Anyways, this will be an abbreviated post as I was too busy waving my arms around to write tasting notes and my brain doesn’t store information anywhere near as well as my army of notebooks. So here are my speaking notes and some piccies.

Update: There are now also ‘tasting notes’ courtesy of Mr Matchett. Each whisky is also matched with a computer game…

First up Sullivan’s Cove Double Cask.

Aren’t Australians a happy bunch

Australian whisky matured in a mix of American and French oak.
Distillery was founded in 1994 in Hobart, Tasmania.

Chris says:
Game: Santa vs Super Mega Worm
Nose: Foam bananas
Taste: Gone off after a bit. Creamed corn

Next Three Ships 10 Year Old.

It’s very pretty there

Distilled at the James Sedgwick Distillery in Wellington, South Africa.

The whisky is named for the three ships in the exploratory fleet of Bartholemew Diaz, discoverer of the Cape of Good Hope.

The distillery is named for the founder of James Sedgwick & Co, a purveyor of fine boozes and cigars founded in 1850. It was purchased by the company in 1886, having formerly been a brandy distillery, and took its current name in 2003.

They also make some other Three Ships single malt expressions and Bain’s grain whisky, and Knight’s, Harrier and Three Ships Select Reserve which are Scotch/South African blends.

Chris says:
Game: Max & The Magic Marker
Nose: Brazil nuts covered in magic marker pen
Taste: Doing sherbet off an oak table through the liquorice straw
Comment: Very moreish

Dram 3 – Hammer Head.

This is the only attractive picture I’ve found of the distillery

Distilled at the Stock distillery in Pradlo, acquired by Stock Spirits in the last few years. It was distilled in 1989, shortly before the fall of the Berlin Wall and the Velvet revolution (November/December 1989) which led to a democratic Czechoslovakia and the break up into the Czech Republic and Slovakia. The distillery was established in 1928 and was nationalised in the 1980s, seemingly making spirits for high ranking communist party members.

It’s made using Czech barley and matured in casks made of Czech wood.

The story is that it sat undisturbed until 2009 when someone from Stock spirits went to check on the contents of the warehouses they just bought and tried some, assuming it would be nasty. It wasn’t. It was released to travel retail in 2010 and is now on general sale, although not in large amounts.

It takes its name from the nickname of the mill bought in shortly before making the whisky – a large and noisy hammer mill.

I’ve written about them before.

Chris says:
Game: Minecraft
Nose: Oily and muddy and fizzy
Taste: Herby and minty like absinthe
Comment: Like a thistle that grew underground

Number 4 – Kavalan Classic.

Ian Chang walks past some casks…

Very young Taiwanese whisky – aged for about 3 years in a mixture of 6 different cask types. The first whisky released by the distillery and hopefully typifying the style, with mango as the key fruity note.

The distillery was opened by the King Car group, run by Mr TT Lee (always referred to that way whenever I’ve spoken to people from Kavalan), in 2006 and is in the north east of Taiwan in an area that used to be called Kavalan, also the name of the native people of the area.

Dr Jim Swan, distilling consultant extraordinaire who helped set up Penderyn, took up the challenge of developing the spirit – made especially hard by the extreme temperatures which leads to 15-20% angel’s share per year. The spirit and short maturation work well in the environment, picking up a lot of ‘maturity’ in three or four years.

The distillery is open to visitors 365 days a year – they had 1 million visitors in 2010 and 2.6 million by October 2010. In comparison, Glenfiddich draw the most visitors of the Scottish distilleries and has about 100,000 per year.

Their whiskies are not currently available outside of south-east Asia, so we were rather lucky to get a sample bottle.

I’ve mentioned the Kavalan Classic previously.

Chris says:
Game: Wipeout Fusion. Taiwany so that would make it Leisure Suit Larry.
Nose: Curdled ice cream
Taste: Kim Basinger’s feet in 9 and a half weeks. Mild cheddar from Sainsbury’s

Whisky 5 – Millstone Peated

There’s not a lot of piccies of the Zuidam chaps. I hope this is them…

Made in The Netherlands, and matured for over 5 years in a mixture of new American oak, ex-bourbon and ex-sherry casks. The fermentation stage of production is much longer than for many whiskies, to which they attribute the fruity character of the spirit and finished whisky.

Made by Dutch distiller Zuidam in their facility on the Belgian border. More famous for their liqueurs and genever but increasingly known for their whiskies, especially their rye. A fairly young distillery, founded in 1975 by Fred van Zuidam, they aren’t doing bad for newbies.

Chris says:
Game: Dead Space or Heavy Rain (if you let Shaun Mars die [Despite Chris's assumptions I did not let Shaun die. Grab me in person and I will talk for a while about Heavy Rain... - Billy]). Davey says Chuckie Egg
Nose: Baby sick
Taste: Cheesy and wrong
Finish: Cheese omelette well done

The final whisky – Kornog Taouarc’h Trived.

There’s something beautifully mad about French distillers

Peated French whisky from the Glann ar Mor distillery. Peated to 35ppm (similar levels to Caol Ila & Lagavulin) and matured in American oak. Kornog means west and Taouarch’h means peat. I have no clue what Trived means, but they also do Pevared, which is matured in Sauternes casks.

Glan ar Mor means ‘by the sea’ in Breton and the distillery is on an old farm. The weather is a bit nicer than in Scotland and the whisky matures a bit faster thanks to that. It’s an old school distillery, with flame fired small stills, worm tubs and wooden washbacks.

Chris says:
Game: Rise of the Robots
Nose: Smoked pear
Taste: Lux soap
Rating: 39/100

The thing that most pleased me about the session was that while every whisky had at least one person who didn’t like it, they all also had at least one person who did. The Three Ships pretty much came out as top by the end of the night (with the empty bottle either being a sign of favour or a sign that we didn’t hide it as fast as the others) but all of the others were Good Whisky, dispelling at least some of the myths about the quality of whiskies from outside of the major producing regions.

And that’s that. There’ll be more sessions in March (along with the one tomorrow and the other two in February) and at least a few them should end up on here.

Many thanks to Cat and the folks at Albannach for looking after us and letting us have their shiny tasting room for the evening.

Sullivan’s Cove Double Cask
Australian Single Malt Whisky, 40%. ~£55.

Three Ships 10 Year Old
South African Single Malt Whisky, 43%. ~£45.

Hammer Head
Czech Single Malt Whisky, 40.7%. ~£40.

Kavalan Classic
Taiwanese Single Malt Whisky, 40%. Unavailable in Europe.

Millstone Peated
Dutch Single Malt Whisky, 40%. ~£55.

Kornog Taouarc’h Trived
French Single Malt Whisky, 46%. ~£65.

I encountered these for the first time back in October while helping out at The Whisky Show, as Gerry Tosh, HP’s Global Marketing Manager, was down from Orkney to run a masterclass tasting through the three whiskies that were in the range at the time, along with two new whiskies that were to be released shortly after the show – the whiskies I was just sent, the 1971 and 1976. I helped set up the class, poured some of the whiskies (including the ’71 and ’76 which were transported in plastic sample bottles as the proper bottles weren’t ready at the time) and was then promptly called away to do something else, so missed out on tasting them. That has now been remedied.

1971 and 1976 samples hiding to the right

The Orcadian Vintages are part of Highland Park’s fairly scary range of premium whiskies, only being beaten in price by the £9000 a bottle 50 year old. Before these two most recent additions the line-up consisted of a 1964, 1968 and 1970, and these new ones extend the age range to whisky matured for ‘only’ about 35 years. They don’t mess about at Highland Park and have priced these drams appropriately, with each of the Orcadian Vintages coming in at over £2000 (and the 1964 now over £3000 at work).

