08/08/2026 Whisky Fringe (Day 2 -- Part 1)

Following yesterday's adventures, I would be lying if I pretended I feel fine, this morning. But a run and a shower do wonders.

This sight helps too

As does meeting this beautiful bird

And breakfast does miracles.

Especially this kind of breakfast!
Brazilian Lemonade, Crème Brûlée,
Vegan Cherry Matcha, Tropical Cheesecake

It is soon time to leave -- in a hurry, even!

A short train ride later, we reach our first stop with a minute to spare and sit down for lunch. It is, of course, our usual spot, l'escargot bleu.

Talonmore & Apple (me)

Duck-and-pigeon terrine with onion compote (me)

Duck egg omelette with Comté cheese (JS)

Plaice filet [sic], smoked haddock, mussels with Orkney Scallop (JS)

honey beetroot + tomato salad

Suckling pig roulade with black pudding (me)

Ile Flottante (JS)

Chocolate Némésis (me)

Latte (JS)

Everything is excellent. The plaice, however, is legendary. Texture, seasoning, sauce, accompaniment, it is perfection in the form of a flat fish. So much so it has me shedding tears each time I take a bite. That is not an exaggeration for comedic effect. Plaice has long been my favourite fish, but this is something else. One of the best dishes I have ever had.

JS: "The fish was cooked to perfection. It had a sense of plaice."

Sadly the meal has to end. We have business across the road and a queue to join (it is much longer than yesterday).

We want to start by tying up loose ends at the Thompsons' stall, but it is busy already. Instead, we stop by Tormore. Before I have the time to ask the lady how she likes working with OC and SSS, she undertakes to tell us the history of the distillery. I do not have the heart to tell her we already know it.

Tormore Timeless (43%, OB, Bourbon + Sherry Casks, b.2026)

Nose: lemon drizzle, madeleine and sponge cake.

Mouth: more lemon-y goodness, muffin, drizzle or sponge cake.

Finish: it has a soft bitterness, here, mixed peel, lemon and grapefruit zest.

Comment: clever wording to describe a no-age-statement. It is a great starter.

Score: 7/10

As we obtain the next dram, someone farts. Several times. We need to flee to the smokers' corner outside to escape the pugnacity of the stench. tOMoH has been known to let some nasty ones rip on occasion (Psycho has a recurrent story on the subject), but this lack of consideration is very difficult to accept. Tomorrow, mine will smell similar and I will have fever. I blame the guy who farted in the tent, at Whisky Fringe 2026, around 14:15 on the Saturday. The NHS is in disarray because of your lack of restraint, Mister!

Tormore 12yo (46%, OB, Bourbon, Cream Sherry + Toasted American White Oak Casks, b.2026)

Nose: darker citrus, blush orange, faint oiled furniture.

Mouth: orange rinds and peels, a bitter bite, mixed peel.

Finish: wine-cured orange, blush orange and a dusting of white pepper.

Comment: very good.

Score: 7/10

Tormore 16yo (46.8%, OB, Cream Sherry + Oloroso Sherry Casks, b.2026)

Nose: orange chocolate cakes (PiM's) and cream.

Mouth: creamy, thick, mellow, it has a lick of chocolate. It turns desiccating upon chewing.

Finish: creamy and dark, it has earthy notes and decaying dark woods.

Comment: good too, if perhaps a little dry.

Score: 7/10

Finally, an opening at the Dornoch duo's.

North British 33yo 1991/2025 An Edinburgh Dram (40.1%, Thompson Bros.)

Nose: bakery scents from a shiny steel pipe. There is honey and jams coming up too.

Mouth: thin and subtle, it has vanilla milk, remnants of marmalade in a metal goblet and sweet corn.

Finish: short, fairly simple, with baking chou dough, marmalade and such. And a touch of metal as well.

Comment: unchallenging, but very agreeable.

Score: 8/10

I go back to Decadent Drinks, where one of the staff is a friend of DH's, who advised last night to go meet him.

A nice bloke alright, though he has fired his best shots already: we had the orange dram and the most-prestigious bottles at his stand yesterday. Today's halftime orange dram is not yet open, so that does not work. Instead, I get to try the Daftmill again.

