Category Archives: Scottish Whiskies

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May 15, 2015

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Scottish Whiskies, Whisky Reviews

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Ben Nevis 22 Cadenhead’s Small Batch 53.5%

BenNevis_22

Ben Nevis is quite an interesting distillery. At least in my book. As the name would suggest the distillery lies at the foot of Ben Nevis, the tallest mountain in Scotland. It is currently owned by Nikka and a great deal of the whisky produced there is shipped directly to Japan for use in their blends. I believe Nikka Black 8 year old gets the lions share of the spirit but it also shows up in the Pure Malt series. Due to it’s heavy usage in Japanese blends, you don’t see too much of it on the shelves as a single malt. They have a couple standard expressions and some really expensive weird expressions aged in white port and ruby port. So finding a bottle of Ben Nevis was a real treat for me. I have found the independent bottlings of Ben Nevis to be quite exciting.

Distillery: Ben Nevis

Bottler: Cadenhead

Age: 22

Cask: Bourbon

ABV: 53.5%

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May 15, 2015

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Glenfiddich 15 Solera

Glenfiddich_15_solera

Well first off, it may seem odd that the picture does not show the front of the bottle. Well I can explain. The bottle with it’s lovely case was given to me by AliceInWhiskyland for Christmas. At the time Glenfiddich had a promotion where you could send in a postcard with a message to make a personalized label. So there is a very personal label on this particular bottle which I was not inclined to share. The plus side for you is that you get a good view of the actual whisky.

Glenfiddich was the first distillery to really produce and market single malt whiskies. Some people view it as the distillery that started the whole single malt trend and for that many a whisky drinker are grateful. The Glenfiddich 15 year solera is a special one amongst the core Glenfiddich range. Solera is a method of producing liquors where a continuous vatting is used. In the case of the Glenfiddich 15 Solera, there is a large oak vat that has continuously held whisky since the start of this expression. They add whisky in and take whisky out but never fully drain the vat, so theoretically drops of the original spirit are still swirling around in the vat and your glass. It’s a neat idea for maintaining consistency and in this case I believe it has done very well.

Distillery: Glenfiddich

Expression: Glenfiddich 15 Solera

Age: 15

ABV: 40%

Price: ~£36 (£35.83 at Master of Malt)

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May 15, 2015

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Adelphi Private Stock Blended Scotch Whisky

Adelphi_blend

Adelphi Distillery has a bit of a misleading name. As it exists now it is an independent bottler, although they recently built a distillery called Ardnamurchan Distillery in Glenbeg (Est. 2014). The company is named after an actual distillery in Glasgow that started in 1825 and closed in 1902. The great grandson, Jamie Walker, of the last owner of the distillery revived the name for a bottling company.  The company was sold to two lairds and is now managed by Alex Bruce.

Adelphi is mostly known for their single cask, cask strength bottlings which have been highly praised. Apparently only 50 casks are bottle a year for their single cask range.

The Adelphi Private Stock blend is interesting in it’s contrast to their single cask bottlings. Amongst the sea of their ever changing range this seems to have a bit more permanence.

Bottler: Adelphi Distillery

Age: NAS

Type: Blend

ABV: 40%

Price: ~£21 (£20.95 at Master of Malt)

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May 11, 2015

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SMWS 70.10 Balblair Teenage Shenanigans

smws_70.10

Well this is exciting. You don’t see too many independent bottlings of Balblair. Add on to that a single cask and cask strength and you’ve got yourself a special treat, not to mention the young age which is actually very refreshing.

Distillery: Balblair

SMWS Name: Teenage Shenanigans

Age: 9 years

Distilled: 2005/5/11

Cask: Refill Barrel

ABV: 58.5%

Price: £44.00 from SMWS

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May 10, 2015

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SMWS 127.42 Port Charlotte Peat Freak Heaven

smws_127.42_port_charlotte

This is the second newest bottling of Port Charlotte by SMWS (127.43 is currently the newest) and one of the oldest bottlings of Port Charlotte at the moment. Port Charlotte is the heavily peated whisky produced by the Bruichladdich Distillery. This particular bottling was released just after SMWS started restricting sales of certain whiskies to phone orders at specific times of day. I suspect SMWS has implemented this new sales strategy to prevent people from hoarding whiskies with potential collectors value. Since the Port Charlotte distilling began in 2001, you won’t find much older than this right now.

Bottler: SMWS

Distillery: Bruichladdich (Port Charlotte)

SMWS Name: Peat Freak Heaven

Age: 12 years

Distilled: 2002/6/21

Number of Bottles: 127

Cask: Refill Bourbon

ABV: 63%

Price: £61.30 from SMWS

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May 10, 2015

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Longrow Red Port Cask (3rd Edition) 11 Year Old

Longrow_red_port

Longrow comes from the Springbank distillery in Campbeltown. It was Cambeltown’s answer to the heavily peated whiskies produced on Islay. For a part of the year Springbrank distills wort from heavily peated malt to make the Longrow series. Longrow Red is a special series of Longrow where the spirit has been matured in red wine casks for some or all of it’s life. Hence the “Red” part of its name. While port might not necessarily be thought of as a red wine, it is red and a fortified wine. So in my book it’s A OK. The Port version is the 3rd in the series and I do not know if they plan to continue releasing Longrow Red’s after this. The 1st in the series was aged in Cabernet Sauvignon casks for the last 4 years of its maturation. The 2nd one was aged in Australian Shiraz casks for the last 5 years of it’s maturation. Only 9,000 bottles of the Port Cask were produced.

Distillery: Springbank (Longrow)

Age: 11 Years

Cask: Port

ABV: 51.8%

Price: ~£60

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April 8, 2015

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Benromach 10

Benromach_10

The Benromach 10 was the whisky that led me to the rabbit hole of whiskyland. AliceInWhiskyland bought me a bottle for my birthday and it’s been a best friend ever since. It’s actually the 3rd whisky I’ve ever tried and the expression that I have bought more than any other. So it definitely has a place in my heart and cupboard.

Details:

Distillery: Benromach

Expression: 10 years old

Age: 10

ABV: 43%

Price: ~£35 (£34.63 from Master of Malt)

Note: This is an older batch of the Benromach 10 from when they came in copper coloured tins. Newer batches seem to have a slightly different profile that is a bit peatier.

Background:

According to Benromach, the 10 year old is comprised of only first fill sherry and bourbon casks. Benromach make peated and unpeated whisky and I believe they mix the two to make expressions like these since their peaty whiskies are relatively high ppm’s of about 50-60. This expression is quite peaty for a speyside but definitely no where near the Benromach Peat Smoke expression.

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