Dogme reviews #1. Five short reviews

Sometimes reviews do get long and complicated. I get more confused than informed. For simple people like me that can only pick up between 0 and 3 notes in a whisky (beside "whisky") I will now try out some Dogme reviews. Or maybe I just don't have time to anything but short reviews and relax these days..

One rule : maximum 20 words. Initial first thoughts counts!

Do whisky make you think of a colour ?. It often does for me. This is somewhat irrational, but sometimes when I taste a whisky a colour pops up in my head. It might just be the predominant colours of the things I pick up in the whisky? It doesn't happen that often for me, but maybe for 1 or 2 in 10 whiskies.

Anyway, the few words combined with the rating should give you an idea of what I think of the whisky

Test samples from whiskybase

1. Glen Elgin 1985 Edition Spirits 46.6%

26yo Bottled 2011 

Great mouthfeel and texture. Sweet candy and spicy dry wood. Big and bold. Old. Citrus, medium finish

Rating 86 Colour: Brown

2. Clynelish 1988 Edition Spirits 50.0%

23yo Bottled 2012

Light. Slightly sour (acetic acid), Medium wood, some citrus and coconut. Longer finish

Rating 83 

3. Macduff 2000 Archives 48.2%

11yo. Bottled 2012

Funny artificial taste. Plastic ?. Sherry spiced. Medium finish

Rating 81

4. Glen Ord 1997 Archives  54.2%

15yo. Bottled 2012

Nose is light and immature. Greater palate but a little boring. Coconut, citrus, wood spiced and malty

Rating 83

5. Benriach 2000 12yo OB 54.4%

Bottled for the Netherlands. Virgin Oak Cask

Typical intense new wood whisky. Vanilla, intense mint

Rating 86 Colour : White

The six PLOWED bottlings

Here is a list of the 6 PLOWED bottlings, the labels has been retrieved from the COLA site.

Bottled in 1999. Fantastic old Springbank. This is a favourite PLOWED bottling by a considerate fragment of the group.

Another Classic. Early 70's Ardbeg by Douglas Laing. Say no More. Another favourite. Bottled 2001
Dave Broom and Michael Jackson disagrees HERE 

Brorageddon. The best Brora I have tasted. My favourite of the PLOWED bottlings. It's even a candidate to the best whisky I have ever tasted. 

Bottled 2003. First label to include the slogan "Self-styled whisky connoisseurs" It wasn't meant as a compliment when a Bowmore rep. adressed Bushido, after an enquiry about the tasting notes he had discovered in recent bottlings, which he described as FWP

LAWS reviews it HERE

Port Ellen from 2004. This one divides the group. Some like it (a lot), some don't. I am not a big fan

LAWS like it , HERE 

The last of the Old Malt Cask quartet. A Laphroaig bottled in 2006

Serge reviewed this one and liked it here

The latest addition to the range and the first OB, a 1986 BenRiach bottled in 2009, which again combines peat and sherry. Another bottle that split opinions, seems like it need some time in the glass/bottle

Conclusion? Don't drink with PLOWED if you're pregnant

Three quick Benriachs

BenRiach 15 yo OB, Pedro Ximenez-finish, 46%

Nose: Fresh, sugar sherry, light and elegant, summery. It actually brings distant memories from summers gone by.

Taste: Juicy sugar sherry sweetness. Dark, burnt sugar and plenty of oak. A modern dram with a decent quality.
Rating: 84

BenRiach Horizons 12 yo OB, triple distilled, sherry finish, 50%

BenRiach Horizons

Nose: Lovely oloroso sherry, toffee and orange chocolate, vague rubber notes (rubber band), burnt nuts and prunes.

Taste: Young. Feisty sherry with dark coffee notes and bitter nuts. It's a powerful horizon we're looking at here, so no extra softness for being distilled three times. Good whisky.
Rating: 86



BenRiach Authenticus 25 yo OB, 46%
Nose: Peaches and fruit drops - or is it fruit caramel? Beautiful nose with the smoke drifting quietly behind the fruit curtains.

Taste: Peaches and mango. Again the smoky element is carefully present and mixes in with the tropical style very, very well. A delicate experience.

Rating: 89



Concluding comment: During the last 7-8 years, careful and innovative ownership, along with the delicate quality of the whisky, has raised the profile of Benriach distillery and it's bottlings from a point of oblivion to a wide popularity. These three drams are fine examples of good quality Speyside whisky.