As part of the justification for the silly money they’re charging for them they do present them rather well. The 50 year old beats everything, with its organic looking metal bottle sheath and hidden carvings, but the Orcadian Vintages do a pretty good job – oak boxes with carved text and heavy dark glass bottles (really heavy, as I discovered when trying to free pour 10cl samples for a room of 40 – my arm was shaking a bit by the end) with silver HP logo amulets. They are rather beautiful but the whisky inside is what’s important.

The one bit I did overhear in Gerry’s presentation of the Orcadian Vintages was about their smokiness. Highland Park use some peat in the drying of their barley, at least in the 20% that they produce themselves on their own malting floor by hand, and back in the 1960s and 70s the peating level was a bit more random than the 40ppm that they use in their homemade malt today. Gerry’s explanation, marketing story though it may be, is rather compelling – it’s to do with the wind. The traditional kiln used for drying malted barley is topped with a pagoda roof which not only looks pretty, and has become the sign of a distillery as you drive through the Highlands, it also affects the air flow. Now, Orkney is rather a windy place and the pagodas didn’t always help to keep things consistent and the amount of smoke that hung around in the kiln was increased or decreased as the wind rushed by, leading to the more inconsistent levels of peat in some of these older whiskies – a level of seasonality that you may not expect. I don’t particularly care whether it’s entirely true or not, but I rather like the idea and feel the urge to look up average windspeeds around Kirwall through the 60s and 70s…

Shaky arm alert

The 1971 is a medium/dark gold with a nose of salty caramel, butter and honey, apples and pears, sweet grapes, digestive biscuits, and hints of sticky cocktail cherries and musty cupboards. To taste it starts with a big sugary sweetness that fades through custard and apples to elegant but sour fruit (unripe mango?), with cinnamon and more butter. It has a medium long finish, with woody spice, apple skins and a hint of menthol. Really rather nice indeed – showing some of the fruitiness that you often find in 1970s whiskies and which is threatening to bankrupt me at whisky auctions.

The 1976 poured a lot paler and had a nose of light brine, fruit skins, vanilla cream, milk chocolate and almond paste. On the palate it was quite soft with a creamy mouthfeel – sweet apple turned into tannic apple skins with more sour fruit and fruity caramel keeping things just sweet enough. The finish was longer than the 1971 with apples and custard, cinnamon fireballs, dry wood and a lingering hint of fruity Garibaldi biscuits. This one wasn’t so much for me – a bit too much tannin and fire.

Anyways, the Orcadian Vintages aren’t the most accessible whiskies in terms of price, but they’re just an example of what the distillery has hiding in its old stock – great whiskies that people are willing to part with stonking amounts of money for. Luckily the expertise didn’t go anywhere and they’re still producing great whiskies today. Although I am currently waiting on a 1990s bottling of Highland Park 12 year old to arrive from an auction so I can do a comparison…

Highland Park 1971
Island Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 46.7%. ~£2300

Highland Park 1976
Island Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 49.1%. ~£2000

Photos shot by m’colleague Petras at The Whisky Show – there are a load more on our website.

Anyways, #27. This was another evening in the hands of Berry Brothers and Rudd‘s Rob Whitehead, but this time with a big twist. We were were going to taste the whiskies more blind than usual: In the basement of Berry’s, two floors below the streets of St James’s, with the lights off.

The plan was simple – why stop at just covering the bottles? Why not remove the sense of sight all together? The BBR basement doesn’t have any natural light and with the closing of a few doors it was pitch black – the brightest thing I could see (apart from the red light on Jason’s night vision goggles that he’d borrowed for the evening) was the fluorescent dial on the watch of the person next to me, which was just visible through the sleeve of his shirt.

We started the evening upstairs with our first unnamed dram, which was pleasant but not particularly memorable. Annoyingly I didn’t write any notes on it as I’d left my notebook in my bag due to thinking that we’d be in the dark for the whole tasting, which wasn’t quite right – we’d try a couple of whiskies and then turn the lights on so we could have a look at them and see if our impressions matched up with reality. We wandered down into the cellars, sat at the table and waited as Jason looked for the light switch.

The first downstairs dram of the night had a nose of sweet chocolate, red fruit, hazelnuts and gummi sweets. In the mouth it had a silky texture, butter and custard up front to taste and an aniseed ball centre after that. It finished sweet and syrupy and was all in all a rather good dram. The next whisky had a nose of struck match, sour fruit and diesel, with a hint of old brandy rancio (autumn leaves and forests) and nuts. To taste it was thick and oily with vanilla, foam straberries and creamy spice. It finished with pine and old polished wood.

The first drams (humour)

The lights came up and the whiskies were revealed. The first one turned out to be Cutty Sark Imperial Kingdom, an export only blend that Rob had a bottle of squirreled away. It was discontinued about 5 years ago and never really sold in the UK anyway and this was much to the distress of the room, who rather liked it. The second was Glenrothes 1995, bottled in 2011, which was also the dram we tried upstairs. This was a bit of a shock to everyone, myself included, as noone would have picked it out as the same whisky. It seems that our eyes are slightly more important to tasting than we thought.

The lights went out again, Jason was molested in the dark and made occasional surprised noises and a new dram appeared. On the nose it seemed very young, with new spirit graininess, apple skins and a hint of creamy custard. To taste it had cream, light spiece, more apple skins and unripe melon, finishing with pine and some dry green wood.

The next whisky was much more fully flavoured and predicted around the room to be much darker. On the nose it had sour apples and spice, a hint of menthol, raisins, ginger snaps, molasses and soft brown sugar. To taste it was spicy and tannic, with marzipan, custard, liquorice and big sugared raisins. It finished long, with cinnamon, and dark and damp wood.

Again the lights came up and revealed that the first whisky was a Berry’s Own Selection Mannochmore 12 year old. The cask it was matured in was condemned (to a life probably involving a fire, flooring or decorative flower arranging) after this was bottled, due to it being a little on the tired side – that’s not something that’s done lightly but after 12 years it was obvious that the cask wasn’t giving much more to the whisky. The other dram was Berry’s Own Selection Macduff 2000. Macduff is a dram that you do see around, although more often under the name Glen Deveron, which the distillery use on their own bottlings. I’ve not been a fan of their OBs, but the independent’s I’ve tried in recent times have been interesting, although quite varied – the last one I had was a huge caramel coated fruitcake of a whisky which I was meant to pick up as a Christmas dram. Definitely a distillery to keep an eye on in the indies, especially if you can get a taste first.

The lights went down once more time and a final dram was passed down the table. On the nose it was pretty much what is currently my perfect dram – sweet shops and mud, sugar syrup, a hint of woody smoke and a light medicinal nature. To taste there was big waxed fruit, melons, passion fruit and fruit tinged sugar syrup. It finished long with smoke and tropical fruit. I predicted it was a Brora but I was (happily) wrong – it was the Talisker 25 2009 edition. I was happy as it’s a much more reasonable price than most Broras and there is some of it around still, as I may have to find a bottle to add to my birthday stash.

Rob made a slip at this point by starting something that might become a tradition – he did another competition. This time he got us to guess the ABV of the Talisker 25 before it was revealed, which in the end was won by our usual whisky wizard Mr Rook. Rather than the impressive whisky Rob rolled out last time he went instead for a cognac – the rather impressive Frapin Extra. Darren promptly cracked it open and shared it around the room. On the nose it had watermelon, sweet grape juice, peach, pomegranate and brown sugar. To taste it was classic old cognac, gentle and restrained with leaves and old wood, as well as some spiced apple. It finished long, green and fresh with sugary wood. A cognac to convert whisky drinkers, which was sort of the plan…

Anyways, that was that. The next tasting is sold out and I should probably get a move on as I need to write my notes as I’m running it. Keep an eye on the Whisky Squad website as the February session(s?) should be appearing soon.