And discover where Francis is!

Since we are here and have a man on the inside, there are a few less-flamboyant things we have not yet tried.

Highland 30yo 1994+1995/2026 (47.1%, Decadent Drinks, Refill Hogsheads, 250b)

Nose: hay and apricot jelly, baked peaches.

Mouth: crushed peach stones, apricot stones, fruity and drying.

Finish: very fruity, with peach jelly and tinned peaches.

Comment: lovely. Could this be a Glenburgie? So much peach!

Score: 8/10

Old Orkney Relics 30yo 1996/2026 (41.7%, Decadent Drinks)

Nose: buttered bread slices that soon morph into hardened leather.

Mouth: mellow, toffee-like, it is rather buttery in texture and old school in taste. Close to what one would imagine an old blend should taste like, in fact.

Finish: more toffee, Scottish tablet and dried peach shavings. Cardboard-y, not in an unpleasant way (JS).

Comment: Decadent Drinks managed to secure Gordon & MacPhail's last cask of Old Orkney, hence the name. It is reminiscent of the one we tried, ahem, twelve years ago.

Score: 8/10

JS comes back with a dram: she rolled the die to get a mystery dram from the Thompsons.

If you read this and are not familiar with the concept, the Mystery Dram series is a collection that bears but a question mark on the front of the bottle. It has the ABV on the back, because that is a legal requirement, but not much else. All bottlings in a batch have the same ABV, by the way. When they release a batch, the bottlers disclose which casks were bottled, how many bottles each cask yielded, and the proportion a certain cask represents amongst the whole batch. One blind-buys a certain number of bottles at a flat rate and fate decides what one receives. One needs to unseal the bottle (remove the foil) to reveal the distillery and the age written on the stopper. At a tasting or a festival, it is a neat way to surprise others and shake their prejudices.

When travelling to festivals, the Thompsons bring six bottles (numbered 1 to 6) and a die. Punters roll the die, which dictates which bottling they try. JS rolls a 4.

Mystery Malt #4

Nose: lemon, lime, grapefruit, pomelo, freeze-dried peach slices.

Mouth: light, creamy and summery, it has plenty of fruits, including citrus zest. And, yes, that means a certain bitterness. it is acidic most of all, though. Pepper appears at second sip.

Finish: more citrus-y goodness, a tad creamy, zesty, zingy, alive.

Comment: solid. Several attempts to identify it (based on the sheet with the list of distilleries used for this batch), none accurate. It is a Raasay. We are dumbfounded.

Isle of Raasay 7yo b.2026 (46.3%, Thompson Bros. Mystery Malt, 1st Fill Bourbon Barrel, B#6, 206b) 8/10

The stats sheet

Daftmill 2012/2025 (46%, OB Summer Batch Release, 5250b)

Nose: super lemon-y, almost a one-trick pony. A lemon-y pony, that is.

Mouth: soft and custard-y, it gains a bay-leaf bitterness upon chewing.

Finish: custard, punctuated with lemon juice. Citrus sweets occur later on.

Comment: simple, but excellent at what it does.

Score: 8/10

Time to strategise. We have not paid attention to the halftime-orange selection of the day and the time is approaching. We go correct that.

An inventive way to circumvent the use of a trademarked name

We have a few minutes left and there so much else to try.

Lindores Abbey b.2026 1494 (46%, OB, Bourbon Barrels, Red Wine Barriques & Sherry Butts)

Nose: slightly herbaceous, it has a whiff of a 1970s kitchen in Continental Europe. Hot cast-iron pipes, stale butter, old bread, lack of ventilation.

Mouth: corn syrup, though not much of the sweetness one would expect of that.

Finish: it has a bit of a kick. Mint lozenges, mint cream supplemented with lime zest.

Comment: decent, if uneventful.

Score: 6/10

Nc'Nean 5yo 2019/2025 Lemon Meadow (48.5%, OB The Huntress Series, STR Red Wine + ex-American Whiskey + ex-Oloroso Casks, 5729b)

Nose: acidic as pine needles, dried citrus zest and Douglas-fir needles.

