Ardnamurchan ad/07.21 :04

Since no one has reviewed this yet, I wrote up something substantial to give people an idea of what to expect.  Nose Vanilla/creme brulee, lavender/heather, and dark honey.  Almost like a Speyside, but with more depth and spicy bite on the back-end.  Palate The spice becomes more-noticeable and is followed by vanilla cream soda, butterscotch, honey, and a little salt.  The salt and spice keep the taste from being as sweet as it may sound.  This whisky is slightly peated, which brings out a mild smokiness that blends in well into the background.  There's an earthiness to it that I find appealing. Finish Spice comes back on the finish, resulting in a spice-to-honey/lavender-back-to-spice progression from the initial palate to the finish.  Smoke shows up more on the finish, but it's like barrel char more than a peat fire. Overall I looked into the details of this whisky (helpfully provided by a QR code on the bottle) and saw that it's made of a vatting of 5- and 6- year barrels.  That explains some of the obvious spiciness and relatively narrow range of flavors, but, like with Kilchoman's whiskies, careful distilling and barrel management overcome the youth quite a bit.  Knowing that this is a young distillery that's making an effort to be sustainable and a good member of its community made me buy the bottle to support them, but also gave me modest expectations.  I was impressed, though.  The whisky has an uncommon character and I appreciate that, for a young distillery, they didn't lean hard on peat or sherry to make up for the lack of maturation.  At $55 a bottle, I think this is a reasonable value, given how much personality it has.  If Ardnamurchan can maintain this quality, they'll be giving the big boys a run for their money in 6-7 years.