Bladnoch

A Fairy Tale Story ?

Bladnoch distillery

Bladnoch distillery is Scotlands southernmost distillery, It's located just outside Wigtown in Galloway, and is one of the remote distilleries in Scotland. Diageo mothballed Bladnoch in 1993 and sold it to Raymond Armstrong, a building entrepeneur from Northern Ireland in 1994, with a condition not to distill. Raymond Armstrong needed a summerhouse and Bladnoch he bought.

Bladnoch River from the distillery

Raymond, being an entrepeneur, soon wanted to reopen the place, but it wasn't after many years of hard work and negotiating with Diageo he got the permissions. In December 2000 production was kicked off again. 

 A visitor centre was opened and old stock was acquired, and Raymond was able to release his own bottlings of Bladnoch. In 2008 he released his first bottlings of his own production, three 6 year olds, a lightly peated, an ex-bourbon cask and an ex-sherry cask. Recently an 8yo has been released.

 Bladnoch is a whiskyentusiasts dream of a distillery. The releases, both from new and old stock are single cask or small batches, often bottled at casks strength. Beside Bladnoch bottlings, Raymond also purchases casks from other distilleries and bottle them for his online Forum members. And it's cheap, very cheap whisky

Check out the best online distillery website here : http://www.bladnoch.co.uk/

The cask of one of the first forum bottlings

Raymond Armstrong and a cask of Bladnoch

Ralfy and Raymond

Just this week the bottle no.1 of a 28yo Inchgower is being auctioned for charity. The bottle has the signature of both Ralfy and Raymond. Ralfy made a vlog about this bottling and you can follow the auction via the Bladnoch Forum.

Ralfy's vlog : http://whiskyreviews.blogspot.com/2010/08/bladnoch-forum-bottling-factory.html

Bladnoch Forum : http://www.bladnoch.co.uk/threads/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=36491#Post36491

Bidding ends 29th August. The money is destined for local charity 

The Bladnoch Forum got a lively activity, with regular postings from Raymond about the daily doos at the distillery, and participation from other distillers and bottlers as well as whiskyentusiast from all over the world.

Joining the forum gives access to discounts on both Bladnoch and Forum bottlings.

You can also follow Bladnoch on facebook here : http://bit.ly/9cXVKX

Well, this post was really an excuse to have a few drams, so here we go :

Bladnoch bottlings

1. Bladnoch 8yo 55% 

I have to say I love this bottling. Young whisky that isn't peated, heavily sherried or finished. Just plain "simple" whisky from good casks. It's very easy drinkable, and I have before described it's complexity as sniper like, and that still holds. After 2 or 3 sips the flavours starts to explode in your mouth.

It's a fresh, clean malt

Today I get : Mint, firecrackers, slight grassy-citus and some maltyness

The finish is very long and playful

Very more-ish whisky!

This should be a compulsary part of every entusiasts whiskycupboard 

Rating 89

2. Bladnoch 19yo 55%

Floral, minty, coconut

I have tried quite a few "old" Bladnochs during the last 5 years. With the gap in production of 8 years the bottlings from Raymonds older releases slowly gets older and older. The first one I acquired around 2004-2005 was 15yo and the most recent bottling is 19yo and 20yo's. This 19yo, one of the more perfume-floral Bladnochs (I find this quite a lot of Bladnochs from 1988-1993) is the first bottling I tried that appears more aged whisky than fresh whisky. In that sense it reminds me most of the 23yo Rare Malt Bladnoch, that until I saw the 20yo on the Bladnoch Forum just recently, was the only 20+ yo Bladnoch I was aware of, and is the only 20+ yo Bladnoch I ever tasted. 23yo Bladnoch was a magnificient dram and I am really looking forward to what will be bottled in 5 years time from Raymond, if any old stock will be left by then!

Well, this is essential the first bottling from Raymond I had that felt like "old" whisky when drinking it.

Rating 84

3. Glen Elgin 25yo 41.8% Bladnoch Forum Bottling

Sweet, candylike, well aged, slight elderflower, good bourboncask. Another cracker of a whisky from a bourbon cask.. The finish is long and reveals a bit of coconut and mint

Rating 85

4. Glen Elgin 25yo 42.5% Bladnoch Forum Bottling

Not far from the 41.8% bottling flavourwise, but not as intense in its expression.I've always had Glen Elgin on my secret gem list and these two bottlings are just more water on my mill ! 