Mouth: it is strong and desiccating.

Finish: acidic, dry, it has plenty of pine needles and pine cones.

Comment: alright. Will not make me fall in love with the distillery, though.

Score: 7/10

In that time, JS has the following ones too:

• Nc'nean Organic (46%, OB, unknown batch)
• Nc'nean 2017+2022/2026 Malted Teacake (48.5%, OB The Huntress Series, 56% STR Red Wine + 42% Bourbon + 2% Oloroso Sherry Casks, B#5)
• Nc'nean 4yo 2020/2024 Amy (48.5%, OB Quiet Rebels, 63% STR + 19% ex-Maury + 18% ex-Bourbon, 10132b)

We go queue for our respective halftime choices. I am first in line, this year.

him: "Do you want anything, or are you queueing for the orange dram?"
tOMoH: "Queueing."
him: "Alright."

A few confused looks, then a modest queue starts to form behind me. What a trendsetter!

They blow the whistle. The exhibitors start to pour. All excited with my newly-poured bounty, I lose my pen. There are many on the floor, so it is only a matter of picking one up. However, it is not the same colour. And I do not like losing my stuff. As the crowd at the stall dissipates, I recover my prized pen, no doubt a free promotional item from who knows what company, worth absolutely bugger all. But it is mine.

Continue reading here.

07/08/2026 Whisky Fringe (Day 1 -- Part 3) After-party at the SMWS

Back to Glasgow to meet DH with JS. What better place than the local SMWS branch? It is Friday night and the new outturn is being launched. It is busy!

50.124 7yo d.2018 Vitality and maturity (59.4%, SMWS Society Cask, 1st Fill ex-Oloroso Hogshead, 328b)

Nose: winy. It has pickled onions, roast beef, wine sauce. It moves on to pan-seared mushrooms, the pan being deglazed with red-wine vinegar.

Mouth: strong and earthy, it has dead leaves, forest floor, dried pearl onions. Chewing adds a soft sweetness and a lot of horsepower.

Finish: burning-hot bread dough, Selkirk bannock, burnt Guiness cake. It really acquires a burnt note, after a while, perhaps charred beef, and a crisp bitterness.

Comment: disappointing. The previous 50, also a young one, was an excellent surprise. This one is more winy than I prefer.

Score: 7/10

76.166 20yo d.2005 Anyone for cricket? (50.9%, SMWS Society Cask, 1st Fill ex-Bourbon Barrel, 176b)

Nose: very floral and juicy (not sappy). Honeysuckle, rosehip, followed by pears, quinces and apples, gooseberries and Mirabelle plums. That ends with Greek shortbread.

Mouth: soft and fruity, it has plump gooseberries, Mirabelle plums and an avalanche of Conference pears upon chewing. The second sip has mild citrus, dusted in confectionary sugar.

Finish: elegant, floral, it displays physalis and Mirabelle plums here too, unripe pears, crunchy, almost unpleasant, yet actually very good.

Score: 8/10

121,126 9yo d.2006 Midnight desires (60.9%, SMWS Society Cask, 1st Fill ex-Sherry Hogshead, 153b)

Nose: another loud Sherry cask in action, with pickled onions, cured beef, braised shallots and red cabbage.

Mouth: sharp, spirit-y, it is akin to a strong wine spilled on earth. Rancio, roast beef, a lot of spices and dusty earth. It is really fierce, even after a few sips. Red cabbage again, augmented with cranberry sauce.

Finish: here is the best part, with a better balance, despite a pronounced winy bitterness. It feels like a bay leaf on roast beef. Time makes it mellower and sweeter, which works better for tOMoH.

Score: 6/10

Food enters.

Chicken supreme, roast baby gem, Caesar dressing, butter mash, bacon jam & chicken jus (DH)

Harissa roast hispi cabbage, garlic polenta & tahini dressing (me)

Garlic-baked mushroom burger, romesco, grilled onions, Parmesan & hand cut chips
House salad (JS)

68.141 14yo d.2011 The cooper and the croze (54.3%, SMWS Society Cask, ex-Bourbon Hogshead finished in 1st Fill American Oak Cask, 249b)

Nose: mercilessly strong, it gives rye vibes, metal and shoe polish.

