Tag: Speyside
Aberlour A’Bunadh Batch #21
When it comes right down to it, I’m not sure that I’m much for subtlety. Smoky, heavily-peated whiskies were my starting point in the world of scotch. The smokier the better, and it took me a year or two to get ‘off the island’, as it were. Slowly my palate adapted and I was able to discern the nuances in a wider range of whiskies, from peaty-beasts to delicate, unpeated whiskies. And so next I turned my eyes toward heavily-sherried whiskies. Nuance be damned.
Whereas smoky whiskies are relatively common, heavily sherried whiskies are relatively more rare. Many are one-off single cask bottlings, such as the 25-year single-cask G&M Strathisla or the 24-year single-cask, cask-strength SMWS Inchgower that I tried recently. Whiskies such as these, great though they are, are both hard to find and expensive. And this is where the beauty of the A’Bunadh comes in.
Yet here is a massively sherried whisky, up there with some of the most heavily sherried ones that you can find. But instead of being scarce it is one of Aberlour’s regular bottlings, nearly always available. And what’s more, it is very affordable. For a whisky of this impact and quality, that’s a tough combination to beat.
Aberlour was originally established in 1826, and since then has been rebuilt a couple of times following massive fires. Today, it remains one of the few whisky distilleries using a very high proportion of sherry casks, ranging anywhere from 25-50% of their casks in use at any one time. Today their regular bottlings are a 12-year and a 16-year, alongside the A’Bunadh. The 12 and 16-year both use a process that Aberlour calls “double-matured”, whereby the whisky from two separate casks, one sherry one bourbon, are blended together and then left to age for an additional period of time for the flavors to marry. Both of these are also quite nice whiskies, and also great values.
A’Bunadh translates as “the origin” in Gaelic, and this whisky definitely gives the impression of coming practically straight from the cask. A’Bunadh was first released in 1997, and since then Aberlour has released 25 different batches. Each batch is drawn from a single sherry cask (sherry casks, known as “butts”, can hold up to 500 liters, or 132 gallons, or somewhere in the realm of 600+ bottles), and bottled at cask-strength. As a result, each batch is slightly different from others, due to the nuances of single-cask aging. The A’Bunadh has no age statement on the bottle, but indications are that it is generally around 8 years.
This bottling, from batch #21 was bottled at 59.5%.
The whisky pours with a wonderful viscosity, and is a dark, amber red, the color of polished mahogany. The nose is rich with classic sherried whisky notes of almonds, red wine, raspberries, and melted brown sugar. This is a whisky that I could thoroughly enjoy just nosing all day long. The palate is velvety and unctuous, heavily textured with mouth-coating oils and flavors. The flavor profile is similar to that of the nose, with brown sugar, candied almonds, creme caramel, and unfiltered honey. The palate is just teeming with flavor, and the high percentage really makes it buzz with activity. A little water mellows things out, but you really have to start at full-throttle, to experience all of the whisky-goodness of the A’Bunadh. The finish is very long-lasting with flavors of marzipan, honey, and red fruit. Very lingering and enticing.
Wow. The A’Bunadh is just a fabulous whisky. If you enjoy sherried whiskies, or just whisky in general, you simply must grab a dram of this. Even better, make sure that you have some time and good company to sit with this whisky and really enjoy it to its fullest.
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Glenallachie 13 Year SMWS Cask 107.6
It’s a rare treat when you have a chance to sample a bottle of Glenallachie whisky. This is because, of the roughly 3-million liters of whisky that they produce each year, almost none of it is bottled as a single malt. I’ve definitely never seen it bottled on its own before, and so was pretty excited at the prospect of trying this offering from the Scotch Malt Whisky Society.
Glenallachie is a Speyside distillery that was built in 1967 by Mackinlay Macpherson Ltd., one of the big scotch whisky conglomerates of the time. According to Robin Laing they were looking for “a fine, subtle, delicate, complex malt for blending purposes.”* It later passed into the hands of Invergordon Distillers Group, and is now part of Pernod Ricard’s portfolio of distilleries. Today it serves the same purpose that it did back in 1967, producing millions of liters of whisky that is used almost entirely for blending purposes. Specifically, it is a part of the following blends: MacKinlay’s, King’s Ransom, Clan Campbell, Legendary, White Horse, and House of Lords. Phew!
The SMWS has named this bottling “A Summer Meadow”. It spent 13 years aging in a refill bourbon hogshead, and was bottled at a whopping 59%.
The color is very light gold, reminiscent of sauvignon blanc. The nose has elements of vanilla saltwater taffy, sugar cookies, and citrus, underscored by warm, malty notes. The palate kicks off with zinging, tart citrus flavors, prickling above an undercurrent of creamy lemon pudding. There is a slightly smoky note kicking around as well. The body has a plush, soft texture, and a nice, mouth-coating oiliness while not being too heavy. The finish is lithe but rich, with citrus, taffy, and mineral flavors.
