17/01 & 25/02/2021 Reduced whiskies

Not everyone wants cask-strength whiskies all the time. For this session, JS and I curated a line-up with only reduced whiskies. All poured blind, it goes without saying.

As with the November tasting, we have this over two dates, with two groups, though some join both times.

Group 1: adc, Psycho, PSc, kruuk2, dom666, JS and tOMoH.
Group 2: adc, Psycho (for the first dram only), Bishlouk, STL, red71, ruckus, sonicvince, JS and tOMoH.

kruuk2 even has his samples, this time. He and dom666 explain they met yesterday to split and share the large samples that dom666 held, which led to a few comical situations -- buying plastic containers, damaging one with a cutter, whisky dripping, transfer to a new container and a mental note that whisky #2 was now in container whose lid read #3 -- only for Mrs. kruuk2 to point out the bleeding obvious: that he only had to swap the lids... Them boys, eh? :-)

Group 1

Group 2 observes that ruckus, wearing headphones and sitting in front of his record collection, has a beard to end all beards. Or is it a beard? No! Nothing on the chin.
tOMoH: "You look straight out of the American Civil War."
Bishlouk: "With your headphones on, you look like DJ Ulysses Grant."

Group 2

Dram #1

Nose: adc says it is nice, because she can smell it forever without it assaulting the nose. I find chocolate and a beef-stock cube, to which dom666 and kruuk2 add, 'Oxo'. Next is a hint of forsythia, coated in caramel, then cherry (PSc), a spicy touch and, finally, hydrocarbon (PSc). adc guesses Speyside, Bishlouk thinks it is a grain, whilst STL reckons a sherry-matured grain, likely a Cambus. I find crushed strawberry.
Mouth: dry and spicy (kruuk2), an Islay (dom666, who will later claim he said 'Speyside'), lukewarm cola, ginger ale. PSc finds it spicy on the tongue, after a sweet beginning. It is sweet alright, sugary, even, with toffee and Demerara sugar.
Finish: dry, earthy, it has coffee grounds, mocha and toasted hazelnuts (adc). kruuk2 calls it an interior whisky, to which PSc adds it could be one "to drink on a terrace, but with a plaid." sonicvince finds it caramelised.

Knockando 20yo 1974/1995 Quincentenary (43%, OB specially selected for Aberdeen University) 8/10

Full notes here.

adc: "The nose, the palate, the finish seem like three different whiskies."
Psycho: "You weren't supposed to pour all five samples into the one glass!"

We talk about Top Gun 2 and the Dune remake.
kruuk2: "S'ils l'avaient sorti en salle et en streaming en même temps, ç'aurait fait Dune pierre deux coups"

dom666 [about the GR20]: "All in all, it goes down, even though it goes up and down."

red71: "Psycho [who rocks a mean beard too], if you are not Chewbacca, you must be a young Gandalf!"

Dram #2

Nose: more flat cola, Dr. Pepper, oregano (Psycho -- I note that I am making an oregano sauce, but he cannot be smelling that from another country). red71 finds it vegetal, with fresh plant stems, whilst sonicvince detects mint and adc is reminded of a meadow after the rain. For me, it is a whisper of faded leather. The second group thinks that the nose looses steam rapidly.
Mouth: cinnamon and a soft ginger freshness, adc finds it creamy. Psycho finds it fresh, yet also spicy. ruckus finds it sweet.
Finish: "Dailuaine?" (adc) Comforting, discreet (dom666). Short, though it leaves a strange and persistent taste in the mouth (sonicvince).

Dailuaine 16yo (43%, OB, L0343LS000 00039534, b. 2010) 8/10

Full notes here.

dom666 [referring to Psycho's note and name]: "Tu sais, l'origan, c'est juste de la marjolaine sauvage. Et Nicolas et Marjolaine..."
tOMoH: "dom666 has Dorothée's anthology in fifteen CDs. He puts glasses in front of them; we can't see them, but they're there..."
PSc: "Have you heard of the Wikidomia encyclopedia?"
kruuk2: "Same as the Nicopedia."

adc [during the second session]: "Dram #2 is better than I remembered it."
STL: "How can you tell? You don't remember which is which..."