Mouth: earthy plasticine and plums. It is also really strong, with red-chilli flakes.

Finish: boozy plums, prunes, prune syrup and liqueur, and, after a moment, cherry peppers. It feels stronger than the advertised ABV, which is not necessarily a good thing. Overall, it improves with water.

Score: 7/10

tOMoH: "Have you got Bath Street exclusive bottlings?"

There is only one, it turns out.

53.512 12yo Haven in a heartless world (58.7%, SMWS In Celebration 40 Bath Street Exclusive Cask, ex-Bourbon Cask finished in Refill Charred Red Wine Barrique, 286b)

Nose: peated kimchi (DH), a lot of mud, drying pottery and clay, wet earth smeared on an oilcloth.

Mouth: smoky-prune syrup moving towards chestnut paste, nutspread, smashed blackberries and ink. Of course, ink. It is a Caol Ila, after all. It feels stronger and spicier at second sip, with more ink and fishing nets dipped in plum juice.

Finish: big, earthy, muddy. We have tarry sands gorged with sea water.

Score: 7/10

59.108 14yo 2012/2026 Veritably vivacious (57.4%, SMWS Two to One, 1st Fill ex- Bourbon Hogshead & 1st Fill American Oak ex-Oloroso Hogshead, 572b)

Nose: chocolate spread, a dollop of Marmite, rancio, Madeira. Next is a splashed wet with fortified wine.

Mouth: sweet, sweet, sweet. Tawny Port, pressed apricots. It gains a big dose of pepper over time, but the fruity sweetness does stay.

Finish: strong, fired up with black pepper, it also welcomes nuts and a lick of mahogany cabinets.

Score: 7/10

Enough. It has been a long day.

07/08/2026 Whisky Fringe (Day 1 -- Part 2)

It started here.

It is the halfway point. Here, that means exhibitors pour their special wares for a token that everyone received at the start. It is called the halftime orange dram. Queues have been forming for the most popular drams, but it seems there is nothing comparable to the chaos at the Tomatin stall last year. JS and I debate what to get: the only stand-out on offer is the Rosebank 31yo, but we had that last year already.

What is in our vicinity?

Glenburgie 38yo 1988/2026 Chapter Thirty Two (46.7%, Decadent Drinks Whiskyland, Refill Hogshead, 168b)

Nose: I want to say 'peachy', but that is SSS talking, who told us he finds Glenburgie peachy. It is fruity, though. Nectarines, plums, greengages, none too ripe.

Mouth: a tad mute at first, it wakes up with a chew: lots of greengages, apricot stones, but also something fiercely bitter that is not a fruit stone... Walnut shells turned into a paste?

Finish: explosive, long and bitterly fruity. Fruit stones, walnut shells, preserved pistachio.

Comment: I would like to like this more, but it is nice. It is a pleasant bonus that JS is told to keep her token and spend it elsewhere.

Score: 8/10 (Thanks for the dram, AMcR)

Port Askaig 25yo b.2025 (45.8%, Elixir Distillers)

Nose: meow! Ashes and char, elegant as an old Ardbeg. Fireplace grille, then algae scratched off an empty vase, lichen scrapped off an old stone. At long last, it becomes fruity, with peach and plum cloaked in a veil of smoke.

Mouth: tarry ropes, smoky fishing nets, diesel fumes hanging over harbour water, smoked plum. Ha! Ha! Some crushed glass and sand appear too, gently stripping.

Finish: biggish, sandy, flooded with diesel-tainted sea water, smoked cockles and fishing nets drifting in the current.

Comment: my dram of the day, so far. Probably a Caol Ila; it ticks all the boxes of a good one, at that.

Score: 8/10

Royal Brackla 23yo 2000/2023 Double Cask (53.3%, OB Exceptional Cask Series, Refill Puncheon + Tokaji Wine Finish, C#500005, 258b)

Nose: sweet, it offers dunked biscuit, sweet corn, lots of sweet corn, perhaps a cardboard box full of green grapes, gooseberries and unripe greengages.