Cutty Sark Imperial Kingdom
Blended Scotch Whisky, 40%. ~£50 but now discontinued

Glenrothes 1995, bottled 2011
Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 43%. ~£45

Berry’s Own Selection Mannochmore 12 year old
Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 43%. ~£40

Berry’s Own Selection Macduff 2000 (UK exclusive to The Whisky Barrel)
Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 46%. ~£40

Talisker 25 year old, bottled 2009
Island Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 54.8%. ~£150

I’ve written a bit about Kavalan before but haven’t had a chance to try any more of their whiskies since then, so when Eddie Ludlow announced that he’d achieved a bit of a coup and got the distillery to exhibit at his Manchester show plans began to be made. I booked cheap train tickets to Manchester, getting there bright and early, and had a ticket home all in place when Eddie announced part two of his plan – Kavalan Master Blender Ian Chang would also be leading a tasting of the Kavalan range. A new return ticket was bought, the previous one departing 10 minutes before the start of the tasting, and plans to fill in a long morning of wandering around Manchester before the afternoon whisky session started to foment.

In the end it all went rather well – I wandered the streets of Manchester, ate a greasy breakfast, bought some new shoes, leeched Apple store wifi and then propped up the bar at the Marble Arch in an act of long overdue pilgrimage until it was time for whisky. A hastily grabbed ‘meal’ of scotch pancakes and scotch eggs later and I was through the door and into the hall for a quick circuit before the tasting started.

Ian Chang is not this blurry in real life

Ian Chang is Kavalan’s Master Blender, having studied food science and technology at the University of Reading. His employer is King Car, owned by the much mentioned and fabled Mr TT Lee, one of the biggest food and drink companies in east Asia, based in Taiwan. Back in January 2002 they started planning their next project, building a distillery, buoyed along by Taiwan’s new membership of the World Trade Organisation and the relaxing of rules around brewing and distilling that had previously limited production to state owned companies.

They chose the location carefully, extending King Car’s mineral water bottling facility that sat near the junction of Taiwan’s Snow and Central mountain ranges. The distillery’s name comes from that of the indigenous people, who also leant their name to the area until 1809, which appealed to Mr TT Lee, who grew up nearby. They started construction in April 2005, finishing in December and then installing the distilling gear and doing production test runs until March 2006. The first proper run of new make spirit tok place at 3:30pm on March 11th 2006.

The distillery is now a bit of a tourist destination, opening up their tours on December 4th 2008, the same day that they released their Kavalan Classic. They operate 365 days per year, don’t charge for the tour and pull in between 2k and 5k people per day – 1million people in 2010 and 2.6million by October 2011. In comparison Glenfiddich, one of the busiest Scottish distilleries, has about 100k visitors per year…

All the production at Kavalan is single malt and the whole manufacturing process was put together in association with legendary whisky consultant Dr Jim Swan (who hid at the back of the room during the tasting, volunteering an occasional comment), also known for helping start Penderyn in Wales. They import their malt from Europe (predominantly Scandinavia at the moment) as it’s too hot in Taiwan to grow and malt grain, a theme which is repeated throughout the production process. Their mash tun was imported from Rothes, in Speyside, and they seem to do a fairly regular mash, although rather than feeding the draff (spent grains) to cattle or pigs they instead press it into crackers, which are sold by King Car as people-food. They use stainless steel fermentation tanks, double skinned to aid in temperature control as the sub-tropical climate of Taiwan is far from ideal for making beer.

Ian didn’t go into their distillation itself but the next, and potentially most interesting piece, is maturation. The biggest problem with making whisky in Taiwan is the heat, as it’s a rather different climate to Scotland where most of the whisky distilling expertise is centred and they had to do a lot of research to find out how to make whisky without fighting nature too much. With yearly temperatures ranging from 10°c to 38°c the Angel’s Share is rather higher than the 2-3% you get in Scotland, coming in instead at 15-20% of evaporation per year, meaning that they can’t keep the whisky in the cask for long simply as a matter of logistics – after 5 or 6 years there’s not all that much left in there. Luckily the legal minimum for whisky maturation in Taiwan is just 2 years.

The first whisky we tried was Kavalan Classic, their regular single malt. It picked up the IWSC Best in Class award in 2011, having won a silver for the previous few years. It uses six different cask types in its makeup – refill and first fill bourbon, sherry and a variety of wine casks. They don’t use much in the way of sherry in the Classic, as the heat brings out too much tannin from the casks, which could overpower the quite delicate whisky. On the nose it was floral and fruity, with plasticine and glue, mango (the tropical fruit note that is the distillery’s main characteristic flavour) and sour grape. To taste there was vanilla, butter, cinnamon and sweet sponge cake. The finish was short, with light sweet butter and some light sweet oak. Not a massively complicated dram but nice and easy to drink.

Next on the mat was Concertmaster, a 40% ABV mix of refill and first fill bourbon matured whisky that is finished in port barriques. It’s ‘only’ picked up silver medals so far, as well as a Malt Maniacs “Cask Innovation” award in 2010, but they’re still developing and tweaking the mix as they get more spirit maturing in the warehouses. On the nose there was pungent honey, candy floss, a rich sweetness, sugared raisins and vanilla sugar. To taste it started out with cloves, which led to a light and sugary liqueur-like body rounded out with sweet and sour fruit. It finished medium-long with sweet vanilla wood.

Third on the mat was the Solist Bourbon, the companion whisky to the one I wrote about last time, which is now sold out. The series is a range of single cask whiskies, unchillfiltered and released at cask strength, making for some more extreme drams than the regular output of the distillery (the Solist Sherry is still one of the most outrageous whiskies I’ve ever tried). They’ve got an eye on distributing their whiskies in Europe, but currently have some trademark issues to work through, and as such have been looking to push maturation to 3 years (the legal minimum as set by the SWA), difficult as it is in the Taiwanese climate – this is one of the first whiskies to hit that age. It was launched on 5th August 2009 and has since won a stack of awards, including an IWSC silver, ISC Gold and WWA Best of the Rest of the World. On the nose this is classic bourbon cask matured malt – vanilla, coconut, uncooked cake batter, cinnamon and caramelised bananas. To taste it’s quite drying and tannic, but also full of caramel, lemon sherbert, apples and custard. A drop of water knocks out some of the sweetness (and cask strength burn) and adds some more sour apple and a hint of menthol. The flavours hang around for a bit, with lemony air freshener and butter fading to dry and tannic wood.

Last whisky of the night was the Vinho, one of their more recent releases showing off their wood management. The casks are made from slow growing American oak (in a similar fashion to Glenmorangie’s Astar) and the planks are seasoned outside for 24 months, open to the elements. The casks are then assembled and used to mature a variety of wines before they are emptied and shipped to Taiwan ready for whisky. Before use the barrel staves are planed to remove most of the wine soaked wood, reassembled, toasted and then recharred, in a more extreme than usual dechar/rechar process. In theory with high temperatures the planing back of the wood should allow fruity flavours to develop without becoming overpowering, as well as giving some more first fill character. The whisky poured a deep reddy brown, more reminiscent of European oak and sherry casks, and had a nose of rich fruit, black liquorice, red wine, dried cherry, marzipan and apricot heavy tagine. To taste it had big sherry flavours, black liquorice and sticky sugared raisins leading into a long finish of more raisins, sweet red grapes and cinnamon. A successful experiment.

As yet there isn’t an importer for Kavalan outside of Asia, although they are working on it and I hope they sort something soon – their whiskies are pretty good and it’d be great to be able to taste them without finding an Asia bound whisky mule…

Kavalan Classic
Taiwanese Single Malt Whisky, 40%.

