For Pork Hellene, see? I will never tire of that pun. Even the more relevant, considering the samples below are from MV, who introduced me to Udo Jürgens.
You know...
Anyway, let us roll.
Port Ellen 23yo 1983/2007 (56.7%, Douglas Laing The Old & Rare Platinum Selection selected by & exclusively bottled for The Whisky Fair Bourbon Hogshead, 150b): nose: call the chimney sweep! We have a blocked chimney. And it is not Santa who is stuck in there, it is a build-up of soot. Plenty of ink too, amusingly. Is this an Ardbeg from the 1970s? We then have more-coastal notes, such as fishing nets, crab crates, hull planks, half eaten by sea salt, and a jerry-can of diesel. That petrolic side develops, and engine oil soon introduces a whole (newish) engine, all clean steel and grease. It does not stop there either: earthy scents grow in power, part rich soil, part sand patties after a black tide. In the distance, a whisper of natural gas. Smelling this, one would think they closed the distillery to curb carbon emissions! Later on, we have crusty bread turning stale. The second nose is deeper and earthier, with dried mushrooms, potting soil, and cigarette smoke. But then, we also have acrylic paint and old radiators. How interesting. Not much soot left to spot, at this stage. A couple of drops of water tone it down a lot. All that remains is a bit of smoky milk bread. It takes a while before crates of smoked haddock finally come to the fore. Mouth: rancio and dusty clay floors at first, the (strong) palate soon introduces a deluge of soot, dark, acrid, and a little intimidating. Coal dust, smog, coal stoves in need of servicing, creosote. We have little-to-no petrol, here, but tar instead, smoked black cumin, and crushed nigella seeds. A slice of lemon too, fairly discreet. The second sip is softer, fruitier (peach, nectarine, plum), and earthier. We are talking about modelling clay and plasticine, rather than countryside scents. After a minute in the mouth, diesel makes a comeback, and the fruits are torched with a diesel flame. Water adds an oil lamp to that, dusty, oily, and as if stuck in the past. Nice. Finish: the lemon is more pronounced, and it announces burnt wood and dusty wood burners. We comfortably remain in fossil-fuel territory, but it is strikingly different again: neither petrol nor coal, but wood. Burnt wood. It has some fruits, skewered and roasted on the campfire: pineapple (it has lost all its juice, though). grapefruit rinds, tart apples (Granny Smith or Bramley). After a couple of minutes, medicinal touches surface: tincture of iodine and gauze, embrocation, and disinfectants of sorts. The second sip has oil-drenched earth, and methane via retro-nasal olfaction. What remains of those medicinal touches are old bandages and an empty bottle of ether. With water, we have smoked sphagnum moss, stagnant water, and smoked bracken. It is juicier than neat, not because of exuberant fruits -- none of that here! It is simply fresh, juicy peat. 9/10 (Thanks for the sample, MV)
Port Ellen 28yo 1983/2011 (58.9%, Malts of Scotland, Bourbon Hogshead, C#MoS11011, 267b): nose: astonishingly, this one is mute as a swan. It takes a while to slowly wake up, and the petroleum products are different than in the previous dram. No petrol or oil, here; instead, we have glues and solvents. Strong-glue tubes that are easy to picture giving a cheap high in dodgy parks of big cities, iodine, gauze, and white spirit or turpentine, maybe. It has notions of seafood too, namely lukewarm oysters and empty crab shells, but they are in the shadow of that glue. In the back of the sinuses, peat patties are drying on the window sill. And that is swiftly pushed aside by gauze, tincture of iodine, and turpentine. If looking for it, one may identify melted sands (glassmaking, then), though it is less in-your-face. Later on, we spot a pot of dark watercolour, dried beyond salvaging, and ozone. The tilted glass gives a breeze of Cologne. The second nose is perhaps even muter than the first, despite having had an hour to open up. Scratching a bit, we find kerosene and detergents for hospital floors. It is reminiscent of an airport, in a way. Deeper inhaling reveals rubber boots, or a gardening hose. If there was one oil product we missed thus far, it was rubber. Well, no longer! That transforms into plasticine and window-cleaning solution, over time, none too shouty. Water unveils embrocation, old bandages, mummy wraps, and dried mosses. The odd part is that those come with stagnant water too. Mouth: chewy and unexpectedly fruitier than the first dram, it has Starburst of some flavour, but smoked to smithereens. Indeed, seconds on the palate, and the liquid unleashes so much smoke that it is hard to see past it. New linoleum, burnt linoleum, carpet glue, creosote, and a badly-tuned diesel engine. It has a drop of lime juice as well, and smoked citrus peels. The second sip is similar to a petrol station: it has got that