Mouth: liqueur, brandy, corn syrup. It is a lot stronger than expected too. Crystallised apple drops, hard candy of sorts and briny cardboard.

Finish: toffee and cardboard. It struggles to develop the complexity I would like, even after a couple of sips. JS finds it a lot of red fruits.

Comment: it would be a good blend, but for a single malt, and a halftime orange dram at that, it leaves me wanting.

Score: 7/10

Daftmill 20yo 2006/2026 Chapter Thirty Five (53%, Decadent Drinks Whiskyland, 1str Fill Sherry Butt & 1st Fill Bourbon Barrel, 344b)

Nose: it is a perfume-y number that turns earthy. Then, we have dried kale, crackly leather an fruity flapjacks.

Mouth: earthy and drying, rancio turned to eleven. It is also strong, fierce, but that is balanced by remarkable berries (cranberries, boysenberries, mulberries) and bitter wood. Oh! it is bitter alright, if pleasantly so.

Finish: earthy and fruity. A beautiful Oloroso cask (I guess). A vatting of two casks, in fact.

Comment: imagine this! The first independently-bottled Daftmill and the oldest bottled Daftmill to-date. What a move to pull off! Apparently, there is a 22yo cask sample under the counter at the Daftmill stand, but it is neither here nor there. The cask is loud, but I like it. That said, I prefer Daftmill in a Bourbon cask.

Score: 8/10

Dufftown 13yo 2012/2026 (52.3%, James Eadie Distilleries of Great Britain & Ireland Commemorative, First Fill Bourbon Barrel, 530b)

Nose: honeysuckle, ethereal perfume, an empty Moka pot, barley water.

Mouth: warming, it has melted toffee, mocha custard that has not yet cooled down and hot metal.

Finish: toffee and cream of tartar or custard powder.

Comment: decent.

Score: 7/10

ST tells us they brought the cask end of their Highland 1976 -- the real cask end, cloudy liquid, vegetables and all. This is not exactly the bottling that was unveiled at the Whisky Fair.

Highland 49yo 1976/2026 Cask End (45.1%, Thompson Bros. specially bottled for Dornoch Castle, Hogshead, C#SR26050)

Nose: ridiculously fruity. Ridiculously!

Mouth: a lick of wood bitterness, but mostly fruit stones with tatters of flesh still attached.

Finish: exotic fruits, woodworm and rotten cherries. Crazy depth.

Comment: this is incredible. Dram of the festival.

Score: 9/10 (Thanks for the dram, ST)

Clynelish 12yo 2013/2026 (52.5%, James Eadie Distilleries of Great Britain & Ireland Commemorative UK Exclusive, Re-Charred Hogshead, 496b)

Nose: shaving foam.

Mouth: wick, fresh and spent, shaving foam and a dollop of minty toothpaste.

Finish: something fiercely minty in this finish, perhaps a lick of cardboard and toffee too.

Comment: good!

Score: 7/10

Ardmore 27yo 1999/2026 (50.5%, Thompson Bros., First Fill Barrel, 161b)

Nose: plaster bands, elastic bands, then a strawberry filling for chocolate wafers. Fruit juice sprayed onto old bandages.

Mouth: fruity paste it is (strawberry again), with quite a bit of alcohol and chewy bandages. This is so good! Fruitier and fizzier with each sip.

Finish: big, it alternates between smoked fruits and bandages. There is a pinch of earth and some grated mature Cheddar, as well as one manner or another of mature-Italian-cheese rind.

Comment: excellent.

Score: 8/10

Glenturret 35yo 1990/2026 Chapter Twenty Nine (41.5%, Decadent Drinks Whiskyland, Refill Hogshead, 231b)

Nose: wood and strawberry, the latter most prominent. That turns into strawberry yoghurt.

Mouth: more fruits -- freeze-dried raspberries, peach stones, apricot stones.

Finish: wonderfully fresh, it has rambutan, lychee, white peach, Korean pear, Korean melon... 

Comment: phwoar! If my palate was not so tired, this may well score a 9.

Score: 8/10

Time to go. They are clearing people out. A quick stop by the shop and we are out of here.