Kavalan Concertmaster
Taiwanese Single Malt Whisky, 40%.

Kavalan Solist Bourbon
Taiwanese Single Malt Whisky, ?%.

Kavalan Vinho
Taiwanese Single Malt Whisky, 40%.

We were back in The Gunmakers, but in the back room for this, the second Whisky Squad Christmas dinner. Due to Mr Rook claiming that he had ‘work’ or ‘a small child to look after’ or some other rubbish excuse I stepped in to introduce the first few drams until he could make his way over. As such my notes were minimal as I was standing up and getting in the way of a room eating and drinking. Anyways – whiskies:

Hibiki 17 year old – the surprise hit of the Suntory session with Zoran Peric earlier this year, this is the first (that I remember) repeat dram at Whisky Squad and was chosen to go with the first course (soup, pate or smoked salmon). Here are my notes from last time: On the nose it had glue (naturally), maple syrup, apples and custard, and candied lemons – ‘Apple tart with cream’ my notes read. To taste it was generally sweet with butter, sweet apple, vanilla cream and perfumed wood. It’s finish was long and spicy, with green apples and a lightly tannic woodiness hanging around.

Balvenie 21 Port Wood – I’ve spent a lot of the last year drinking Balvenie, so this was quite a fitting next dram for me, matched with the main courses (beef stew, roast chicken or something vegematarian). Annoyingly I don’t have any notes on this, the peril of having drunk it enough that I always assume that I’ve already written them loads of times – here’s some stuff from my unreliable memory. On the nose it’s got the regular Balvenie spice but isn’t quite as heavy as you’d expect from something with 21 years in a port pipe under its belt. To taste it’s got balanced savoury and sweetness, with honey, a bit of sticky red fruit, liquorice and some elegant wood. It’s a tasty dram and works better as a digestif in my opinion, although it happily held up to the beef stew.

Glenisla 1977 / 28 Years Old / Cask #199599 – I think it was this specific single cask bottling, but I didn’t get a chance to note down all the details. However, as soon as I stuck my nose in the glass I sat down and started writing tasting notes – I was trying this one blind (unlike the last two, which I’d been given up heads-up about) and it was unlike anything else I’ve smelled in the world of whisky. Glenisla was an experimental whisky made (I think) just in 1977 at Glen Keith distillery. I’ve heard a few tales about what it actually is, but as far as I can tell it’s a peaty whisky that was made peaty by using heavily peated water in the mash rather than peaty barley. It’s rather rare and there are only a few independent bottlings of it in the wild, so I was rather pleased to get a taste, especially as I’d only learned of its existence about the previous week.

On the nose it started off rhubarb-like, with stewed rhubarb and rhubarb & custard sweets, before moving into much more savoury territory with fresh celery, celery salt and the smell that I always associate with artichokes, despite not having any memory of what artichokes smell like. It went on with unripe figs, and grape juice before taking a weird turn through mushrooms, wet forest floors and rich compost. To taste it started out muddy before the artificial rhubarb from the nose made itself known. From there it went through artificial sweetener and sweet smoke to honey and cloying syrup. It finished with mint and aniseed balls, both hanging around for a little while. A totally strange whisky and one that after a single dram I couldn’t say whether I liked or not. It was also picked out as Gunmakers Landlord Jeff’s favourite whisky of all time. He is a man with strange tastes.

Glendronach 21 year old – ‘Parliament’ – this wasn’t in the originally published version of this post, but when Jason gave me a call to ask whether he had dreamed it or if I had left it out for editorial purposes I thought I’d better do a quick update. I forgot it as I was attempting to get Darren to eat his dinner at the time, although not in a ‘here comes the big airplane!’ style spoon to mouth faux-flying way, as I feel that he is probably a lot more qualified than I in that respect currently. Anyways, the whisky is named for the Parliament of rooks that live in the tree opposite the distillery and in short I rather like it. I even said so in the blog post I wrote for work when I went through a bunch of their whiskies. My tasting notes from then read:

Nose: Sticky black liquorice, dark chocolate, stewed raisins, spiced apple and hints of nuts and marzipan. It’s rich and fruitily sweet rather than syrupy, and it sits on the edge of cloying.

Palate: Rich and bitter sweet, with charcoal and raisins, soured PX and hard liquorice sticks. Water lightens the body and brings out some custard, but leaves the charcoal edge.

Finish: Menthol, ground almonds, woody liquorice root, dry fragrant wood and a lingering edge of marzipan.

The King’s Ginger – as donated by Whisky Squad presenting alumnus and regular attendee Rob Whitehead as a post-prandial dram, this was presented blind and with no comment on the fact that it’s a liqueur rather than a whisky. It was created in 1903 by Berry Brothers & Rudd on commission from King Edward VII, who required a drink to fortify him during his morning car rides. As such it’s sweet and spicy with lots of ginger to ‘keep the blood flowing’. It’s no longer a recommended driving aid but is incredibly popular, with Rob spending much of his time during December handing bottles over the counter at Berrys. On the nose you get a big sugar syrup hit as well as spicy ginger, but it’s not particularly heavy or cloying. To taste the ginger and sweetness is balanced by lemony citrus, although it does have the sticky syrupy finish of many liqueurs as well as a hint of sweet tea. A hit in the room and now on the Christmas list of a number of the attendees.

Unfortunately I didn’t get a chance to take any pictures of the food or whisky, but here’s the solitary snap I did get – landlord Jeff riding Squad regular (and Christmas fan, as his hat shows) Ross around the room…:

There was also a quiz with less questions than the previous year, winners who didn’t work in the whisky industry and a stack of whisky miniatures as prizes. A good night and a fitting end to the Whisky Squad year. Apart from the final ‘Whisky Surprise’ bring a bottle session, that is…although I suspect that will remain shrouded in mystery (my increasingly drunken notes peter out half way through).

Hibiki 17 year old
Japanese Blended Whisky,43%. ~£70

Balvenie 21 year old Port Wood
Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 40%. ~£80

Glenisla 1977 Cask #19959
Experimental Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 50.7%. ~£140

The King’s Ginger
Bespoke Royal Liqueur, 41%. ~£18 for 50cl

Anyways, the second tasting of November was deliberately pushed towards the end of the month as it was in honour of Movember, and the extra couple of weeks meant that there were some moustaches on display, unlike during the Smoking Section tasting where MoSista Charly‘s stick on lip warmer was the only thing worthy of the name ‘Mo’. Anyways, we gathered upstairs at the Scotch Malt Whisky Society with bottles donated from a variety of sponsors and all the proceeds going straight to the Whisky4Movember fund raising efforts. Unfortunately we had some generous sponsors and even excluding the emergency bottle I had in my bag, just in case any of the whiskies didn’t arrive, we had eight drams to get through. It’s a hard life…

First up, tasted blind as usual, was a mid-golden dram. On the nose it had sour apple skins, butter, cream, light spice, and milky butter icing. To taste it was creamy up front, with fruit and woody spice down the middle. It was quite light in body and very easily drinkable, with a finish of spiced creme brulee. An excellent start to the evening and not particularly surprising when the paper was pulled off and it turned out to be the Great King Street Artist’s Blend from Compass Box. I’ve written about this before, both here in a post about the Compass Box twitter tasting and in a work post around release time, and my opinion stays the same – a versatile, tasty and easy drinking whisky, and a great place to push people who assume that all blends are rubbish. Thanks to Compass Box for donating the bottle.

