of a wash and spirit still as used by most distilleries, Benrinnes uses a wash still, low wines still, and spirit still. The strongest part of the runoff from the wash stills goes straight to the spirit stills, making for double distillation. Meanwhile the weaker spirit from the wash stills goes to the low wines still and subsequently the spirit stills, making for triple distillation (thus the partial triple distillation). Page 72 of Misako Udo’s book has an interesting, albeit confusing, illustration of this process, if you’re interested in looking it up. The distillery combines this distillation method with a mid-sized stills charge (filling them all to about 87%) and unpeated malt to produce a rather clean scotch that can take on a lot of influence from the barrel aging process.
This bottle from the SMWS is especially exciting because it’s been aged for 14 years in a refill sherry butt, very unusual for Benrinnes who today almost exclusively use ex-bourbon casks for aging. I entirely recognize the rationale for the near wholesale shift to bourbon casks on the part of distillers (availability and reliability being obvious benefits), but it nonetheless makes me sad to think of fewer and fewer scotches being aged in sherry casks. Sherry and scotch go so well together, especially in the case of smoky, Islay whiskies where sherry casks are almost never used today. So, this bottle is not only a rare chance to try Benrinnes as a single malt, but also to try Benrinnes from a sherry cask!
As I mentioned this Benrinnes has been aged 14 years in a refill sherry cask. It was distilled in February of 1993 and has been bottled at 56.5%. The whisky appears a light gold with a soft, polished sheen to it. The nose greets you with fresh scents of sugared lemons and shortbread, alongside a hint of macadamia nuts. Agitating the whisky brings out scents of oranges and a thread of smoke. The palate has warm sugary flavors, Belgian waffles and syrup, berries and a hint of smoke. The sherry flavors are evident but muted and they mingle very nicely with the other flavors. The finish has smoke, fruit syrup, citrus, and is long-lasting.
What a fabulous scotch. The best part about this scotch was how the flavors really opened up and changed the longer it was in the glass. It may seem indulgent or time-consuming, but I found that the best way to enjoy this scotch was to drink half of your first dram, then refill the missing half, and let the glass sit for about 30 minutes. When you come back to the whisky it will have changed noticeably, gaining in complexity and warm depth. Yum!
So this is yet another great bottle from the SMWS, yet perhaps somewhat sad at the same time? This Benrinnes has obviously benefited a great deal from its aging in a sherry cask, and it is too bad to think of what a rarity this cask/bottle is. But I suppose that makes it all the more special to have a chance to try it!
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