cascode
Bakery Hill Double Wood Single Malt
Single Malt — Victoria, Australia
Reviewed
September 18, 2020 (edited August 11, 2022)
Nose: Apricot juice, prune juice, malt, honeydew melon. There are a lot of sweet fruity and syrupy aromas here and it has a plush, full quality. There are some leathery, spicy notes as well but they are subdued to start with, gaining prominence over time.
Palate: Sweet but somewhat flinty arrival that is malty at its core, but surrounded by grippy, almost hard tastes. After the unapologetically sweet and fruity nose the initial palate is a little surprising, but then you remember this has French oak influence and it makes sense. There is not a lot of development but definitely some intense marmalade and golden syrup notes, which become dominant (over-dominating, actually). The texture is good.
Finish: Medium/short. Golden syrup and malt are the final memories. There is a little metallic bitterness in the aftertaste.
The nose fools you into thinking this will be a sweet whisky but it's actually drier than expected, but not at all unpleasant. The finish is a little short. I tasted this immediately after the Cask Strength version of their "Classic Malt" and it suffered in comparison. I'd be interested to know what the "French oak casks" actually were - maybe they are refill ex-apera casks? They don't taste like virgin casks.
I'm swiftly coming to the conclusion that Bakery Hill needs to be at considerable strength to tell its story properly, and I can't help but wonder what this expression would be like with 10-12% more abv. At lower strength (and we're still talking 46%) everything I've tasted from them has seemed lacking in presence.
The nose was, for me, absolutely the best part of the experience and although the palate was good the golden syrup note is too prominent and gave it a one-note character. I'd equate this to their standard Classic Malt, and it is really just a variation on that theme. Neither of them approaches the Cask Strength expression, which is not simply more intense, it has a lot more complexity.
"Average" : 79/100 (2.75 stars)
175.0
AUD
per
Bottle
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@PBMichiganWolverine As far as I know it's just to do with lack of supply. Why did Yamazaki 12 go from an affordable malt to being absurdly priced and hard to get? Same story. 10 years ago Sullivan's Cove was a small Tasmanian operation with limited investment in casks and just enough spirit in maturation to meet domestic needs plus a small amount of export. Then Jim Murray named the French Oak as his whisky of the year and everyone when loopy over it (although IMHO it's far from being the best Aussie whisky). Demand outstripped supply by several thousand percent and they are still trying to catch up, but the sudden squeeze meant that a big expansion was needed which meant big investment in casks, staff, output, etc. It's still very hard to find any Sullivan's Cove here - you can't even buy it direct at the distillery most of the time and when an expression is released it disappears in a matter of hours. The one good thing is that Murray's spotlight on Australian whisky encouraged a huge growth spurt with about 30 distilleries all starting up within a year or two.
@PBMichiganWolverine Oh, and by the way, no one over here drinks Fosters. It's our joke on the rest of the world 😋
@ContemplativeFox Yes, as you said and @PBMichiganWolverine reiterated, our taxes are crippling to the local industry, however that's only half the story. All of our distilleries began as tiny, struggling start-ups less than 25 years ago - the majority less than 15 years ago. Although a few have grown the biggest in Australia is still smaller than Kilchoman. As a matter of fact, Kilchoman produces more whisky annually than all the Australian distilleries put together. Also, whereas Scotland has 200 years of investment, education, experience and infrastructure dedicated to whisky production, we have nothing of the kind to support our distillers. Ours is essentially a cottage industry making a very expensive, hand-made luxury item in a punishingly hostile economic environment. The product has to be priced at a point where the distillery can break even and believe me, none of them are raking in money by fleecing the consumer with inflated prices. You would have to be both obsessively passionate and downright crazy to start a distillery in Australia.
@cascode wondering if these regulations took place in the last 10 years? The last Aussie whiskey I bought was Sullivan’s Cove about 10 yrs ago—-their French oak and the American oak—-at $60/each. Now, it’s well over $500-700
@ContemplativeFox i think @cascode could she’d more light, but you’re right—-it’s the outrageous taxes imposed by AUS. I think it’s based on ABV, so beer ( like Foster’s) is cheap. But whiskey is damn expensive. On the other hand, one reason why you’re seeing craft distillers popping up everywhere in the US is because we changed our tax system to tax small producers much less than bigger ones.
@cascode I gave up at the slightly fatigued virgin...
Wow, even the regular version of this is really expensive! I suspect that Australia's liquor taxes are in large part to blame, but this still seems steep.
@CKarmios That's a very good question, and I found this on the Bakery Hill website - they describe the casking as follows: "... matured for up to 7 years in American Oak Ex-Bourbon barrels from Jack Daniels, before being transferred to a virgin French Oak ex-wine barrel, shaved back to bare wood, and then given a light toast to highlight the oak itself". So up to 7 years (which in Australia could be anything from the legal minimum of 2 years up to 7) in ex-bourbon wood that contained one of the sweetest of bourbons (sorry "Tennessee whisky", ahem). The French oak thing is a little odd as I don't see how an ex-wine barrel can possibly be a virgin cask. It's basically French oak, re-coopered in Australia and probably used for apera and then STRed. So in practice a slightly "fatigued" virgin (yeah, I used to know girls like that before I settled down). It's the interplay of JD and a whiff of Aussie sherry that is giving the sweet fruity notes, IMHO.
Now where do the apricots, prunes and melons come from; that was quite a first sniff on the nose.