Nose: Grassy and grainy (hay, cut grass, green vegetables, crushed dandelions) with a lot of fresh-sawn wood. There’s a fruity note but it’s more like tinned apple slices than fresh apples and also an odd perfume-like note that I finally realized was vanilla trying to punch through a lot of cabbage water and yeasty bread dough. Water has little effect on the nose. Palate: Solventy-sweet arrival with aggressively sharp white pepper and a sweet grassy flavour. The texture is oily but as it develops the pepper builds to cancel the texture. Dandelions, sawdust and raw white flour. Again, water does virtually nothing to the palate. Finish: Medium/Short. Grassy cereal fading to weak black tea and a slightly sour aftertaste. This is very young whisky and while I don’t criticize a whisky just for being young (there are plenty of excellent 3-5 year old drams around) this one smells and tastes like it is barely out of the cradle even though it is apparently 4 years old. The fact that reduction has almost zero effect on it also says a lot about how young this is. There is a lot of potential here but this whisky needs way more time to rest and gain some maturity. I had the feeling that the distillate was fat and oily but the casks were ferociously raw and overpowering it. Nc’nean has received a lot of positive comments and to their credit they are serious about sustainability and artisan quality, but I think the distillery is being hyped a bit too much and that never does any good. Tasted from a 30ml sample, I’ll come back to their whisky in about 12 years and see what it's like when it has grown up. “Average” : 79/100 (2.75 stars)