Ah, Balven...I mean Kininvie. You got me. You got me good. In our quest to try juice from every active distillery in Scotland, I came across Kininvie here. This distillery was founded in 1990, on the grounds of The Balvenie distillery by William Grant & Sons. This single malt is primarily used in Monkey Shoulder and Clan Macgregor blends. The kicker is that Kininvie doesn’t have their own Mash house- all their Mash is piped over from The Balvenie. Kininvie only uses their own mash recipes. So, in effect, The Balvenie is a contract distiller for them. That explains a lot... This is a 23 year old malt distilled way back in 1990 when the place first began operations. Kininvie also releases a 17 year old, but everything else goes towards blend. This is Batch 3 and was bottled at 42.6%. It’s pale gold in the taster, oily with tons of undefined legs running down the glass. The nose is mostly ex-bourbon wood. There’s light orchard fruits like apples and pears and a tiny bit of vanilla. It smells like a light, American whiskey. The palate is similar on the flavor side, but it’s super smooth, a bit thick and sugary with an oily mouthfeel. The finish is medium length, delicate and woody. It’s smooth from start to finish, but incredibly boring. After trying an ounce neat, I did something I almost never do- I added water. At 23 years old there’s got to be hidden complexity or added depth of flavor to be unearthed. Not really. The nose offered up some perfume notes that weren’t there initially, but there was no improvement to the palate. Bummer. So, what we have here is a contracted Balvenie- with a price point to match. I paid $145 for this 375ml bottle. What a rip off! This dram is boring as hell and ridiculously overpriced. I saved this one for the end of our tour thinking it would deliver the goods- wrong. I got robbed. 2.5-2.75 stars TOPS. I want to deduct stars for the price, but it is incredibly smooth whisky. Avoid buying this and bum a taste off of a fool dumb enough to buy a bottle. Cheers.