Longrow Peated

This is a really good peated single malt, even though it doesn’t have a age statement. This has a really good peated flavor, vegetal type of peat, not dry or too smoky. The flavor is creamy and fruity sweet, not too sweet and extremely smooth. This is a keeper and highly recommended for everyone wants to try peated whisky.

Yum! Well that’s a mouthful!

The lame duck in my collection. Not a good peated or a Campbelltown. Fails at both and is left in no mans land.

Somewhat creamier peat- not as ‘in your face’ as other peat forward expressions.

Nose: Sour peat, yet quite fresh having a certain ”brightness” to it (lemon?). Also a touch of iodine/minerals. After resting a while in the glass, it turns a bit funkier; rubber, machine oil, and a touch of clay. Beyond the peaty notes are vanilla and caramel, though quite mild. I like it so far! Palate: Quite consistent with the nose but sweeter (a bit like artificial sweeterers) and hay-like, and also a slight salty-rock touch. A lot going on and hardly a harmonious experience (thrash metal rather than a classic symphony), with the sweetness not merging that well the funky rubbery notes imo. Like eating sweet licorice in the workshop at a farm. Finish: Sweet licorice, rubber, clay, and peat. Some salty sweetness. Medium long. At the very end there is a light touch of chocholate as well. Quite nice! Overall: Interesting and full of character, showing typical Springbank ”funk” I suppose. Yet it is a bit all over the place and a tad too raw for my taste. Still, I wouldn’t want to go as far as to say it’s not a good whisky, and I will score it 3.25 (which to me is the lower end of ”good” but surely better than just ”OK”).

Love the peat, funk and proof. Seems a tad one dimensional and overall I prefer the cousins (glengyle and springbank) as I get a bit more in those expressions. I’d love to try more cask finishes in the longrow family but they’re hard to find and expensive in my neck of the woods. There’s a sweetness to this that makes this Eminently drinkable. Update: bumped up to 4 stars. This becomes really nice the longer it opens up. My New Years resolution is to not use “funk” to describe campbeltown scotch. So let’s call this vegetal peat. It’s fantastic.