Tastes

Not sure if this is the right picture for the review of this I believe 2018 edition. Nose - So i get candy cigarettes, lemon lime, a bit of a real cigarette smoke, iodine, and there's a savory note. This is oddly similar with a bit more citrus than some of their younger elements. Taste - elements of vegetable, vanilla, oak, powered sugar, some citrus fruit, oak almost mutes some of it. The finish is that candy and soft peat. Anyone who thinks 25 years will get rid of the peat punch is crazy, this is heavily peated by any standards. But with it comes so much complexity, so much nuance, so much just awesome whisky. I always struggle with nuanced notes on peat, but as a peat lover this is hands down my favorite heavily peated whisky to date, pushes the ardbeg 23 out of the way. I'm not honestly a fan of Laphroaig generally but this 25 year is amazing. I'm debating a 4.5 vs a 4.75 and i think I'm settling on a 4.5 but it's a STRONG 4.5. This is a bottle I'll replace at almost any price as I need this always in my collection.

The 25 is one of if not the best valued sherry whiskies on the market. How does the 21 year at a pathetically low 43% work? Nose - So I get oak sour and bitter notes, some sherry plums and raisins, and oddly I'm getting vanilla like I'd get from a bourbon cask which doesn't make any sense as this is all european oak sherry butts. I should add this isn't the first time I got these notes either. Very sweet, fruity, but vegtably. i get almost a sweet and sour sauce note as well. Really complex and interesting, but not exactly what I'd expect on this. This is about my 4th pour from this bottle in the last 3 days since getting it, so I've removed enough from the bottle for it to oxidize but odds are it still needs a week. As always, i will try and come back at some point if things change up. Taste - So up front you'll get the pathetic 43% and I'm not sure but I think this was chill filtered sadly (let me know). The result is that when it hits the tip of your tongue where often big bold whiskies blow you away without sweet flavors, it's almost a non event. Even as you get it into the middle of the tongue it's pretty boring. Then as you start to swallow, magic happens. The finish is this long complex fruity and well well aged oak note with some buttery elements, almost a burned caramel (not the caramel itself but the burned top). You get the spice from the European oak, the dark fruits from the sherry, but there's something else that's not expected that reminds me of a bourbon cask, it must be the from the malt. Anyway, for 150 which this can be found for, it's awesome stuff though I'd get a glendronach 18 currently for about 160 (local prices). Really good value and it brings out some of the best notes you get in a sherry whisky, but it's complex and has bitter notes unlike some of the more sweat ones. 3.5 star score great stuff.

1. I just want to thank whoever decided to vintage date the bottles for review as the 21 is night and day different each batch. 2. This is special guys! Nose - Sweet and savory elements but the dominate note is from the port influence. I get a bit of a grape bubble gum with a red wine element. behind that is light oak, some vanilla, some jam, and just a general springbank slightly salty malty experience. Taste - My first though it just how long and complex this one is. There's at least 3-4 transitions, it goes from sweet to bitter to savory. It starts a bit waxy sweet, muted flavors, but sweet. Then some oak tannins come in and it takes on this slightly bitter note still with this sweet and muted malt profile. Then things get crazy as it turns to these salty springbank elements and the flavor just goes all over the place and creates a wonderful long and complex finish. The fruity grape bubble game notes are there though I'm starting to think more juicy fruit with a drop of a wine element, the malt is very oak touched but not overly so giving it a very nice balanced feel. The 2019 springbank is somewhat hit or miss for me so far. My first few pours were outstanding but I'm not sure if it is me but right now this isn't blowing my socks off. It's incredibly complex, the 46% is just enough to give this a nice mouth feel while allowing you to swirl this in your mouth and really take it in without any alcohol fatigue. Overall this is really nice stuff. A must buy if you can afford and are an advanced whisky drinker (you need to like the whole spectrum from peat to wine finishing to oak and everything in between to get this one). 4.25 stars

