16/05/2021 Kavalan

Kavalan 5yo 2015/2021 (54.8%, OB Solist, Vinho Barrique, C#W151203043A, 213b): nose: immediately, this reminds me why I do not taste Kavalan very often: it is a heady mix of heavy wine and astringent wood with high-octane alcohol. Teak furniture, newly assembled and given a generous lick of teak oil (I understand one is not supposed to oil teak that much), toasted bread, dunked into a bowl of fortified wine, grilled dried dates and fortified-wine-soaked blotting paper or cardboard -- picture a bottle of Port on its flank on a teak desk, the content emptying on the desk blotter. Add a fistful of honey-glazed pecans, left under the grill for a little too long, and a glass of Pedro Ximénez for kicks: it is sweet, yet it retains a whiff of dunnage warehouse too. Simmering in a broth, bay leaves tickle the back of the nose, as one tilts the glass. Mouth: thick and spicy, nigh-on fiery, this has a red-chilli relish spread on a teak chest, with dates and pecans thrown into the mix. To extinguish the roaring chilli fire, you down a glass of syrupy sherry -- a daft thing to do, as it only fans the flames, of course. Boy! this is thick and coating. It turns musty too, almost cork-like on the taste buds, drying. I suppose that, if one consumes too much sugar, one ends up dehydrated too, and that is how this feels. The aggressive woody tones recede, the chilli calms down over time, leaving but the cloying sweetness. Treacle soon dominates this palate. Treacle and cough syrup. Finish: it is all thick and coating syrup, here, with a notch of wood remaining, enough sugar to give one diabetes with a single look, and that drying cork touch, yet it all feels more balanced than the palate, in that the chilli is only in the background, now, much more tolerable as a result. Phew! The second sip brings about something toasty, reminiscent of a liquorice-flavoured cough syrup. It does remain sweet, there is no question about it! Exhausting whisky, this. I cannot see how one could drink more than one glass -- or why one would want to. 7/10 (Thanks for the sample, SA and JW)