Dram #3

Nose: "very smoky," says adc, who concedes it loses that smoke over time. Shoe polish, polished leather, charcoal (adc), medicinal and waxy (dom666), borderline plasticine-like. Mull's whisky cave (adc), wormwood, caramelised apple or unbaked bread (Psycho). kruuk2 finds it two-faced, starting out fruity, then becoming woody and more classical. adc calls it schist-y, slate-y or shale-like. Pears (sonicvince), fresh and flowery (Bishlouk), almost solvent-like (red71), dust, elderberry (adc), squashed overripe banana (sonicvince), mirabelle plum, peach and even mango and lychee, from where I stand.
Mouth: more waxy goodness, plasticine, soft shoe polish, citrus (PSc), oregano. It is also mineral (Psycho) and metallic (PSc). Psycho, once prompted, calls pencil-sharpener blade, while PSc retorts graphite. Not much in the mouth for Bishlouk, but STL has banana. ruckus finds it sweet again, and indeed, banana rum for me, and that is quite sweet.
Finish: patina, furniture wax, coating beeswax, thick and dark, even honey and rose-petal jelly. sonicvince regrets that the finish does not match the lovely nose, even with the added frangipane. red71 is not convinced by this one. It does tickle my gums and ticks all my boxes.

Glen Grant 25yo (40%, Gordon & MacPhail, b.1980s) 8/10

Full notes here.

PSc: "I can smell something I have never smelled before, so I can't identify it..."
tOMoH: "Success?"

PSc teases Psycho that he should use fertiliser to grow his beard

sonicvince: "I love how the discussion moved from lacquemant waffles to Bref detergent..."
tOMoH: "Lacq. The br(i)ef version of lacquemant is lacq."

Dram #4

Nose: hay and dry cereal and a pinch of ash. It is not all dry and barren, though: squashed plums peek, as do oily Lays paprika crisps (Psycho). kruuk2 is not a fan of the nose, whilst PSc finds it lemon-y. I spot pink grapefruit, even if PSc calls it Parasol Citron. Plasticine again. Very ripe banana (sonicvince), but also sea spray (sonicvince), and a freshness that soon turns citrus-y (sonicvince, who is now inexhautstible), acidic (Bishlouk), fresh as a beach (sonicvince), refined (Bishlouk). adc makes the comment more high-brow, saying it has carambola.
Mouth: stone dry, spicy (dried-chilli flakes), then it becomes lemon-y again, with a few chocolate shavings. red71 and sonicvince find it rougher on the tongue, which is odd, as I have sweet beer. It is chewy, though. Peppery spices (Bishlouk), waxy fruit (Bishlouk), a mix of apricot and pink grapefruit. adc calls it mineral, like drinking water that has flowed on granite.
Finish: lemon-y and dry again, it has hay and jute bags, corn flour, then apricot flesh to accompany the comeback of milk chocolate. ruckus finds it drying, which is echoed by red71's comment about bitterness. sonicvince finds the finish very long, Bishlouk finds it complex, yet it leaves a drying bitterness that works less well for him. ruckus does not care much for it. red71 and sonicvince love this almond-skin bitterness.

Macduff 24yo 1984/2008 (46%, Signatory Vintage for Direct Wines First Cask, C#877, b#215, L08/498) 9/10

Full notes here.

dom666: "Nazi Germany loved Coca-Cola. There were several bottling plants in Germany. Of course, when the embargo started, the Americans stopped supplying Coca-Cola, so the Germans made an ersatz..."
tOMoH: "They called it Swastikoka..."
Psycho: Ikea was also making the bunk beds for the camps!"
tOMoH: "...under the name Swastikea..."

Dram #5

Nose: "my grandmother's sofa" (Psycho), dust, old papers (adc), some kind of cloth -- jute? (adc), peach skins, freshly-polished combat boots, liquorice and vanilla (PSc), books kept in a (dry) dusty cellar (adc), "hay in the sun, in the summer, with a fence and a linden tree" (PSc in full poetic mode), bison herb (adc). "It smells like feet after a hike in plastic sandals," says adc during the second session. sonicvince calls this nose "more common," though time makes it more metallic, he admits. I tell everyone it is leather they are smelling, which attracts the response: "leather that smells like feet, then." Moccasins it is. Smoke and damp leather, according to sonicvince, which Bishlouk confuses for industrial metal. sonicvince concedes it is metallic -- metallic and animal; stables, if adc is to be believed.
Mouth: lively, fruity, it has strawberry and kumquat (adc). Psycho finds it sweet, sugary. Soft and sweet (sonicvince), it has varnish, a creamy, custard-y texture (adc), but it is also a tad soapy (sonicvince); 'Bref,' says ruckus, our resident detergent expert. Floral in a rose-petal fashion (sonicvince). Or is it slate? adc says so.
Finish: long, cinnamon-y, citrus-y, the finish has satsumas, pink grapefruit and dried fruits (Psycho). On the other hand, kruuk2 finds it good, but not noteworthy, sort of: "it tastes like whisky." sonicvince finds it spicier than the previous drams, but pleasant.