Excellent whiskies. The ABV is lower than expected for a 25yo casks strength, but I almost always found that whiskies that has gone surprisingly low on their ABV relative to their age are absolutely wonderful. The alcohol content is low, but the whisky, and by that also the ingredients responsible for flavour hasn't been diluted

Rating 85

5. Benriach 23yo 49.7%

Spicy, very minty, meaty. Another cracker of an ex-bourbon cask. Some floral notes in the finish

Rating 85

6. Balblair 20yo 53.7%

An ex-sherry cask bottling. If you like raisins you will like this one. I get a minimum impact of sulphur on the nose but after 10 seconds it's gone. The sherry casks impact still allow a slight note of vanilla to get thru. A really good bottling that improves over time

Rating 89

I also reviewed a couple of Bladnoch Forum Glenburgies at this post : http://danishwhiskyblog.blogspot.com/2010/08/glenburgie.html

Distilleries improved

We all have our favourite distilleries, well most of us I guess. We also have some distilleries we have some problem getting along with. Well I do...or did

Things change. A distillery might change their production, or the company owning them might change their bottling style, that can be a change in age, a new bottling range, alcoholpercentage, they might drop chillfiltering their whiskies, or just vat different types of casks together. And my palate changes as well. First time someone gave me a Laphroaig I thought it was the worst thing I ever tasted..that opinion changed fast.

Here's a list of some whiskies which I used to find very bad, just bad, or just plain boring. Bad whisky is often due to some kind of fault in the production, boring whisky can be caused by bottling from casks thats too plain, that is casks that haven't given as much to the whisky as they should, maybe they have been used too many times.

1. Bowmore
Bowmore bottles some fantastic stuff, but in the eighties, something went wrong at the distillery. A lot of bottlings from this era is too soapy and too floral. Any soap is too soapy. These flaws goes for both OB's (The distillery's own bottlings) and IB's (Independant bottlings). This became so bad, a PLOWED Bowmore fan coined the tasting note FWP : French Whore Perfume to describe his experiences with Bowmore. Employess associated with the distillery usually denied this, and some even took offense (You're just a of self-styled connoisseurs was a reply to above when he questioned the distillery, self-styled whisky connoisseurs is now the offficial PLOWED logo)
Well Bowmore isn't like that anymore. I did avoid them for something like a 5 year period, but visiting them in 2007 and trying a few of their drams made me realise that this distillery was worthy again. Avoid anything disitilled before 1994 and after 1979 just to be safe :-)
It must be a company flaw as I have experienced the same flaws in Glen Garioch occasionally and Auchentoshan rarely. Visiting Auchentoshan in 2007 I mentioned this to one of their staff and it was quite entertaining watching this poor lad pretending he never heard about it before
Anyhoo, its 3 great distilleries that has overcome these troubles

2. Isle of Jura
I went to Islay in 2001 and at a bar I ordered the 10, 16 and 21 if my memory is correct. They all tasted of sour socks to me, really really bad. I'd actually revisited these bottlings and other Juras occasionally, the 10 at Fringe 2009 and it was still the same. I must have been complaining too much about Jura, to such an extent, that several of my friends has caught me praising Jura's when serving them blind to me, much to the fun of the donator. So therre is good Jura around. I've tried good Jura at SMWS (better than good actually, it was brilliant). At the entrance to a whiskyfair in Hadsten, Denmark 2009, the welcome dram was a 10yo Jura from Chieftain's, another brilliant bottling. Recently the distillery has changed their line, added some peated malts to their vattings etc.. I like the Superstition and its on my to-do list to try their new bottlings, especially their boutique barrel series which have been praised to me by trusted whisky friends

3. Tobermory/Ledaig
The products from this distillery gave me similar troubles as Jura. Sour socks whisky. I tried some awesome old bottlings, but the general production just seemed bad from one end to the other. Well that didn't stop me visiting the distillery last year. Mull is a fantastic Island and Tobermory (the town) is one of the most picturesque villages in Scotland. At the distillery I had the pleasure of getting spotted by the guide showing us around. Two friends and I, who was on the tour, and never asked a question still got pulled aside from the rest of the group when we enjoyed our compulsary dram after the tour and offered a few more. Somehow we looked like people who like whisky :-)
We had the pleasure, and it WAS a great pleasure, to try their new Ledaig and new Tobermory, both bottled at 46.3%. Nothing wrong with any of these, which was a bit of surprise to me. I gently commented that this was a lot better than what I remembered coming out from the distillery. The guide straight away admitted that the quality of their whiskies had improved and that it used to be feinty. No denials here
Well - there's another distillery for you all to go out and try again.
The same Company also relaunched Deanston at 46.3%. I didn't find the old version of Deanston flawed, just pretty boring. The new version is a lot better