This is a wholly satisfying and easy drinking whisky. I was particularly taken with the surprising amount of body that it had considering its very light color. As well, the flavors that it presented were intriguingly contrasting and eye-opening. It really is a “subtle, delicate, and complex malt”!
*Laing, Robin. The Whisky River, p. 116
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Signatory Linkwood 9 Year
Linkwood is a whisky that you rarely find in single malt bottlings, and for the vast majority of those you do find (and I believe all that you’ll find in the U.S.) we have the independent bottlers to thank. I wrote a bit a couple of weeks back about independent bottlers when I was talking about a Blackadder Longmorn bottling. At the time, I mentioned that there were only a few independent bottlers that I found to be reliable sources of bottles, and among those was Signatory.
Signatory is, along with Gordon & MacPhail, one of the two most common independent bottlers you’re likely to find in shops in the U.S. They produce a wide range of bottlings, including lots of distilleries, many of whom are no longer with us. They also have a couple of different series of bottlings, including a cask-strength series, and an un-chill-filtered series. This last has been a source of some very surprising bottles that I’ve tried, including heavily peated versions of Bunnahabhain and Benriach (both malts whose distillery bottlings have historically been unpeated).
They’re also the source of perhaps the single most amazing scotch I’ve ever had the remarkable good fortune to try. It was a single-cask bottling of Ardbeg, distilled in 1967 and aged in oloroso sherry casks for 30 years. I don’t know how it was that I was lucky enough to try this whisky, but I’m so glad I did. Now that I’ve tasted scotch-perfection, I know just how amazing whisky can be.
And so I was intrigued and excited when a friend came to town with a Signatory bottling of Linkwood. Surprisingly, I’d never tried a Linkwood whisky before (I even went back and checked my records to be sure), and since it came from a sherry cask I figured it was a great place to start. But it was also a 375ml bottle, a size I had never seen whisky in before. It seemed the perfect combination for a night of dramming.
Linkwood is located in northern part of the Speyside region. It was founded in 1824 and has been rebuilt/refurbished three times since then, in 1873, 1963, and 1971 when it was expanded from 2 to 6 stills. One of the infamous stories about Linkwood concerns Roderick MacKenzie, the distillery manager in the 1940’s and 50’s. He was so superstitious about maintaining the quality and characteristics of Linkwood’s whisky that he “strove to avoid any change that might impact adversely on the whisky quality, even issuing an edict to not remove cobwebs in the still-house.”*
Today it’s a large distillery, turning out 2.6 million liters per year, but only 1-2% of this goes for single malt bottling. Of that 1-2%, the majority goes into bottles for the Flora & Fauna series, an excellent series of whiskies put out by United Malt & Grain Distilleries (only available in the UK). The whiskies in this series tend to be somewhat rare in single malt bottlings, owing to the fact that the majority of these distilleries’ products go into UMD’s various blends. The list below is slightly dated (from 2006), but gives a good picture of what is included in the series:
- Aberfeldy 15 Years
- Aultmore 12 Years
- Balmenach 12 Years
- Benrinnes 15 Years
- Bladnoch 10 Years
- Blair Athol 12 Years
- Caol Ila 15 Years
- Clynelish 14 Years
- Craigellachie 14 Years
- Dailuaine 16 Years
- Dufftown 15 Years
- Glendullan 12 Years
- Glenlossie 10 Years
- Inchgower 14 Years
- Linkwood 12 Years
- Mannochmore 12 Years
- Mortlach 16 Years
- Pittyvaich 12 Years
- Rosebank 12 Years
- Royal Brackla 10 Years
- Speyburn 12 Years
- Teaninich 10 Years
So many great distilleries in there that are so hard to find in single malt bottlings!
This bottle from Signatory is quite unique. It was distilled on May 31, 1988 and bottled in June 1997, at the tender age of 9 years. It comes from two sherry butts, numbers 2757 and 2758, and was bottled at 43%.
The whisky has the appearance of lightly burnished gold. Despite the low 43%, it looks like it has some good body to it, with some decent legs. The nose has scents of ripe red berries, hints of cinnamon, pepper, and nutmeg, all of which are underscored by pleasantly warming sweet lightly sherried notes. The palate has a wonderfully soft and velvety texture. Sweet flavors of caramel, dessert wine, ripe grapes, a wisp of smoke, are layered together with a surprising amount of depth. Warming alcohol catches a bit of fire at the back of the palate, and this is really the only place that the scotch’s youthfulness shows. Following on this the finish kicks off with citrus and apple flavors, giving way to a brightening acidity, mixed with a tingling alcohol.
