Tastes

While I"m sad that we're seeing more and more NAS special releases at higher prices, if it's good, I won't hold the lack of an age statement against it (can't say the same for the price). And this is quite good. If I were to point someone to a whiskey with an oily mouthfeel, this would be the one. The nose is all honey with coy hints of peat and brine. On the palate, pears, peat, and that sweet honey slowly build and make themselves known with an assurance you can expect from Ardbeg. Those slowly fade into a delightful punch of tartness followed by a rush of saliva who is just trying to figure out what's going on. The sweet honeyed peat sits on the roof of your mouth with a small campfire to keep it warm. And it stays there indefinitely.

The nose makes promises of a decent, stereotypical caramelly-vanilla bourbon but the finish on this tastes like dirty, moist paper. The proof tries to cover it up, but it's not fooling anyone.

I generally like to poop on Willett because their pricing is about as silly as how intentionally mysterious their products are, but I don't mind this all that much. It's about what you would expect from a two year rye and, apart from being too expensive--which is to be expected--this is pretty decent. Looking forward to the coming years that will hopefully allow them to price these things accordingly, fancy coat of arms be damned.

This isn't great; green bananas and a bit of sawdust, but it's 100 proof and $11. I really can't complain about anything apart from the suspiciously infuriating lack of distribution.

Very malty. Fun. Better than expected.

There's a bitterness to this years that, for me, dominated everything else.