07/08/2026 Whisky Fringe 2026 (Day 1 -- Part 1)

Back in Edinburgh for another edition of the Whisky Fringe. The train was cancelled, this morning. We had to take another one, two hours later, which made us rush and join the queue a little too close to the opening time, without a proper meal. Not without food, though: we stopped in a wee shop for sarnies. The queue is just long enough to eat half of them and line our stomachs a little.

It seems the show has grown quite a bit, since last year, with more exhibitors and a whole new room called Lost Distilleries. As the name suggests, that one focuses on hard-to-get drams from closed distilleries, and one obtains drams in exchange for tokens, which cost £5 each. We could end up spending a lot of time (and money), there!

Oh! and there is a welcome dram from a closed distillery.

Port Dundas 15yo 2010/2026 (46%, Signatory Vintage The Un-Chillfiltered Collection, 1st Fill Sherry Hogsheads & 1st Fill Bourbon Barrels, L26/63)

Nose: buttery pastry, very sweet, doughnut, custard cream.

Mouth: the doughnut parade continues, which is ironic, considering we had no time to stop for doughnuts on the way here. There is also a corn-husk bitterness.

Finish: sweet doughnuts served on a metal plate (zinc?)

Comment: nice starter.

Score: 7/10

Now perusing the bottlings in the Lost Distilleries area. The selection is impressive. In fact, it is phlabberghasting.

A Glen Flagler? A Kinclaith? A Killyloch?

The most saught-after Glenlochy?

It is hilarious to see most people gravitate towards the Port Ellen, a Diageo Annual Release, at that, when there is much rarer stuff to explore. That said, I have tried or own ninety-five percent of what is on offer and elect to spend little time here. Perhaps others feel the same.

To note: the Rosebank is the official 31yo that we tried last year. It is offered this year as a halftime-orange dram again. To have it here too feels like a gaffe-and-a-half!

We continue our journey downstairs to the tent.

Balblair 12yo 2014/2026 (56.1%, Little Brown Dog Small Batch, Calvados Cask, 290b)

Nose: it has gherkin, then brine an moist paper bags from a perfume shop.

Mouth: very brandy-like. Plum, greengage, gooseberry, apple.. That last one is suggestion speaking, surely -- Calvados, innit.

Finish: yes, this is a fruit eau-de-vie in character, with crunchy apples and unripe plums.

Comment: it is okay. A bit thin and eau-de-vie-like for me.

Score: 6/10

Orkney 24yo 2001/2026 (53.1%, Little Brown Dog Small Batch, Refill Hogsheads)

Nose: comforting and medicinal nose, with old bandages, embrocations, age-old gauze. Roasted apples are behind, as are smoked apples and a bit of tobacco too (cigar).

Mouth: rather juicy, it has tobacco and gauze, through which pressurised fruit-juice steam has been pumped.

Finish: long, warming. Someone is smoking a cigarillo whilst roasting apples.

Comment: very, very good.

Score: 8/10

Caol Ila 12yo 2013/2026 (57.3%, Little Brown Dog Small Batch, Refill Bourbon Barrels, 384b)

Nose: spirit-y, it opens up to give a naked sweet crust (no topping). Fortunately, pressed apricot rears its head.

Mouth: ha. Very thin and very spirit-y, as if custard (without vanilla) and corn syrup (without sweetness) had a bastard child.

Finish: not much, here either. Wet cardboard with confectionary sugar. JS finds it a skunky aftertaste, while I find it astringent.

Comment: an unpeated Caol Ila. A curiosity that does not work for me. I remember trying the official unpeated expression, many years ago, and thinking the same. It must have been 2011's Special Release version or 2012's. It appears Caol Ila without peat is simply not whisky that works for me.

Score: 6/10

Invergordon 7yo 2017.2025 (58.8%, Little Brown Dog Small Batch, Virgin Oak Casks, 300b)

Nose: a lot of custard, at first, but that Irn Bru note so typical of rye whiskies appears at the end. Warm pastry, pie or other.

Mouth: a rye it is! Irn Bru, polished metal and something much weirder. Fart? Or is it the three blokes near us?