Nose - dusty corn, peanuts, some caramel, and dusty oak. Taste - The taste is a bit sweeter than the nose, but there's still that beam profile of peanuts, dusty corn, a lot of caramel, and oak. So I don't get this. The 9 year single barrel is really good whisky. The standard small batch is actually pretty good. But every time they bottle something officially with more age, they want to showcase everything beam does wrong. That nutty beam character is nice when it's subtle. Instead the salted peanuts overwhelm the bourbon character, it's oak and nuts. Why? We know for a fact that they have massive amounts of outstanding barrels, these 9 year store picks have been getting rave reviews, but as soon as beam blends together batches, we get absolute crap. I've been working on this one for a few weeks, kept putting off reviewing it due to sometimes think it is too hot, other times thinking I'm off. I wasn't and it is. This is just another poor effort from beam. Whoever is doing their blending should be replaced. That said, this isn't complete a disaster. It's a 1 star whisky, quality components but unless you're obsessed with that beam profile, avoid it. It's over priced to add insult to injury.

Shocked I'm not just the first review on batch 1 but on batch 2 and nobody has reviewed the younger batches. So....this is going to be a crazy review. Just get ready. Nose - intense! There is a lot of alcohol on this massive CS bourbon. It's sweet, fruity, rich, dark, and has some hints of chocolate. Taste - Rich and intense, drying, just a flavor bomb. You get a this amazing and layered caramel and fruits. Some dark chocolate. Some bitter oak, then some spice, then back to fruity characters. The finish is medium to long with all kinds of just over the top flavors. Yet there are smooth and subtle flavor, it's like you get a stream of sugary sweet notes under all the powerful alcohol and other notes. So I feel an obligation to bring this one way down in abv to see what I get. So my glass now smells like watered down buffalo trace almost, I added a LOT of water. So there's some bitter notes here. It's now giving me a bit of nutty flavor. it's got a lot of good bourbon notes. Clearly don't do this to your bourbon, 30% bourbon is stupid, but I wanted to bring this down to see what was there. It loses the sweetness which is funny, but now it's just filled with all kinds of cool bourbon elements. Anyway I'm going 3.75 and I'll be coming back to this as I bought 3 bottles. This has serious bourbon of the year potential if king of kentucky doesn't just blow me away again. A bit more harsh and unrefined than a btac but there's as much flavor and complexity.

This review is of batch 18. Would be nice if Nancy could pop in an let us know if anything has changed for this batch. Nose - So my first impression is that this is overly sweet, almost too much and almost getting into aspartame levels. I do still get a nice bit of oak, vanilla, caramel...it is a very traditional bourbon note and very on profile for a bit of a generic bourbon. That said it is amped up to 10, it's intense nosing, there's far more intense sweetness than a 103 proof bourbon should provide. Still, I can't really give high praise on nose alone, it's good. Taste - This is not the bourbon I remember from my first bottle. You definitely get that there is some older whisky in here. Adding water really helped this one. So with water you start to get some of the sweeter note but some fruity flavors are coming out too. I'm getting a hint of tobacco as I go. This is complex without anything jumping out and over powering the overall rich sweet aged bourbon profile. This is classic bourbon. It isn't nutty, it isn't chocolate, it isn't cinnamon, no mineral notes, no over the top oak. It is those vanillas, caramels, corn, and yes there's an oak note here but it's just classic bourbon oak. It's old enough, there isn't a lot of a "hug" or a bite but it's got a really good mouth feel and great proof. So I'm at a 3.25. A very very sold offering, a bit expensive, but the quality is here. There is a hint of a bitter finish that pushes me from 3.5 to the 3.25. I think the last bottle I had was pushing 4.0.