distinctive smell that affects one's taste for the next few kilometres, and, of course, the rubber hoses of the pumps themselves. Water gives a drop of paint thinner in a pot of dark-green modelling paint. Sphagnum moss appears, after a while, smoked, yet tame. Finish: a beautiful, dancing finish that swirls about, dishing out iodine, citrus juice, and coal dust, but also a gentle (or not-so-gentle, depending on one's level of tolerance) bitterness. Here is a tractor tyre set on fire. The smoke it generates is acrid and toxic. The tongue feels as though it has just licked a tractor tyre too, albeit not one that is burning, and it is entirely coated in sticky soot to boot. Good, but honestly quite challenging. As the tongue recovers, the taste buds identify charred grapefruits and blackened pineapple slices. No point looking for any juice, here; it all looks like Los Angeles in that nightmare sequence from Terminator 2. The second sip is more welcoming, to a degree. In a charred landscape, we can now picture other things, such as grapefruits and parchments. They feel baked and recognisable for a few seconds, yet they revert back to charred paper, crumbling to dust in no time. Water brings in smoked lichens and mosses. 8/10 (Thanks for the sample, MV)
Port Ellen 28yo 1982/2011 (63.6%, Scotch Single Malt Circle selected by and bottled for Maltisten Westfalen, Bourbon Hogshead, C#2860, 452b): nose: a different beast again. Here, what strikes first is heather. Not a hugely-fragrant flower field, but a heather bale, or a heather brush. Twigs doused in white wine (Grenache), pretty austere and mineral. An earthier tone develops, timid and indistinct. It is dry and arid earth, only suited to certain crops (tOMoH does not know enough on the subject to elaborate). It is hard for me to shake a mental vision of a loamy soil, and I picture a drop of lemon juice on oysters, even though it has very little to make one think of the sea. A dry fishing net in a chest in the loft, that has not seen the sea for decades, perhaps. I wonder if the high ABV makes this less expressive. Heated plastic ends up emerging, closer to Bakelite than to cellophane. The second nose brings more warm plastic, in the form of (empty) rubbish bins left out in the sun, or plastic cups for the soda fountain. There is a sugary quality to this too, melted (smoked) caster sugar, before it turns into caramel, and an ever-bigger whiff of marsh gas. Lastly, we can celebrate the arrival of fermented apples. Water increases the plastic note, and makes it softer plastic -- not quite oilskins, but closer to (new) rubber boots than rubbish bins. Mouth: sharp and precise, I think they say. In this case, that means it hits one note very clearly: lemon on scorched earth. As one gets accustomed to the fierce strength, other notes become discernible, such as hot sands and roasted peaches, then hot dusty boilers on a trawler. The second sip has spent matches -- the burnt paraffin sticks much more than the sulphur-y tips; this is hardly sulphur-y. Burnt fruit stones (peaches and greengages), as well as a tiny green bitterness. Oh! it is not dandelion stems, or anything; more smoked calamansi foliage. Repeated sipping flashes a light on exhaust fumes, and underlines said bitterness. A drop of water makes this more medicinal, with TCP and tincture of iodine next to smoked baked plums. Unusual, but it works. Finish: pleasantly fruity from the start (the start of the finish, yes?), it feels much better integrated than the palate could make one fear. Grilled pineapple comes out strongest, maybe peach is in second place. We are soon distracted by a bucket of oven-dried dredged waste, which is original enough to trigger one's curiosity. Obviously, and despite being "easier" than foreseen, the finish goes on forever. Embers, hot sands, heather brushes ready for the fire. It comes across as more medicinal than frankly smoky, and, by that, I mean numbing like anaesthetic. The tongue is a bit groggy. Understandable, when one considers the amount of alcohol in each sip. The second gulp feels peculiarly approachable, and would be overflowing with fruits (mirabelle plums, Golden Delicious apples), were it not for a dual countereffect of limestone and rubber. Cheese slates and racing racing radial tyre, we will call them. The finish has an obvious smoke too, now closer to exhaust fumes than anything more rustic. Much to my surprise, water continues the smoked baked plum impression. In addition, we have heated dusty cast iron, and an increased bitterness. Perhaps the plums were not quite ripe before baking. In any case, it stays warming and slightly numbing. Also to note is the arrival of burnt wood. 9/10 (Thanks for the sample, MV)
Science says we should try blending all three, as well as the three possible combinations of any two, but I cannot be bothered. I like them enough on their own.
Happy birthday, FH, JPH, MD.
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