Bruichladdich 15yo (43%, OB imported by F.Ili Rinaldi Importatori, b.1981, 900b) 9/10

Full notes here.

When it is revealed that only the first whisky is mine, and the other four are JS's:
sonicvince: "Thanks, JS! Good thing you're here!"

sonicvince: "STL changed rooms!"

STL: "Well, either I changed rooms, or I had to leave you..."

tOMoH: "It's the first time we win! \o/"

Interesting to see the two groups' respective preferences. Drams #1 to #3 were very popular with group 1 (#3 being the favourite), whilst #4 and #5 were widely seen as far weaker. Aside ruckus, group 2 was exactly the opposite, loving drams #4 and #5 and being uniformly disappointed with #3, even adc, who was there both nights.

I gave one rule before we started the sesh: no Brexit talk, no COVID-19 discussion. Mostly, we were good about it -- and boy, was it all the more enjoyable too! Lots of friendly banter and general nonsense with minimum stress. Woo!

23/02/2021 Clynelish

Clynelish 21yo 1995/2017 (54.6%, Douglas Laing Xtra Old Particular, Refill Hogshead, C#DL12014, 265b, b#237): nose: caster sugar, dusted onto apple pie, a whisper of encaustic that soon turns into bolder furniture polish, pickled red onion -- in a sweet sort of way, if that makes sense, yet without being onion relish. At the next twist, it is baked potato, dusty books, old sheepskin leather, then heady wine, before it finally delivers some jammy fruits: rowan-berry jelly, billberry curd (dedicated to all Roland Casper fans) and elderberry cordial. It certainly evolves to become rather heady, heavy, even. The second nose is full-on jelly, a tad lighter, now, with quince and acorn jellies. Yes, they make that; a hit in Squirrelandia, I hear. Mouth: crisp and sharp, more so than the nose suggested, it immediately displays pouring honey and vinegar-y pickle, as well as a copious dose of wood dust and galangal shavings, dried to brittle, charry shards. There is even a pinch of ash. The second sip is a little more syrupy, until the alcohol catches up and bites the tongue with a wee dose of cracked black pepper. Elderberry and blackberry then set up camp for good, pitching their tent on a bed of solid oak and mahogany ornaments. Maybe bramble is there too. Not bad. Finish: soft at first, it grows in power, with dark honey on a slice of toasted oak (watch your teeth!), sprinkled with a pinch of ash and wood dust. There persists an impression of dusty old books and desiccating ground walnut shells. It is not unpleasant, but it is borderline, according to my taste. Repeated sipping brings about an impression of darkness: dark wood, dark fruits, dark honey, black-magic spell books... Ha! Ha! It does remain drying, in the long run. Decent, but it does not enthral me, tonight. 7/10

22/02/2021 Imperial

Imperial 22yo 1998/2020 Monologue (52.1%, Chapter 7 A Whisky Anthology for Europe & Asia, Bourbon Barrel, C#104355, 218b): nose: amazingly floral, in a dry sense, teeming with dried lavender, buttercups and other meadows flowers, pot-pourri, hay, then yellow fruits: mirabelle plum, peach, even unripe mango. Warm wool appears, recently woven, and that mango becomes more pronounced -- much to my satisfaction, I might add. Quince jelly, sprinkled with ash, warm plastic buckets, dry fern, and burnt bracken, competing with the mango. After a few minutes, the nose has something closer to ink (Pelikan Royal Blue), then warm metal; picture a stainless-steel worktop in a heated professional kitchen. Last but not least, roasted peanuts enter the picture. Mouth: soft and fruity, the palate has a silky texture, though it does not lack character. Ten seconds in, a gentle metallic edge complements the lovely plums, nectarines and ripe peaches. It is definitely stone fruits, and the knife to cut them has bitten into the stone. That, of course, creates a mild bitterness, which in no way takes away from the enjoyment. The second sip is warming like a natural-gas stove (hot metal, then), and also a little woodier. The fruit stones seem more pronounced, over time, with even mango stones thrown into the mix (not to be confused with mangosteen) and maybe a torn peppermint leaf. Finish: marvellously fruity and creamy, it seems a combination of peach flesh and milk-chocolate coulis. A winning combination if I know one! Hot cocoa, dried herbs, as there were in the nose (tarragon and hay, here). The finish is medium-long, slowly fading out with elegance, barely hinting at the metallic hue from earlier. It is dominated by buttery fruit and creamy chocolate goodness, even if, in the long run, the afore-mentioned peppermint becomes more and more numbing. Outstanding Imperial! 8/10 (Thanks for the sample, EC)

