Dunedin Double Cask 18 Year

“I fear I must blame the french for this. Not because I’m English…” N: Oak tannins are immediate and slightly mask a stewed fruit compote with lightest vanilla. This nose is delicate, light and softly warming. P: Drying, astringent wood leads with some light citrus and the beginnings of a dark figgy and jammy body that almost hits a lovely cherry flavour. But then tannic wood cuts back in and stops further development. A syrupy texture is enjoyable. F: Short. Peppery and oaky and then gone. I have wanted to try this last frontier of geographical whisky for some time now. The price has come down and the opportunity presented, so I was glad to get in on this. I had really high hopes and wanted this to be excellent. It sadly wasn’t. It was just ok to good. There are two oaks going on here and unfortunately the tannic wood flavours are too powerful. I fear I must blame the French for this. Not because I’m English, but I’m starting to find that European oaks are, if not tempered carefully, aggressive beasts. Six years in American oak and then 12 in French Oak, ooooph. What is here though is light, delicate, and very interesting. It’s a clean spirit and I think these Kiwis may even know what they’re doing, but they’ve let this oak influence build to be a little out of balance in the end. Distiller whisky taste #82

Rating: 14/23 I've never had whiskey from New Zealand before. And this is 18 years old! I don't even know what grain this is made with, but at least I know it's mature. N: There's a cleanliness to it that's lightly spicy with plentiful mild (though not exactly mellow) wood. Giving it a minute, a bit of sweetness comes out, adding some richness and fullness. There's some sweet corn, paper, and a touch of vanilla. Something a tad herbal brings in just the faintest mint. It's not that complex of a nose, but it smells reasonably tasty at least. P: Wow, this is much more tart than I'd expected! It's lemony. I was getting I.W. Harper 15 on the nose, but now I'm getting single grain scotch. It isn't so much corn as it is unmalted barley and it comes with some really dry wood with a definite tannic character, though not a blod flavor. There isn't a lot of that grain character though. Sipping this a bit more, there are suggestions of some other citrus fruits and red fruits, but they're faint. The slightest floral presence at times - though all of the flavors here are slight. Actually, I get just a hint of rummy molasses. I got it on the nose too, but it was so faint that I wasn't confident it was really there. It's tannic in a drying sense, but it's at a good level. It certainly isn't a punch in the face. It's also far smoother than most single grain whisky I've tried, especially considering its age. F: Faintly waxy with some lingering barley (?) sweetness. That paper and hint of vanilla stand out here too. - Conclusion - My bottle of 29 year old Caledonian from 1987 by Signatory (12/23) is harsher than this, but also sweeter and fuller. I don't know what the ABV on this is, but I'm confident that the Caledonian's 54.7% is higher. The Canedonian's flavors are less refined than the ones here. I wouldn't say that I love this dram, but it's more refined than the Caledonian without being as challenging and while retaining some interesting character. Side by side, the rum flavor really stands out here. It's surprising. Still, the flavors here are so subtle that it's difficult to make it through a pour without the complexity fading. In comparison, I.W. Harper 15 (14/23) has a bit more character to it (which say a lot about how little character is here), though it's again rougher around the edges. Still, If I.W. Harper 15 is rough around the edges. I might be mis-calibrating my nuance scale here because IW Harper 15 is really a fairy drab dram. The I.W. Harper is definitely closer to this than the Caledonian is. I think that the slightly over-oaked character of the I.W. Harper puts it a little behind this though. What do I have around here that's a 15? Hmm... Ah! Dalmore 12 (15/23). I'm inclined to say that the Dalmore is better than this is. I think that this is closer to the I.W. Harper, so I'm going with a 14. If this had the harshness that I normally associate with single grain whisky, I'd probably be giving it more like a 10 or 11. I do wonder whether this avoided that simply by being bottled at a low enough proof, but whether that's it or not, it finding the right proof improves the quality and I can appreciate the smoothness here. Thank you, @PBMichiganWolverine , for sharing this!

Nose - raspberry, pomegranate, apricot, fig, mint, rubber, allspice, cereal grain, light sulphur, orange zest, floral notes, butterscotch, vanilla, mild to moderate ethanol burn. Taste - peach, rubber, raspberry, butterscotch, vanilla, mint, lemon, grapefruit, cereal grain, cinnamon, ginger, dry oak, mild to moderate alcohol bite, finishing short with cereal grain, red fruit, and dry oak flavors. My first whiskey from New Zealand comes from the ghosted Willowbank distillery. It’s 18 years old and finished in bourbon and red wine casks. The nose greets you with rubbery red fruits, not so different from the ones I found on the Del Maguey Tobala mezcal. Otherwise, it’s very light and grainy with some butterscotch and citrus zest in the mix. The palate is also light and grainy with the same rubbery quality and some juicy fruits. The mouthfeel is thin and the finish is disappointingly short. This is below average and tastes much younger than the 18 year age statement would indicate. The bright, juicy red fruit quality is intriguing, but it’s watery and unpleasantly rubbery and sour. Regardless, I greatly appreciate the opportunity to try this rare whiskey. Thank you to @PBMichiganWolverine for sending this one along!