Next on the list was the first of two drams donated by our hosts – the SMWS. On the nose it had spiced vinegar, pungent fruit, sweet and sour sauce, treacle toffee, Love Hearts and a touch of minty menthol. To taste it was big and meaty, with some drying tannic wood, spiced apples, sour grapes, apple wood and a hint of woody smoke. It finished very differently, with strawberries, coconut and tropical fruit, as well as some drying wood. A rather complex and interesting dram that turned out to be 123.6 – Rhubarb and Custard, matured for 10 years in a refill port pipe. While the society don’t officially give out what distillery each number goes with, 123 is Glengoyne, a distillery that until recently I’d almost entirely avoided but have become quite fond of in the last couple of weeks. They claim to be the only distillery to dry their barley with no peat whatsoever, using hot air instead, and have been running since 1833. They were taken over by Ian Macleod Distillers in 2003, as the company’s first only and currently only distillery, and since then have been making a lot of headway in the market. I need to try more of their whiskies…

Number three had a young and fruity nose, with some spirity alcohol, toffee, grapefruit and passion fruit – the last two flavours that I’ve been increasingly looking for in whisky. To taste there was fizzy sherbert, sweet lemons, cream and the caraway graininess of less mature whisky. It finished well, with lingering spiced wood, Tangfastic Haribo and more tropical fruit. A bit of a hit around the room and an annoyance when the label came of as it was Cask Strength and Carry On, a whisky from Arran bottled by the chaps at Caskstrength.net which sold out within a couple of days of release. I’ve still got a bit of the sample that Joel and Neil gave me when they released it, but annoyingly I didn’t try it until after they’d run out of bottles and didn’t get any myself. Luckily, Darren did acquire a few bottles (although whether that was by way of tax for his house being used as a staging point after the bottles were driven down from Arran is between Darren and the Caskstrength boys) and he donated one to the evening. There was even a Movember link with the Neil half of Caskstrength having been featured on one of the first Movember bottles. Well, his excellent moustache (now departed) was, at least.

Next up was one that I was fairly sure I’d guessed – a really dark and sticky dram. On the nose it was big and sherried – sugared raisins, the burnt edges from a beef joint, dark wood and rich fruit. To taste that continued, with lots of fruit – plums and stewed mixed winter berries – and some sticky liquorice at the back. The flavours hung around for a while with fruit and buttered wood. The label came off to show that I was right for once – it was the Movember 2011 bottling, a vatting of a couple of casks of 9 year old whisky from Glenfarclas. The barrels were chosen by Chris Hoban of the Edinburgh Whisky Blog and naturally there’s a post up over there about his visit to the distillery. It was sold exclusively by the chaps at Master of Malt (boo, hiss, etc) who donated all the profits to the Whisky4Movember fundraising effort (woo, yay, etc), picking up £6000 by the end of November. They are now sold out, but MoM do still have some samples left to buy.

Number five, the beginning of the second half, was a bit of a surprise at first, as after a run of three cask strength drams it was back to a normal 40%. On the nose it had Fry’s Turkish Delight, honey, red fruit and a touch of menthol. To taste it was creamy, with woody spic, some delicate polished wood flavours, and a lingering finish of wood and spice. A lot less powerful in alcohol than the last couple of drams but a nice contrast and very drinkable. A ripple of surprise spread around the room when the bottle turned out to be Balvenie Signature. I was rather pleased that my tasting notes match up with my usual take on Balvenie and it was impressive that it held up despite coming after some palate killing whiskies. Many thanks to Dr Andrew Forrester, Balvenie’s UK Brand Ambassador, for donating the bottle.

The next one was much lighter in colour and the first peaty whisky of the night – a nose of meaty smoke, dirty peat and mulched leaves all undercut by a young sweet spiritiness. To taste it had gritty smoke, sweet fruit and a metallic hint, finishing with tinned smoky fish and a lingering note of pineapple. A strange combination of flavours that made some sense when the whisky was revealed – Birnie Moss. This is a young peaty whisky from Benriach on Speyside, made with an eye towards the European market, especially Spain, Italy and France who love young fiery whisky and don’t mind a touch of smoke. Benriach don’t stop with Birnie Moss though, as their Curiositas is the same spirit left in the cask for a few extra years – an excellent peaty dram with some nice fruitiness underneath that the Birnie Moss shows some of the elegance of. This was a bit of a hit in the room, with at least a couple of bottles going on Christmas lists. Thanks to the Royal Mile Whiskies for the donation.

The penultimate whisky of the night was a step away from peat again, with a nose of spiced cream, sour fruit and a hint of balsamic vinegar. To taste it had fruity toffee, bananas, sweet apples and pears, and a burst of spicy cinnamon. It finished bitter, with green wood and some woody spice. Another slightly random whisky, this time from Jason’s collection, it was Glenmorangie Astar. I’ve written about it before, back in the olden days of this blog, and it’s a concentration of Glenmorangie’s experiments with interesting casks, using barrels made from wood from a forest that they specially selected, before the usual filling with bourbon, emptying, and shipping over to Scotland to be used to mature the whisky.

Finally we reached whisky number eight, another donation from the SWMS and one that was definitely an evening ender. On the nose the first note, that dominated almost everything else, was pickled onions, both real ones and the overpowering (and very tasty) smell of pickled onion Monster Munch. Underneath that there was sour fruit, some gravelly smoke, soured sherry, shoe polish and tomato ketchup. To taste it was full of coal, ash and coal smoke, with a back-end of sweet and sour sauce, baked beans and damp seaweed. The flavours lingered, with the smoke giving way to ash, ketchup, and spicy sweet and sour sauce. A strange and divisive whisky that I really wasn’t sure about, although I happily sat and sniffed at my glass for ages. It was revealed to be 29.104 – Not For Wee Boys, from Laphroaig, matured for 20 years in a refill sherry butt. A beast of a dram and one that had lost a lot of the typical Laphroaig medicinal nature due to the influence of the sherry wood – interesting and one that I hope to be able to grab a dram of next time I visit.

That was it for another month, although despite there being eight whiskies on the mat there was a trip to the bar downstairs for some more drinks, and a few more people left as members of the SMWS than arrived. December also has two meetups, the Christmas dinner later this week and the ‘everyone brings a bottle’ Whisky Surprise night (still some spaces left), which didn’t get a blog post last year due to the horrific drunkenness I managed to inflict on myself. Keep an eye on the Whisky Squad website for the announcement of January’s sessions, one of which I may have something to do with…

Compass Box Great King Street – The Artists’ Blend
Blended Scotch Whisky, 43%. ~£25 for a 50cl bottle

SMWS 123.6 – Rhubarb and Custard
Highland Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 59.5%. ~£60

Cask Strength and Carry On
Island Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 49.9%. ~£50

Movember 2011
Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 53%. ~£40

Balvenie Signature
Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 40%. ~£35

Birnie Moss
Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 48%. ~£30

Glenmorangie Astar
Highland Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 57.1%. ~£55

SMWS 29.104 – Not For Wee Boys
Islay Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 58.2%. ~£70

Anyways, the first of November’s Squad meetups was to feature a topic that hasn’t really been broached since back in my first attendance, Whisky Squad #4 – Islay Malts. That session featured a range of whisky from the island, rather than focusing on the traditional peaty fare, so the chaps decided that a night for smoke heads was long overdue. Hence Whisky Squad #23 – The Smoking Section.

There was some mild confusion at first, as rather than our usual venue of The Gunmakers we had shifted to The Red Lion, tucked in behind Berry Brother’s and Rudd in St James, and usually better known in the whisky circuit as the venue for The Whisky Lounge tastings. However, Jeff, the landlord of The Gunmakers, has decided to refurbish our regular room causing us to be evicted for a couple of sessions while he and his regulars/cohorts/chums rip out the fixtures and throw the sofa out of the window. Hopefully we’ll be back in our spiritual home soon. Anyways, they’re having a Winter Ale and Food festival at the end of the week – you should go, it will be ace.

