Tastes

I rarely drink bourbon, let along buy a bottle, but the Japanese angle was intriguing enough to justify a $40 gamble. The wine and sherry casks do a good job of tempering the creamy bourbon flavors that don’t normally appeal to me, especially so on the nose, where the sugary vanilla and pleasantly sour berries blend together well in harmonious layers. In the mouth the flavors appear in sequence: creamy at first (a bit too cloying for me, like artificially sweetened ice cream), fruity and spicy on the palate, and dry on the long finish. The cream reappears at the very end, the sweetness tempered by an undertone of dry wine notes. It’s an interesting experiment and I don’t begrudge the purchase, especially given the handsome bottle, but it’s not the bourbon that is going to lure me away from House Barley given the overall dominance of the vanilla flavors and the lack of integration on the palate. If you’re an adventurous lover of the corn spirit, however, I wager you’ll enjoy this a lot.

Nice but I prefer the nutty notes of the 10.

As much as I love Ardbeg, I have never spent much time appreciating the 10, let alone buying a bottle. My introduction to the distillery, and enduring focus, was Uigeadail and the subsequent scramble for the annual committee releases meant my liquor cabinet was never short of an Ardbeg bottle or three to choose from. But my ignorance of the charms of the entry level spirit is an embarrassing oversight. It’s the perfect combination of smoky, sweet and oily and I would gladly take four bottles of this over one of Drum, as interesting as that was. Indeed, if I could liquidate my whisky collection and start again, I would buy several bottles of this and other similarly priced classics, a handful of really fantastic expensive stuff and far fewer of the mid-priced limited editions which linger half empty long after the novelty has worn off. But I digress. This is a great whisky and everybody should drink it.

The NAS bottlings have been the weak spot of the Old Pulteney range in the past but this new one is a worthy exception. Finished in heavily peated casks from a Speyside distillery, it sports a spectacular nose that I would love to spend more time with. The peat presence is of the heathery variety and huge for a whisky that was only finished in empty casks, on a par with Balvenie Peat Week for example. The palate isn’t as exciting and the mix of the peat influence and the characteristic Pulteney marine flavors not as integrated as in an Islay, but it’s still a bottle I would happily drink at home. That’s true for any of the four core bottlings in the new Pulteney range, which is not something I can say about many distilleries. In other words, any pick from Wick will do the trick.

Quite different to the 15 year, as the flavors don’t really emerge until mid-palate. The finish is long and heavy on the wood spices. Tasty, but I preferred the 15. Likely to cost about $150 when it hits U.S. shelves, which is close to the price of the much better but discontinued 21.

As I said in my previous review three years ago, this is an even-keeled dram that smoothly navigates the tides of Scotch flavors. The golden color and silky mouthfeel are delightful and it dissolves in the mouth like a caramel, without ever getting too sweet. The wood comes through with a spicy tingle that's more teasing than challenging. It's a bargain at the price and a good gateway to this wonderful distillery.

I had a chance to try the new Old Pulteney range again last night, in a slightly more controlled setting than the whisky show where I tried some of them last year, and I can say that the 15 is the standout. The secondary maturation in ex-Oloroso sherry casks lends it some lovely dry nutty flavors that are well balanced with the classic Pulteney briny notes. While it doesn’t rise to the heights of the discontinued 21, it’s a more than respectable addition to the range.

Peach Flambé would have been a much better name for this fiery, fruity Laphroaig than the atypically generic one the SMWS used. Even diluted to 50%, the fumes fill your head with a mixture of petrol, seaweed, Wellington boots, overripe bananas and sweet balsamic vinegar. The oily distillate starts in the mouth with a dark chocolate note before the surprise star of the event shows up, a left-field burst of peach. What next, cream? Oh yes, thanks, and a sprinkle of brown sugar too. I’ve tried a few SMWS drams over the years but I’m not a member of the society and have never coughed up the premium price they command for their bottles, so I’m chuffed that I got the opportunity to pick up this one at a discount in the secondary market. It’s the best independent Laphroaig I’ve had to date, unique enough to make it interesting yet still distinctly familial.

Packs a lot of flavor for its 40% strength. There’s loads of citrus fruit on the nose, with Meyer lemons and green apples coming to mind. The palate is rich and malty with caramel and some more of the fruity notes. Sweet and spicy on the finish. I’d happily drink this at a bar. Well played, House Tully.