So this is The Whistler Oloros Sherry Cask Blend - the official name. Not just "The Whistler". I'd say I have plans to review the rest of their line, but those darn bottles just keep getting killed the second i get them. But if I can find another 7 year CS you better bet your butt, I'm buying a case. OK so this is their NAS (and given they have a 5 year, one must assume this is 3 years old) and it's presented at 43%. Also despite the name, this is a blend of bourbon and sherry...a bit misleading. OK so their marketing is annoying, though their cork has music notes on it which is just freaking cool. Nose - cereal grain, vanilla, hints of sherry, and there are a lot of somewhat "normal" fruit notes as in not influenced by oak, not bitter or soured as we often get on single malts, but just kinda if you're getting apple it's apple (which I am getting a hint of). I get a salty like note here, not sea breeze salt but just I think the oak is giving some salted like nosing marks. Taste - Again I get those grain elements that come with kind of a vanilla ice cream and a bit of minerality. There are also some savory like fruit notes, perhaps in the relm of a coconut but sweeter. I'm getting some icing. I don't get any malt character and to be honest the sherry doesn't do much to show itself as sherry, instead I get a lot of citrus and fruity notes. All and all this is a delightful and extremely inexpensive irish whisky. At about 35 bucks you can blend this, mix it, add coke, or have it neat. I really can't stress how darn good this is for what it is. Now it's got a bit too much alcohol on it for 43%. The mineral note isn't great. The finish isn't special, no transitions. 2 stars which I feel is an extremely generous score for this. I really think if you see this you should give it a shot.

I wanted to write a few more interesting reviews but the distillers ap is just such an awful tool and we still can't add whisky with an actual computer (well I guess I could install blue stack and then download the ap and use my desktop but what a pain just to add whiskies). Anyway, a bit more well known brand. Highland Park, perhaps second to macallan in terms of whisky prestige but unlike macallan they seem to be able to put out a good product at generally reasonable prices. This one coming in at 100 bucks for a 16 year age statement seems like a pretty big win. Nose - I get vanilla, some red wine tannins, a bit of a spice, perhaps a strawberry. Taste - Great transitions on this one. It opens with some sweet bourbon barrel cask notes, vanilla, caramel, cream, etc. Then it transitions to vanilla and red fruits, I'd think sherry if I didn't know it was a red wine. The the finish goes into this really nice long and lingering oak and perhaps some kinda of red wine like dryness. There's still some bourbon elements as well in there. Given HP uses peat I assume I'm getting some in the finish as well, but without knowing that I'd have thought it was more coming from the oak but peat sensitive people will notice it. I came into this one blind, neck pour, and my only review notes I'd heard were a few people who were fans, but not exactly people I tend to follow closely. Water is a pass on this one, brings out oak without much else. Anyway for 100 bucks and at 46.7% I think we've got a winner guys. I think this is a very reasonable value and I'm scoring it a solid 3.0. Absolutely worth picking up if you see it for about that price point and honestly unless you're ultra peat sensitive, I'd be willing to say this will be a winner for any scotch drinker and most whisky drinkers in general. I used to say HP 18 was the best way to show someone what scotch is. As the price on that has gone up and the abv remains 43%, I think this one might be the one in their lineup to introduce people to.

Nose - fruity, salty, a lot of alcohol, and there's a hell of a lot of really in your face oak. This is very on the citrus side with some perhaps sugar cookie notes. Taste - creamy, vanilla, oak, salt, citrus. Intense huge even. The body is mouth coating. Water really brings out the sweetness, almost a completely change in the sweet tones. Now I"m getting more baked goods. This is a perfect example of the new make from springbank with a lot of time in a very tired oak barrel. The overall effect is that of a really great sipping dram. I can't speak highly enough of this for those who don't want wine cask influence. It is a bit sour and the oak levels are a bit high. An extremely complex whisky for those who can appreciate a hell of a lot of elements that I believe are acquired tastes.

Nose - caramel, oak, touch of honey, and i know this will seem like the power of suggestions but lactose. Vanilla and powered sugar too. Very sweet and very candied. Taste - This is really unique. It's sweet but not as much as the nose indicated. There's oak but it's not overly oaked. It's got a good body but yet it kinda ends quickly. I can't describe this, it's like a werther's butter scotch candy with bitter oak and alcohol. Adding water and I get some kind of fruity note, but not a sweet fruit and then some unique savory bourbon notes. I don't get savory in bourbon much but this has some really savory notes. The oak effect and the bite of alcohol is very much a bourbon like experience but the upfront flavors could easily have me thinking scotch. I'll have to let this open up with some time, perhaps more of the chocolate notes will come out that I suspect are there. For now a unique experience, but run for the hills at 200+. 2.75 a very good experience but it's leaving me a bit short of a must try if money matters.