ContemplativeFox
Sir Edward's Blended Scotch 12 Years
Blended — Scotland
Reviewed
August 8, 2020 (edited February 8, 2021)
Rating: 9/23
I kind of dig this bottle. The shape is a little bit unique and refined with an elegant looking screw top (sort of like how Roku gin tries to hide the fact that it has a screw top, but still makes the screw top look good).
N: I get oil immediately with alcohol and some hay - maybe even some pasture - and a nice kind of earthy, savory richness that really improves upon Glen Logie. I even get a hint of floral sweetness on the nose. It isn't a great nose, but it's decent enough and I can at least tell that it's a blended whisky.
P: It's a heck of a lot smoother than Glen Logie, though there is still some harshness and a definite flavor of alcohol. The big flavor though is the slightly rancid oil, which adds a nice viscosity (between that and the burn, I would definitely have guessed that this was over 40% alcohol) and leads well into the hay and light pasture flavors with its savoriness. There are some spices, which help to explain some of the harshness, but don't totally cover for it. I get ginger, allspice, and some cinnamon, but the biggest one is a peppery harshness that has a little bit of an herbal flavor to it that ties back into the hay and pasture. There is a floral sweetness to it that tastes a bit like fake caramel and has a mineral flavor that goes with it. The balance is fine on the whole and the profile is a bit unique, though not in an expressly bad way. The flavors themselves range from decent to kind of bad, but they're all light enough that the blend kind of just works out.
F: This is really just alcohol, some light slightly rancid oil, and a harsh burn. It's frankly a bad finish and a huge let-down from the decent (well, decent-ish) nose and palate. There's no complexity here and what remains is bad.
This isn't all that great, but it's a hell of a lot better than Glen Logie. This lands in that Jameson range of being boring and also a little bit off, but having just enough redeeming qualities to not actually be bad. I'm going with an 8 to 10 here and I think a 9 seems fitting.
20.0
USD
per
Bottle
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@jdriip PS I also realized that I miscalculated the conversion from my 23 point scale to Distiller's 20 point scale. It's now a 2.0 instead of a 1.75.
@jdriip I'll be interested to find out what you think now as well! I think part of it is that I'm using a harsher scale than you are since I actually thought that this was decent for the price (if you need to have a scotch rather than a bourbon or rum), but it is quite unusual, so it needs some sort of "proceed with caution" warning. I'd be OK with drinking it though. This and the Highland Queen Majesty Sauternes are the best store brand bottom shelf scotches I have tried so far.
@ContemplativeFox I liked this more than you did, but that was about a year ago. Will be interesting to taste again and see what difference the time makes on my impression.