Finish: this is the best part, with custard sprinkled with Irn Bru, and smoked raisins.

Comment: a rye produced at the North-Highland grain distillery. The finish makes this interesting, not memorable.

Score: 7/10

LBD: "I hate these pourers. There is no stopper."
JS: "They're great, aren't they?"

Drookit Dug 10yo (45.1%, Little Brown Dog, Final Batch)

Nose: it smells very blend-y. Dusty cardboard, corn syrup... That dissipates and gives couque suisse and craquelin.

Mouth: the briny jelly of preserved pistachios, mocha custard.

Finish: lovely custard, but the cardboard-y element is hard to see past, and the alcohol is not elegantly integrated.

Comment: meh.

Score: 6/10

Aberdeenshire 12yo (46%, Little Brown Dog, b. ca.2026)

Nose: Scottish tablet, toffee, even fudge. Mostly fudge, actually. And thick ashes.

Mouth: mocha bitterness complements a custard-y texture (again). Melted chocolate with orange rinds and too much milk.

Finish: orange juice punctuated with melted chocolate chips.

Comment: decent likely Geerie.

Score: 7/10

Kingsbarns Doocot (46%, OB, 90% Bourbon + 10% STR Portuguese Red Wine Casks, b. ca.2026)

Nose: bluberry madeleines and blackcurrant cheesecake.

Mouth: it tastes younger than the nose suggested, with windscreen defroster complementing an undeniable fruity backdrop of unripe currants and gooseberries.

Finish: pleasant and comforting, it has blackcurrant cheesecake and blackberry sundae.

Comment: it is okay.

Score: 7/10

Glen Moray 18yo 2007/2026 (54.7%, Keeble Cask Fragrant Drops, Refill Bourbon Barrel, C#357, 218b)

Nose: a peaty Moray? This was announced as a lemon bomb, but it smells pretty earthy to me, with mud patties and farm paths. If there is any lemon, it is smoked. Antiseptic or dishwasher tablet (JS). Lemon rises timidly, given time.

Mouth: green olives meet dishwasher tablets. Chewing injects stringent lemon alright, but it is not that dominant, even if it becomes stripping, over time.

Finish: more dishwasher tablets (well spotted, JS) mixed with mud.

Comment: competent.

Score: 7/10

Tamnavulin 12yo 2013/2026 (60%, Keeble Cask Fragrant Drops, Refill ex-Bourbon Barrel, C#111516, 195b)

Nose: dried grass, hay (is that not the same thing?), mulch, custard powder, maybe a metal straw?

Mouth: hm. Naked. New ropes, turpentine. It is stripping. My tongue feels abused.

Finish: it is better here. It shows some fruits (plums, berries, not very ripe) and ginger biscuits. Or is that my craving those shortbreads they just put out at the stand? The next gulp is a tad more complex, but still not easy.

Comment: disappointing.

Score: 6/10

Kingsbarns Coaltown (46%, OB, ex-Peated Casks, b. ca.2026)

Nose: banana skins? That quickly makes way for baked bread -- baked to cardboard, in fact. We can hear the French residents of Auld Reekie slicing their wrists in despair -- and they are right. Cereals follow, mostly dry as stale granola.

Mouth: toasted cereals indeed, a bit of soot, charred husks and windscreen defroster sprayed onto raw cereals.

Finish: rough, it has defroster spray and bitter currants. Maybe cardboard too.

Comment: not for me.

Score: 5/10

Dalmunach 7yo d.2018 (55.4%, Blind Summit, Amontillado Sherry Hogshead, 170b)

Nose: Mokatines and warmed digestive biscuits are joined by a soap bar. That turns very buttery with a moment's breathing. Later on, we discover plain coffee.

Mouth: cardboard, Horlicks, Mokatine again. It is supremely drying at second sip and rather spicy too.

Finish: ashes, rocks, fruit stones (dry, stripped of any flesh). Long finish, almost invasive.

Comment: okayish.

Score: 6/10

Halftime is looming. Time to decide what to do.

This poster comes in handy

Mossburn thought it useful to specify that 100 ppm
classes as heavily peated :-)

Continue reading here.