A very fine whisky indeed, and perfect as a bridge between winter and summer (whiskies). While I firmly believe that scotch plays well in any season, you definitely need to pick the right scotch for the occasion. In this case, I could actually see this whisky fitting in well in any season, but it seems to work most perfectly somewhere in-between the heavy, smoky whiskies that are so satisfying in the winter and the lighter bodied whiskies that hit the spot in the summer.
What is more, Linkwood clearly makes some nice whisky. They’re one of the several distilleries whose bottles I have looked at on many an occasion, considered, but passed on for one reason or another. After tasting this bottle I realize what I’ve been missing. Time to begin keeping an eye out for others, perhaps a slightly older version, maybe even something from the Society…
*Quote from The Whisky River, Robin Laing, p. 48
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Blackadder Longmorn 16 Year Raw Cask
Blackadder is one of the several independent scotch bottlers putting out alternatives to the distillery releases normally available. I first had the chance to try one of their bottlings almost three years ago, and ever since then I’ve been a big fan of theirs. In contrast to the more common bottlers, such as Gordon & MacPhail and Signatory, Blackadder is very rare, and very hard to find. As far as I know their only US distributor/importer is right here in Massachusetts, and even he has to work hard to get the bottles that he’s able to feature in his shop.
Which is a shame, because when it comes right down to it, 9 times out of 10 the bottlings from Blackadder knock the socks off of anything from Gordon & MacPhail or Signatory, probably the most common of the independent bottlers. By now I’ve been lucky enough to try several different malts from Blackadder, and I can comfortably say that they are putting out some of the best that you’ll find, whether from the distillers themselves or independent bottlers.
In fact, I would have said this the moment that I tasted a Blackadder bottling for the first time. It was a bottle of 36-year old Banff, a Speyside distillery that closed in 1983 and his since been demolished. This was from a first-fill sherry cask and had the color of very dark mahogany. But what was most impressive were the bits of char floating in the whisky, something I’d never seen before.
That’s because this was one of Blackadder’s Raw Cask bottlings, a line that they introduced in 2000. Raw Cask bottles receive only a very light filtering prior to bottling, a process that leaves many of the essential oils and flavors intact, and even some bits of char (see below for a note on this). Bottled at cask strength, the flavor of the whisky was amazing, and the body it displayed was stunning. The difference that the lesser filtration had on the final whisky in the glass was remarkable.
Since then I’ve tasted a number of their Raw Cask bottles, as well as some from their lineup of younger, regular-strength whiskies. Nearly everything has been outstanding, but no doubt the Raw Cask bottles have been the most impressive.
And so, while both Gordon & MacPhail, Signatory, and even Murray McDavid definitely release some great bottles of whisky, it’s the consistently excellent bottles being put out as part of Blackadder’s Raw Cask series that puts them head and shoulders above the others. The only independent bottler I hold in higher esteem is the Scotch Malt Whisky Society, but to some extent that’s because my admiration for what they do goes beyond just the whiskies (which have nonetheless been consistently outstanding).
So, on to Longmorn. This distillery was established in 1893 and has been in nearly continuous operation ever since. Today they’re owned by Chivas Regal and are one of the most important whiskies in that eponymous blend. The distillery uses a very lightly peated malt and charges their stills to about 60% capacity, with the end result generally being a pleasingly middle of the road malt in the Speyside tradition. Common flavors include lots of honey and malt character, and the occasional trace of smoke. They use both bourbon and sherry casks for aging, and produce a massive 3.5 million liters a year. One of the benefits of this huge volume is that it is not uncommon to find bottles of Longmorn from independent bottlers, and I’ve tried a few that have been simply stellar. Much more so than the official distillery bottlings that I’ve tried.
I was lucky to have a chance to taste this particular bottle when a friend of mine picked it up during a recent visit. It’s a Raw Cask bottling of Longmorn that was distilled in 1990 and bottled at 16 years old. It’s from a bourbon barrel, and was bottled at 58.3%.
The color is straw with just a slight, golden tinge to it. With lots of legs and big bubbles this is a nicely textured whisky even just in the glass. The nose has notes of lemons, honey, vanilla, wheat, and a bit of mint. Huge flavors just blossom in your mouth. The palate kicks off with a trace of smoke, followed by luscious tones of honey, wheat, and malt, and a light caramel flavor. The 58.3% is a bit fiery and hot, and the whisky takes kindly to a drop or three of water to calm it down a bit. The finish has generous notes of honey and wheat that just linger on into the sunset, accompanied by an intriguing bit of smoke. A nice finish to a very drinkable whisky!
Yet another great bottling from Blackadder. If you see this one, or any Raw Cask from them, grab it. You won’t be sorry.
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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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