The plan was simple – try some whisky, all of which would be smoky. We were unfortunately not accompanied by our the traditional Whisky guide, Mr Rook, who claimed something about ‘having a small child to look after’, but he had popped in before we turned up and set the dram order. I mention this so that blame can be apportioned. Luckily, m’colleague Tim had come along and we had Rob from Berry Brothers on the other side of the room, so there was enough whisky know-how to spread around. Now, onto the blaming.

Whisky number one was poured and it was quite lightly coloured. On the nose it was savoury, with wine vinegar, burning pine needles, mud and malt, as well as a traditionally peaty medicinal scent with freshly unwrapped bandages. To taste it had predominantly the taste of young spirit – caraway, fire and alcohol. Along with that it had some salty liquorice, brine and lots of smoke – not so much peaty smoke, but just hot, fiery smoke. It finished quickly, with some creamy grain fading to nothing. This was a fairly brutal start to the evening and it wasn’t much of a shock to see that it was Octomore 4.1, the peatiest whisky ever made. Well, the whisky made with the most peated malt, at least, as I don’t know how peaty the spirit was when it came out of the still (distillation removes some of the elements of the wash including some of the phenols that make whisky ‘peaty’). Octomore is the name for the heavily peated malts that Bruichladdich have been making and which should continue as one of their brands now that they’ve released their first 10 year old made solely with spirit distilled since the distilleries reopening and are starting to calm down on releasing so many expressions. This was the ‘blame Darren’ dram, as starting off a tasting with Octomore could be seen as a hostile statement of intent. Luckily things calmed down from here on.

Whisky two was light gold and much calmer. The nose had some plasticine, wax, butter, a bit of fruit, some meatiness and a light hint of smoke. To taste it was bitter and minerally, with more butter, some mint and mulchy leaves – a muddy peat taste. Water added some cream, sweetness, lime citrus and more smoke and it finished a bit cardboardy, with charcoal and coal dust. The label was whipped off to show that this was Benromach Peat Smoke. From seeing the bottle I thought at first that it was Benromach’s Special Edition Organic, the only peaty whisky I knew they’d done, but it seems that they now produce this as a regular bottling – one of the few peated Speyside whiskies.

Next up was a whisky that Tim recognised immediately from the bottle shape and that I had no clue about. On the nose it was sweet, with a farmyardy edge that burned off quite quickly to leave pine, stone, mulchy grain, lime and hints of tropical fruit. To taste there was sweet pastry, menthol, pear drops, pear skin tannins, and musky wood smoke. Water brought out more fruit and more of the muskiness in the smoke, leading to a lingering wood smoke (burning green wood) and sweet woodiness. A tasty dram that I rather enjoyed and couldn’t place, which turned out to be Port Askaig 25 year old, as produced by my employers. Port Askaig is a range of whiskies from an unnamed Islay distillery that we bottle and sell, and which I’ve not tried many of yet. If you’re interested then the folks at Connosr did a rundown of the range that I’ve been using as crib notes when anyone asks me about them…

Whisky four was again light and had a nose of lemon, brine and shellfish – almost scampi and lemon Nik-Naks. Fresh and maritime with a woody smoke behind everything. To taste there was lemon butter, sweet syrup, pine and a lot of alcohol – this was definitely a cask strength whisky and needed some water. Dilution calmed it down a bit and brought out some more mineral notes. The finish was short and my notes simply say “Chocolate?”, the accuracy of which I question. The reveal showed it to be my first correct guess of the night – Chapter 11 Cask Strength from the English Whisky Company, although I will admit that the distinctive bottle shape helped rather a lot. I tried this when judging the World Whisky Masters this year and liked it then (we gave it a Master award, the top honours), and my opinion hasn’t changed – the finest whisky that EWC have produced, and by far my favourite young peated whisky I’ve tried to date.

Whisky five was again one that I probably should have guessed but didn’t. On the nose there were baked beans, kippers, grain, full ashtrays, leaves, fisherman’s friends, lime rind, fennel, stewed tea and charcoal – a lot of flavours. To taste it was simpler, lightly sweet with charcoal, lime leaves, nettles, tobacco and some prickly alcohol. The finish lingered with green leaves and some medicinal smoke. I rather liked it and was very please when Jason pulled off the paper to show that it was Elements of Islay Kh1. The Elements series is also bottled by my employers, with each different distillery being assigned a two letter ‘chemical symbol’ used in combination with a release number to name each bottling. I can’t possibly say which distillery Kh is, but this is the first bottling that we’ve done from them, it’s the first independent bottling of their whisky that they’ve allowed, and it was selected by Tim and I from a selection of samples from the distillery, the first whisky I’ve helped choose. I should probably have recognised it…

The last whisky of the night was then handed around and on the nose had fake butter, nail varnish remover, muddy peat, lots of stony minerality, pears, the ‘wet dog’ muskiness that Tim often talks about in his Islay whisky tasting notes, a spot of astringent Bruichladdich-a-like ‘baby sick’ and an underlying meatiness with peaty medicinal notes. To taste it was very sweet and grainy with some lime and minerality – a simple and young spirit. The finish hung around longer than I expected, with stone, sweet cereals and some peaty mulch. Label off, the whisky turned out to be Kilchoman 100% Islay. A Kilchoman at this point was unexpected (for reasons that the previous paragraph may make obvious) and even less expected was for Peter Wills, son of distillery owner Anthony Wills and their first brand ambassador, to stand up and say hello – I thought I recognised him from whisky shows. 100% Islay is fairly unique in that it is almost entirely local in nature – the barley was grown and malted at Kilchoman; it was then mashed, fermented, distilled and matured at the distillery and only left the island to be bottled, although they did do a limited edition cask strength version that was bottled by hand (using a teapot, it is rumoured).

A nice bit of peaty whisky, despite my current tastes being for more ‘boring’ unpeated bourbon casks and a definite reminder that I need to get myself some Kh1 before it runs out.

Next time – the Movember tasting. Hopefully before the end of the year…

I was beaten to the write-up this month by Pooja over on her Table For One blog. I will not be beaten again! Until next time.

Octomore 4.1
Islay Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 62.5%. ~£80

Benromach Peat Smoke
Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 46%. ~£35

Port Askaig 25 year old
Islay Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 45.8%. ~£100

English Whisky Chapter 11 Cask Strength
Single Malt English Whisky, 59.7%. ~£70

Elements of Islay Kh1
Islay Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 59.7%. ~£50 for a 50cl bottle

Kilchoman 100% Islay
Islay Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 50%. ~£70

While Aldi seem to sit with Lidl at the budget end of the supermarket spectrum they are well known for doing at least one good booze – their Oliver Cromwell 1599 Gin. The 1599 is £9 for 50cl, bottled at a chunky 50% and has an IWSC Gold (and shared honours as best in class) to its name, sparking an interest in what Aldi might do with other booze categories. So when I got an email from the Aldi PR department (although not an invite to the swanky [I presume. I wasn't invited] launch event with Jim Murray of Whisky Bible Fame) offering me a sample of their 24 year old Glen Marnoch and some info about it and their 40 year old Glenbridge, I couldn’t really say no.

It’s not the first Glen Marnoch that Aldi have released, with a 12 year old being claimed as a Dalmore in one forum I found and an 18 hinted as being produced by Glenmorangie (although back then it could have been a Glen Moray, as they were under the same banner then), both with decent reputations. Unfortunately I’ve not got an easily accessible Aldi (although I’ve recently found one that’s only a bus and a train away) so I’ve missed out. Well, the lack of accessibility and a general whisky-snob disdain for supermarket own label single malts that wasn’t backed up by anything as useful as trying any of them.

