boviscopophobic
Royal Canadian Small Batch
Canadian — Canada
Reviewed
November 20, 2016 (edited November 21, 2016)
Culled from Sazerac's 200,000+ barrels of sourced Canadian whisky (most of which goes into bottom-shelf blends). Colour is generic amber. Nose is typical Canadian: butterscotch/caramel, maple (though not cloying), raw grain, dusty rye. Earthy, slate, minerality. Cedar, lemongrass, chalky. Faint dill, even fainter mint. Some tangy citrus. Wide ranging, but weak. Even weaker taste: green apples, faint wood, slight maple, pickle, ginger. Vanilla, caramel. Hot ginger beer on the finish, with some orchard fruits, pickle juice and some tannic bitterness. The whole affair is alternating sweet-and-spicy, which is really what Canadian whisky tends to go for. It's semi-interesting, and doesn't fall too far into the traps of a lot of other Canadian whiskies (it's sweet but not too sweet; it's at least got a hint of spice; its vanilla/caramel notes feel natural rather than synthetic), but it's still hampered by the baggage of the style it inhabits. Ultimately, a good rendition of a style I don't care for much.
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