19/02/2021 Sandy Macnab

Sandy Macnab’s Old Blended Scotch 5yo (40%, Macnab Distilleries, b.1980s): a blend associated with Joseph Hobbs's ventures. This should be full of Lochside. Nose: it is not very loquacious, initially. At a push, it does show its youth, with ether or white alcohol (as in: 'unaged'; not 'white spirit,' the paint remover), yet also transparent wood varnish, carbonyl, and such. Further on, one detects balsa-wood shavings and a jute bag full of dried shallots. Then, even later, something more elegant, reminiscent of patina-covered wood panels in an old countryside holiday home -- 'countryside,' because it has a certain earthiness to it too. Warming and shaking the glass brings shy fruit to the fore (canary-melon slices, physalis, yellow kiwi), as well as roasted pine cones. Timid, dry white wine prevails, however. The nose is obviously trying to present tropical fruits (lychee, dragon fruit, maracuja), yet they never really make it trough. Mouth: ample, silky and oily, velvety, even, it has nutty flavours on the tongue (walnuts, peanuts, nothing too exotic), and cured or wine-soaked fruits (apricots, peaches, poached pears) and subtle cured-ginger slices, mingling with the nuts. Next to that are vaguely-greener nuances on the walls of the mouth, such as hass-avocado skins. White Port, maybe, though that would seem a tad too sweet; Fino sherry, perhaps? It feels thick, not extravagantly sweet. Finish: Stewed apricots, peaches in (red) wine, poached pears, walnuts (skin on), almonds, and simply goodness. It leaves the mouth covered in velvet, wanting for more. Warm-fruit custard with a pinch of ground avocado stone, sprinkled with a teaspoon of avocado oil. No avocado flesh, on the other hand. The finish is medium long and comforting, warming, even. Aside a minor bitterness (the ground avocado stone), this is excellent sipping whisky. 7/10 (Thanks for the dram, JS)

18/02/2021 New Make

Undisclosed New Make (~63%): a blind sample from Cthulhu knows where, with not even a name of someone I could ask for more information. I remember it is new make and I think I remember 63%, for some reason. How useful is this note going to be, eh? :-) Nose: quite new-make-y, yet it has some interesting richness to it too. Next to the usual plum eau-de-vie (a regular in new-make), there is also roasted corn, toffee, caramelised puffed rice (think: Kellogg's Smacks), warm terracotta, draff... I find it pleasantly cereal-y, in fact. Roasted cocoa beans, Kellogg's Chocos (I see that they swap the monkey and the bears mascots randomly, based on the country in which it is marketed -- not confusing at all! I am talking about the bear and the green box), warm oat "milk" and, lastly, an unexpected drop of of apricot liqueur. Or is it stewed apricot? Mouth: wow! This is shooting marzipan and plasticine left, right and centre a la The Pogues. Naturally, that is quickly matched by plum eau-de-vie, yet it does not fully mask the lovely marziplast™. There is something chalkier too, in the back of the mouth, as one chews on it, then blue shoe polish and not-quite-ripe fruits appear (grapes and plums). Finish: bold, warming and comforting, it is heavily marked by marziplast™, waxy plum and something a little more bitter that I cannot immediately identify. Cocoa, perhaps? Not quite dark chocolate, at any rate. The cereal-y side is nowhere to be found, now, although scratching my throat after swallowing makes me think of stale, lukewarm stout, which is as cereal-y as they come. Go figure! Well done, whoever made this. Assuming it loses the plum eau-de-vie with a bit of maturation, it should become a pleasant sipper indeed. 6/10