The month of August has almost disappeared already, and we are behind in tasting. Let us make this last day count!
Bowmore 32yo 1968/2000 (45.5%, OB selected by Brian Morrison to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the Original Stanley P. Morrison Company, 1860b, b0518): it is insane to think we opened this here bottle just shy of thirteen years ago and as insane to acknowledge we last poured it over nine years ago. Nose: what lovely fruits! We have smashed strawberries, plump raspberries, greengages and pink passion fruits. It has a whiff of ex-Bourbon Quercus Alba, which is to say a drop of coconut milk and vanilla ice cream. Very, very elegant. For the first time, I reckon, we catch a murmur of smoke. Oh! it is not industrial chimneys; merely the remains of a campfire. Blink and you miss it, though! In seconds, the second charge of fruits is upon us, with pink grapefruit, banana, papaya and cherimoya. That is followed by lichens on staves and Verdigris, yet also various sorts of nougats and marshmallows. That is not all, for honeysuckle, sarcococca, unripe rosehip, and even hazelwood, dried to crumbling, all rock up at some point. Phwoar! Orange-blossom water and rosewater drip onto smashed Cape gooseberries in a kitchen that has a wood stove. Candied berries and pink passion fruits add another layer. The second nose is so full of pastry one gets to wonder whether one is now nosing a grain whisky! Custard-y turnovers (Mirabelle plums, nectarines), buttery couques aux raisins, and those omnipresent passion fruits (smoked, now) complement rubber boots and a gentle wood smoke. Mouth: quite the attack, despite the bottle being half empty for a decade (or half full, you know?), fruity, acidic and a little bitter. Here are gooseberries, Cape gooseberries, pink and green passion fruit, Mirabelle plums and greengages, a drop of plant sap, just bitter enough to be acknowledged, too quiet to be identified. Chewing unleashes a torrent of maracuja, some not entirely ripe, unripe pineapple, pomelo, grapefruit peels and a little wood. Hell! it even has a rubbery aspect, chewy, a tad bitter, closer to root-y liquorice than to crude oil -- it is a Bowmore, after all, not a Port Ellen. The second sip is more-directly acidic, with bright citrus and other tropical fruits -- pineapple, cherimoya, calamansi, calamondin and, of course, maracuja (yellow, now). Rubber plays a game of whack-a-mole, too fleeting to be seen as bold, merely adding a nuance now and then. Finish: it feels brief and abrupt, filled with plant stems and green-wood splinters. Then, all of a sudden, retro-nasal olfaction picks up similar vibes to what we experienced on the palate. Rubbery liquorice allsorts, chewy citrus peels (Shaddock, blush orange) and orange-blossom water sprayed on tar. The intensity of this fruity bitterness is striking. I keep thinking it should not work, yet, not only it does, it leaves me craving for more. Preserved Seville-orange rinds, in brine, which adds salt to the redoubtable bitter-fruity combination we now take for granted. The second gulp gives a similar impression, with minor rubber on the way down, probably citrus peels rather than oil derivatives, and a lot more going on via retro-nasal olfaction: smoked pomelo, melon skins, cigar leaves (unlit), hazelwood sticks rubbed against one another, heated but not ignited. The other fruits (gooseberry, pineapple Mirabelle) are more in the background, now; only a general creaminess subsists. I have always been fond of this bottling, the first 1960s Bowmore in my collection. Now that I spent enough time with it, it is easy to see why: it is a masterpiece! 10/10
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