Many years ago, I had ordered a sample of a New Zealand whiskey that was aged for 25 years from a ghosted distillery that would have cost several hundred for a bottle, but thankfully the sample was available for a reasonable rate. My main memory from that experience was tutti-frutti bubble gum flavored rubber mulch, but thankfully @PBMichiganWolverine was kind enough to send me over a sample of an 18 year old to review. Let’s see if that memory is close or if that was just a bad bottle. The nose starts with a floral rubbery note almost as if someone decided to put perfume on their Jeep’s tires followed by tutti-frutti bubble gum, sour cherries, and sautéed apples that transitions to ginger, chestnuts and moderate oak spice with low ethanol burn. The taste is a thin mouthfeel that starts with that floral rubbery note but more like bitter rubber mulch with perfume that you’re chewing on followed by you spitting that perfume mulch out to replace it with chewing a tutti-frutti bubble gum with the wrapper still on, sour cherries, and grapefruit that transitions to ginger, chestnuts, acetone and moderate oak spice with low ethanol burn. The finish is medium length with rubber mulch, slight red berry flavor and burnt leaf ash. Well, this one was rough and my memory was very close to what this one tasted like. The nose was a warning of what was to come with sour fruit, rubber and light spices, but the taste is bitter with rubber, perfume, tutti-frutti gum and acetone notes that finishes medium length with light fruit in the background of rubber and ash. I’m very grateful that @PBMichiganWolverine shared with me a pour from this ghosted distillery and can see why they shuttered their doors after all.

Who in here remembers Action Park? This was that “death ride park” in New Jersey that claimed so many teen injuries due to quality issues in their rides. You took a ride there and considered yourself lucky if you came out without any injuries. I was barely in elementary school, but I remember even us little 2nd and 3rd graders thinking it a right of passage to have an Action Park tattoo ( which is a bruise or injury). Unfortunately, I never got to go, because I was simply too young, but more so because my immigrant parents couldn’t afford the tickets. And had no medical insurance. But, what Action Park taught future theme park entrepreneurs was that make sure you take care of your basic foundational stuff, like quality control, else you’ll be out of business. I think that same mantra can be applied to whiskey distilleries. In times like these, where prices are sky high and demand for barely legal 3 yr olds competes with well established 20yr olds, you might find some slack initially, but long term you may not be able to sustain your market share. And that takes us to this pour—-a rather rare one from the ghosted Willowbank distillery in New Zealand. Willowbank closed its doors ages ago, and sold off its equipment to a rum maker in Fiji. Now what stock remains is only what’s left from old stock. During times like these, a ghosted 18yr old will sell. But I can see why it went out of business. This 18yr old doesn’t punch at its weight class. It’s somewhat disjointed, and can’t make out whether it wants to be a grain or malt, whether it wants the fruity NZ red wine characteristic or the malty one. It’s not light enough to be a fruity cocktail mix, yet not weighty enough as a neat sipper. I think it’s schizophrenia in a bottle. It needs to take care of the foundational issue: what will this be used for? Mixed drinks or neat? Do we the grain or malt to shine? Do we want to highlight the red wine fruits or the bread-y malt? But anyway…enjoy it for what it really is : a ghosted distillery that will no longer come back to life, well aged at 18yr , from a region that simply doesn’t have any whiskey production left. With those parameters, a 375ml for $50 did it’s job in spades.

Nose: Pungent malt extract, rubber tyres, charred wood, dried dates and figs, orange liqueur. Palate: Thin and surprisingly weak on the arrival. A little bitter and over-oaked with a distinct cardboard note. A semi-sweet jam or jelly flavour like cranberries, sweetened sour cherries, dark grapes or raisins. You definitely taste the wine cask. There is some mild spice (ginger, pepper) and a dusky, leafy flavour. The texture is acceptable but a little thin. Finish: Medium/short. Sweet and spicy with oak and a hint of ashen or smokey malt in the aftertaste. The nose is huge with a dense, rich quality but unfortunately it lacks grace. The prominent rubbery aromas approach those of hogo in Jamaican rum and could be described as either “bold” or “clumsy” depending on the individual doing the tasting. It’s not a bad nose, but it’s not elegant by any stretch of the imagination. The palate is less boisterous than the nose but it goes too far in the opposite direction, veering into sweet blandness. The cardboard note is off-putting and suggests an overly wide cut, but I don’t think that is the cause. It’s more likely that the casks are showing lignin breakdown. There is a point at which maturation reaches its apex and a whisky can degrade quickly past that stage. This may have been better if bottled as a 16 year old. Water improved the nose a good deal, muting the rubbery aromas, but it made the palate seem confused and anaemic, which further confirms the over-aged theory. It’s not a bad whisky but an event tasting was enough to convince me that I don’t need a bottle, particularly at the price. Although this is listed as AUD$117 that is for a 500ml bottle and the equivalent for 700ml would be $165. There is an almost endless list of far superior whiskies at that price. My taste #4 at the Sydney Whisky Show, 15 May 2021 “Adequate” : 73/100 (2.25 stars)