A brief interlude: Whisky Naming. One of the rules in the SWA’s most recent tranche (part 7 – Distillery Names) was that naming whiskies with names that could potentially be taken as distilleries when they aren’t is a no-no – Glen Marnoch and Glenbridge both fall into that pot. These rules finally come into full force on November 23rd and from then on the ‘confusing’ names, as well as the old whisky classifications (including Vatted Malt, now renamed Blended Malt, the category that Compass Box are ‘celebrating’ with the release of their Last Vatted Malt on the same day), will not be allowed. However, products packaged before the 23rd may use the old prohibited names, although any packaging produced afterwards must conform. Expect to see Glen Marnoch Castle and Glenbridge Harbour or something similar in the future…

Anyways, whisky. Along with the 24 year old they are also releasing a 40 year old, with 3000 bottles of each going on sale on November 24th and December 8th respectively, with the 40yo press release predicting that ‘Whisky lovers will be queuing overnight…’. The reason behind that is simple – price. The 24 is going for £29.99 and the 40 for £49.99. Which is silly. Aldi refer to themselves as a discounter rather than supermarket in their press releases, but 50quid for a 40 year old whisky suggests a loss leader, a dodgy whisky, a company with old whisky that they can’t sell on, or an incredibly good buyer. The cheapest 40yo single malt I can find on our site at work is £129 and the cheapest on WhiskyMarketplace is £118, so £50 is well below the odds. They’re both Speysiders and as the 40 year old is sherry matured it’s cast suspicion on a handful of distilleries who could supply the stock, and a comment that “Whisky of this quality and age would usually sell for around £300 plus” in the press release points the finger heavily towards Glenfarclas (whose 40yo goes for about £300), although I’ve also heard rumours that it might Strathisla. A 40 year old Glenfarclas for £50 is a bargain and on the off-chance that it is tasty I may be joining in the queues to have a go at getting one.

However, they weren’t sending out samples of the 40 (at least not to plebs like me) and the one in the picture above is their 24 year old. Also a Speyside, with no indication as to whether it’s from the same distillery as the 12, 18 or 40, and also a bargain – the cheapest 25 year olds on WhiskyMarketplace are around £60 a piece. So, what’s it like…

On the nose it had apples, vanilla, sponge cake, squirty cream, fake butter and hints of cinnamon and spice to start with. As it sat in the glass more cereal notes developed, with grain and popcorn popping up, as well as an underlying mulchy ‘green’ note. To taste it started with some creamy sweetness with a hint of spice, but that was quickly swamped by bitter wood and sour apple, although without any tannic dryness. A bit of water kicked up the sweetness a notch, but it still sat on top of a bitter centre. The finish was quite long, with bitter wood and a touch of burnt plastic as well as more of the sour apple skin, again without any drying sensation. As that faded I got hints of sweet spicy wood, suggesting that they were lingering underneath the stronger flavours, but they disappeared quite quickly. All in all an encouraging nose that didn’t carry through, with the bitter wood swamping the flavours that I would have enjoyed. It almost tasted as if the some of the casks were overcharred (although as I’ve never tasted whisky from an overcharred cask I have no idea whether that’s what it’d taste like – burnt with bitter char) meaning that flavour overpowered the pleasant sweet orchard fruit and vanilla that I could taste at the beginning and the end.

Disappointing, but early assessment from those who have tried the 40 year old is that is quite passable. At least if I miss out on a bottle of it after the trek to Aldi I can always grab a bottle of their gin…

Glen Marnoch 24 year old
Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 40%. £29.99, available from 24th November 2011, limited to 3000 bottles.

Glenbridge 40 year old
Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 40%. £49.99, available from 8th December 2011, limited to 3000 bottles.

Anyways, what that barely relevant intro brings me to is a pair of whiskies I had a taste of the other week – one as part of a ‘Twitter toast’ and the other one that I picked up while visiting the distillery.

First up is a special edition bottling, Old Pulteney Row to The Pole. It’s a commemorative whisky in honour of a recent Pulteney backed bit of crazy exploring, rowing from Resolute Bay in northern Canada to the 1996 site of the North Magnetic Pole – 450 miles of rowing in extreme weather conditions fuelled (in part?) by whisky. The expedition was led by Jock Wishart, who was part of the 1996 group who pinpointed the Pole’s position, the first time it had been measured accurately, and they left Resolute on July 29th. They arrived at the pole on August 26th after a final 2 miles over land – 2 miles while dragging 1.3 tonnes of boat… They were the first group ever to row to a Pole, although putting it that way does seem a bit weird, as two of the four Poles are in the middle of the Antarctic, and dragging a boat across that definitely doesn’t count as rowing.

Rather impressive and definitely worth releasing a whisky for, which Pulteney have duly done. I got sent over a sample so that I could join in a Twitter Toast – an evening when a bunch of us would have a taste of the whisky on Twitter and the crew would be hidden in a pub in Wick ready to chat as they toasted themselves with a few drams. Anyways, what was the whisky like?

It was a mix of bourbon and sherry casks, with only a few of the latter in the mix and was definitely an Old Pulteney. On the nose it had apples, vanilla cream, pear drops, red boiled sweets, fizzy Refresher chews, lemon, a spicy earthiness and a hint of brine. To taste it was creamy and sweet, with stewed apples with cinnamon slowly turning into tannic apple skin as the flavour developed. It also had some pears, brine and a light raisiny butter that hinted at the sherry casks in the mix. The finish was quite simple, with tannic apple skin fruitiness and light cream lingering for a while and picking up some spiced pear as it faded. A light and tasty example of Old Pulteney, young, fresh and easy drinking.

I then moved on to my follow-up whisky for the night – a single cask Old Pulteney that I got from the distillery, one of the infamous Fill-Your-Own whiskies. A lot of the distilleries do this, but this is the first I’ve actually taken advantage of – they stick a cask of whisky in their shop, find some kind of whisky extraction device (usually a tap or dog/valinch – a tube for dipping whisky out of the barrel with) and let customers fill up their own bottle of whisky. Mine was a 14 year old bourbon cask which was a rather punchy 61.3%. It was also one of the last bottles in the barrel, taking a scarily long time to pour into the measuring flask while our rather aggressive schedule for the day slipped away. Schedule almost abandoned I had a couple of minutes to get my bottle signed by distillery manager Malcolm Waring, although it’s rubbing off now that I’ve taken out of it’s bag a couple of times…

But what does it taste like? On the nose it had musty apple barrels, strong syrupy sweetness with glue and wood polish, reminding me of an aged grain whisky. Water killed some of that and opened things up to show some marzipan and berries. To taste it was sweet to start but quickly descended into apple skin tannins, with floral honeysuckle, wood polish and a hint of woody pot pourri. Again, water calmed things down and revealed more floral notes and wax, as well as more spice and flowery perfume. It finished well, with woody spice, tingling menthol and tannic apple skin. It was fresh but much bigger than the Row to the Pole whisky, with more wood and spice, as well as a lot more tannins, drying things out quite a bit on the finish. Water was definitely needed and made it eminently drinkable, although it does feel more like a spring or summer whisky rather than one to sip in the coming winter nights.

Thanks to Lucas at Alembic Comms for sorting me out a sample of the RTTP.

