Tastes

There’s something a little punk rock about the Springbank 10. It’s a little rough around the edges, but there’s a sweet melody at its core. Even the bottle to me is punk. In our current era of whisky marketing storytelling, my bottle of Springbank 10 has a label that looks like I made it in Microsoft Paint on my Dell running Windows ‘95. It’s even slapped on the bottle crooked....badass... The nose has a hint of smoke, but is predominantly under-ripe pear, some cereal, touch of liquorice, some cherry, and salt. Palate is that same pear, more predominant black liquorice, salt, and a stale smokiness. Like when you used to make out with that girlfriend you had in high school who stole cigarettes from her mom’s purse. You mostly tasted her sweet lip balm, but there’s no covering up those Marlboros. The finish, is fairly long. Liquorice, same smoke, little sweetness. It leaves your ears ringing. I like this stuff. Sometimes the guitars are out of tune. The singer isn’t that great. But, you’ll find yourself humming the melody for days. It’s pretty, pretty vacant. Can’t wait to try another expression from these guys.

I have no idea how this bottle found its way to me. It was distilled in 2003, and is a 5 year old whisky; so bottled in ‘08 or ‘09. I found this bottle when my local liquor store was renovating in 2017. That’s almost a full decade from when I expect it would have hit the shelves. It’s like it blew into my life in a DeLorean and told me to hop in. This is one of the most unique whiskies I have ever experienced. Seeing 5 years old on the tin brings images to your mind of a rough and unrefined malt, but this was the exact opposite of that. This is hands down the most luxurious tasting whisky I have had. Everything about it was velvet and plush. The nose is all cream, vanilla, malt, chocolate milkshake with whipped cream on top. The palate was, this is so cliche, smooth. It was so creamy smooth. It had a mouthfeel like I’ve never experienced. It felt more like a cream liqueur in the mouth than a whisky. The flavours were exactly what the nose promised. Rich, creamy dessert. Vanilla custard, whipped cream, brown sugar, and so much malt. The finish was medium at best. The rich creaminess dried to vanilla and some nutmeg. Again, this was such a unique and enjoyable whisky. It is nothing like any other expression I have had from Bruichladdich. I bought an ‘09 organic thinking it might share some characteristics with the ‘03; not even close. The ‘09 is clearly related to the Classic Laddie. The ‘03 is nothing like the Classic. If you have a DeLorean, fire up the flux capacitor and go pick one of these up for the love of god!