163.1 6yo 2018/2024 Smokin'! (58.1%, SMWS Society Cask, 1st Fill ex-Bourbon Barrel, 240b): nose: smokin' indeed! Roasted apples, smoked quince, a warm-but-empty brasero. It has a pinch of ash too, yet the longer it breathes, the fruitier it gets: soon, we detect roasted pineapple and acidic lemon juice, heated and used to clean shiny metal -- it is not exactly a razor blade, but it does not fall very short. It settles for warm smoked-apple compote and pulped chargrilled pineapple. Looking with intent, one may spot a fleeting whiff of boiled egg, though calling it sulphury would be delusional. Perhaps it has herbs growing in stagnant water; it is slightly vegetative. The second nose is dustier, freckled with drops of old honey that has set and gathered, well, dust. This is a nose that is reminiscent of a rustic kitchen in the countryside, somehow, wood for the fire and all. On the late tip, we note a brown-corduroy game bag at body temperature. It contains an apple and a smattering of gunpowder. Mouth: assertive not brash, which is quite an achievement, after only six years in wood. It has the numbing effect of peppermint with little of the pepper -- could it be spearmint? Or a dentist's anaesthetic? Half a chew fans the smoke a little and restores chargrilled fruits, pineapple and apples, maybe quince too. The second sip is ashier, soot-y, even, acrid, jet-black and coating, while sucking all moisture from the palate. Chewing brings forth incandescent embers, burnt wood, an undecipherable mineral quality, and mixes those with the fruits from before. Finish: a nice, green, minty touch fades out to make way for smoky fruits. Smoked apples, grilled pineapple, shiny metal (it must have been a new grille upon which the pineapple was chargrilled). A hot fruit salad with chopped mint at second gulp. A faint medicinal taste lingers between the roof of the mouth and the top of the throat, part tincture of iodine, part burnt fruit stones (plum), part ether, part piping-hot apple compote. It feels close to anaesthetics again, not so much the effect as the taste, though it is a little numbing, to be clear. This is bloody good. 8/10
Bonne Fête Nationale, Belgian friends.
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