Old Pulteney Row to the Pole Special Edition
Highland Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 40%. ~£20 for a 35cl bottle

Old Pulteney Distillery Only Bourbon Cask #2990
Highland Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 61.3%. ~£50

The Squad is getting a bit popular, with the tickets zooming out of the door at quite a scary speed. As such Messrs Standing and Tate have bribed even more people and started putting on second sessions, and this saving grace meant I got to have an October visit to the Whisky Squad after all. They roped in Whisky Squad drinker Jonny McMillan (for values of ‘roped in’ where Jonny said ‘Can I do a session’) and October part two was born – Now There’s Something You Don’t See Every Day…

Jonny works, when he isn’t selling his soul to the world of non-whisky, at Cadenhead’s whisky shop in London as well as appearing around the country at whisky shows, including the recent Manchester Whisky Show (more of which in a future post) and on the Glenglassaugh stand at the aforementioned Whisky Show (where I was on the stand next door and he fed me some tasty whisky). His theme for the night was elegantly simple – a group of whiskies from distilleries where less than 1% of their output goes to single malt. Apart from one, because Jonny really liked it. Luckily Cadenhead’s are an excellent independent bottler who have lots of interesting whiskies from such places. Anyways – whisky.

Dram #1 poured a light gold and had a nose dominated at first by chocolate caramel digestives, one of the finest biscuits of all time. That was followed up by creamy vanilla, green melon, fizzy Refreshers, lemon, baked beans and some minted peas. The lemon came through on the palate with some lime, spicy wood, apple and more vanilla, with water cranking up the apples and adding some tannic apple skin. The apple skin note continued on into the finish along with some green wood – quite fresh but tannic. As usual the guesses as to what it was were fairly inaccurate, helped by the fact that it was from Glenburgie, which isn’t particularly well known. It was a Glenburgie 1993 bottled in 2004 at 11 years old, one of an outturn of 288 bottles. Cadenhead’s still use the old name of the spirit, Glenburgie-Glenlivet, with the theory floated around the table that they’ve been bottling it long enough that their naming has been grandfathered in by being around longer than the current case law that restricts the use of the Glenlivet suffix. Glenburgie is owned by Pernod Ricard and usually goes into the Ballantine’s blends, although I suspect that there’s a bit in the various Chivas whiskies as well. It’s one that seems to do very well as a single malt (as a recent sell out of the SMWS’s latest bottling at The Whisky Show, along with people randomly grabbing me and asking me if I’d tried it can attest) but still it rarely sees the light of day.

At first I got confused and started nosing whisky #1 again when we moved on and was quite pleased that I got the same things again, and was about to comment that we had two rather similar whiskies, at which point I realised that I was just stupid – dram 2 was quite different. On the nose it started out quite dirty with a chunk of diesel and rubber plimsoll soles, but quickly moved on to sweeter things with icing sugar, vanilla cream and strawberries. To taste there was cooling mint and menthol up front, followed by lemon and lime, chocolate and sea salt. Water added some nice spiciness and more citrus. It finished with sherbert lemons and lots of liquorice. Jonny told us this had an interesting cask but noone guessed either its nature of the distillery – it was a Duthies Ben Nevis 14 year old, matured entirely in a rum cask. While finishing in rum casks is fairly common this is the first one that I’ve tried matured for all of its time in one. Jonny was rather keen on this one and it was quickly (and accidentally, ruining Jonny’s plan of giving a prize to the person who guessed) outed as the distillery who has more than 1% going into single malt releases. Ben Nevis is owned by Nikka and I assume that a lot of their spirit goes overseas, but they also produce some interesting whisky locally as they have a column still onsite that they use to make grain spirit. As such they’re one of the only distilleries left in Scotland (if not the only one) that can still make single blends – whisky made from combining grain and malt spirit at the same distillery. We tried one of their single cask single blends (made by filling a cask with a mixture of new make grain and malt whisky and leaving them to mature together before bottling) before at Whisky Squad and this one was similarly strange in flavour – I liked this one a lot more, though.

Number 3 had a nose of red wine gums (although Jonny thought it more strawberry Chewits), grass, aniseed, floral honeysuckle and a hint of savoury celery. To taste it was sweet and floral, with a strangely vegetal back-end, almost liked buttered green veg. The finish had green grass and wood, lemon and lime, and a light menthol tinge. Again we had no clue what it was and to the surprise of those who had tried whisky from the distillery before, including m’colleague Tim, this was an Aultmore 1997, bottled at 11 years old in 2008. I’ve not had a good record with Aultmore, and neither has Tim, and this was quite different in that we both quite enjoyed it. Most of the spirit from the distillery goes into the Dewar’s blends, also owned by Bacardi, but it was once owned by United Distillers and Vintners (UDV) and there was a 12 year old single malt released as part of the Flora & Fauna range. That is now a rather expensive and rare bottling, as UDV is now part of Diageo and the distillery sold on, but independent bottlings of Aultmore do appear from time to time.

We swiftly moved on to the penultimate dram. On the nose it had sweet rhubarb, berries, green leaves and flowers, with an astringent sweetness isolated by the room as a ‘balsamic drizzle’. To taste there was furniture polish, ginger, more leaves, apples and custard, and a hint of floral air freshener (one of my least favourite notes in a whisky, although subdued here). It finished quite tannic, with apple skins and a pot pourri mix of wood and air freshener (again). This was another surprise, being a Fettercairn 1993, bottled this year at 17 years old. Fettercairn is the quiet distillery from Whyte & Mackay’s portfolio, with their old single malt not particularly well thought of. Their older expressions have turned heads more recently but the vast majority still goes into blending. I’ve found Fettercairn to have a bit leafiness when I’ve tried it before and was happy to find that it’s also in a younger whisky (not that 17 years is that young). This one continued Jonny’s love of strange casks, having been matured entirely in a claret barrel. Red wine finishes are often a bit hit and miss, and this is only the second whisky I’ve tried that spent it’s entire life in a red wine cask – I declare this experiment to be at least a partial success.

We then moved onto the final dram of the night. It had a nose of fruit leaves and berry jam (I rather like leafy whisky at the moment so that recurring note was a good thing for me, at least) with an unexpected of hit pine floor cleaner. It had a rather oily mouthfeel with mint, menthol, woody liquorice root, a bit of soft liquorice pastille, raspberry and victoria sponge cake. It finished with mulchy fruit leaves, dark wood and lingering dark chocolate. A strange combination of flavours and one that yet again noone got near – it was a Craigellachie 1994 (again with a -Glenlivet on the end on the label) bottled at 12 years of age in 2007. Craigellachie sits slap bang in the middle of Speyside, near the Speyside cooperage, and I’ve been driven past it a number of times when up on holiday in Scotland. However, from the road it’s not the picturesque pagoda roofed thing you might expect from seeing distillery photos and looks very much like a chemical plant, which in essence it is. Like Aultmore they’re now owned by Bacardi, having been acquired from UDV when they sold Dewar’s, but they didn’t get a look in to the Flora and Fauna range, changing ownership before UDV got a chance to release one. Diageo, as successors to UDV, have released a Rare Malts expression from their stocks, but in general independent bottlers are the only place to find Craigellachie as a single malt. I’ve only tried a couple and so far they’ve been entirely different to each other, the previous one being a light stereotypical bourbon cask whisky…

Anyways, my missing of a Whisky Squad seems to have started a trend – I am most probably missing the next one as well (although hope has sprung today with a move to a new venue). There are another two in November and the first one (#23, The Smoking Section) flew off the shelves in the usual tiny amount of time. However, there are still a few left for session two of the month, which I will be going to – Whisky 4 Movember. I suspect its fear of bad moustaches that has kept the tickets from selling out, but worry not facial hair is not mandatory.

Glenburgie 1993, 11 years old
Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 59.8%

Ben Nevis 14 years old
Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 58.1%

Aultmore 1997, 11 years old
Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 57.5%.

Fettercairn 1993, 17 years old
Highland Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 51.5%.

Craigellachie 1994, 12 years old
Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 58.3%.