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N: dark fruits, raisins, vanilla, not spiky despite the high abv, lemon grass, warming spices
P: honey, nuts first, then pepper kicks, briny at the end
F: creamy, honey sweetness, briny, some oak and pepper remain for minutes
Reviewed
October 24, 2021 (edited February 20, 2022)
4.5
4.5 out of 5 stars
Smokey salted caramel, stewed fruit and seaweed on the nose. I love the depth of flavors as this dram unfolds. Burnt orange, dried fruits, leather and peat accompanied by a tarry finish. This pour is a balanced mash up of Speyside complexity and island hearty earthiness. This is one of the best cask strength scotches I have discovered in a while.
56.2% Saturated wood, fruit sweetness, and a touch of caramel. Hint of farm funk. ABV is warming with a little pepper. Peat is mild and well balanced. A little water softens the mouth and slightly increases the sweetness.
On the first whiff there is an intense vanilla aroma reminding me of soft creamy vanilla cotton-candy/or rich icecream. This dominates the nose for quite a while with some light earthy peatiness, none of the vegetal, almost seaweed like nose of the Islay malts. Then after letting it breathe, some light strawberry/raspberry scent sneaks around the vanilla, the dehidrated kind.
Kinda what i would expect from a cask strenght bourbon/sherry aged whisky.
The palate is much more heavy with the peat but there are also hinta of the berries i mentioned in the nose and more of the vanilla, maltiness and some pleasent bitter barrel influence
I think this is the 2018/2019 edition. It’s 54.8% abv (and based on what I’ve read it’s 50/50 burbon/sherry cask mix).
Nose: Surprisingly fresh! I certainly pick up sherry notes, but also grapes, apples and pears. It also has a dry chalk-like/limestone character to it which is really nice. The peat is certainly there but not cloying.
Palate: Lighter than expected. Decently refined with fruity notes (red and green apples mainly) and a slightly malty character. Sooty peat - rather light. Signature Springbank ”funk” (think rubber hose and synthetic oil…) though less than in other Springbanks I’ve tried. After a while just a tad of darker fruits.
Finish: More of that chalk-like character from the nose. Green apples. Touch of sweet broth. Sooty peat. Just a tad of rubber.
Overall: On the one hand it’s well-crafted and offers decent complexity. On the other hand it’s not the sledge-hammer you expect from a Springbank at CS, and in that regard it feels a bit underwhelming. Also, the more Springbanks I try the more I realize that I am not that exciting over those funky notes as some are. That said I actually appreciate the overall style of this whisky (lightly peated, burbon/sherry mix). Overall I score it 3.75 on the back of it being well-crafted and aligned with many of my preferences, and it’s not far away from a higher mark. That said I did swing back and forth with this one and at some points I wanted to score it lower (tried it heads-up against Lagavulin 16 and it suddenly tasted like the sweet-like odour of burning/melting plastic…), but sometimes also higher. It does balance on a thread…