5 years ago I went through a few whiskybooks, magazines and online blogs and made a comparison of ratings of standard bottlings and took an average. The result can be seen here :

http://www.whiskynyt.dk/index.php?name=PNphpBB2&file=viewtopic&t=745

The post is in danish, but download the xls-document for the result, here's a key to the columns :
1st column is Jim Murray's Bible 
2nd column is MM Matrix 
3rd column is Whisky Magazine, recalculated 
4th colum is  Jacksons Companion
5th column is an average


As you can see Deanston is last. That wouldn't be the case with bottling available today 


4. Tomatin, Balblair, BenRiach, Imperial and others


Disitilleries can reinvent themselves or get some new owners that cares a bit more about the bottlings coming out. Or an independant bottler might put a distillery on the map

First time I tried the above malts it was something I drank and forgot about 5 seconds later. The distillery bottlings weren't anything worth remembering


Well Tomatin decided to revat their 12, 15 and 18 and going 46 on the last two. Well what a pleasant surprise. Going straight from below average to one of the best OB ranges available

My collection of 18yo Tomatins. Old and new OB's to the left

Balblair relaunched their malts as vintages around 2006 and what an improvement. Another great set of OB's


BenRiach had a change of owners. Billy Walker has been putting out one excellent bottling after the other ever since (except the Birnie Moss..but that wasn't even released as a BenRiach so I suspect they didn't fancy it that much themselves either)


Imperial. Anyone ever paid any notice to this ?. Well, Duncan Taylor did. They hoped they could purchase the distillery, which failed, but the sale was so close to coming through, they actually stocked up on a lot of Imperial Casks. And a lot of the stuff they bottled from Imperial the last couple of years has been awesome. 2nd distillery Duncan Taylor put on the map for me, first was Caperdonich.


5. Arran
Arran bottles a lot and they did so since their malt was 3 years old. Most of this wasn't very good in my opinion. A lot of the terribleness has been hidden by finishes, well, in my case, as I quite often don't like the winery taste of finishes it has been double faulted. I know others liked this, but whisky won't get worse than the Arran Champagne finish.

Arran Peacock and Arran Rowan Tree

Well things are changing. Arran is a young distillery, and some distilleries just need some years in casks before they start to work. As Arran has started bottling whisky 12years and older, it is the ugly duckling turning into a swan peacock. Recent bottlings has been very good. The 12yo OB is a huge huge improvement to the 10yo (look out for a 14yo coming out soon). As well as some excellent single cask bottlings, both from ex-sherry and ex-bourbon casks I do regard The Arran Peacock as one of the best bottlings of whisky ever bottled in it's catagory (Single Malt, several casks - around 12yo)


So, it might be time to retry some of the distilleries you abandoned years ago ?

Port Askaig at the Cockney Pub, Århus and a Superb BenRiach

Cockney Pub is an english/scottish pub in Århus with a good selection of bottled beers, beers on tap and malt whisky. There's a good turnaround, so theres always something new to try out. And it's the only place in Århus serving real ale. On the shelves this week were the three Port Askaigs bottled by Speciality Drinks, which is a bottling company within the The Whisky Exchange, one of the worlds leading whiskyshops

1. Port Askaig Cask Strength 57.1%

2. Port Askaig 17yo 45.8%

3. Port Askaig 25yo 45.8%

It was a hot day, and the bar was hot so the malts was served at a relatively high temperature. There's been some short discussions which distillery these are from, and the fact that Caol Ila is located just next to Port Askaig adding that Caol Ila is the biggest distillery on Islay and the distillery that most frequent feeds independent bottlers with peated malts made it an obvious guess. The bartender at the Cockney pub said the salesman from which he bought the whiskies from, had told him that these were from different distilleries. Labels like this might also change distillery from batch to batch, but as far as I know there's been just one batch so far of Port Askaigs. 

From tasting these I can't tell which distillery is the origin, but it tasted like they were from the same distillery as they had a lot in common. Actually they reminded me most of Ardbeg 10, but not really of any other Ardbeg bottlings. I do believe in Caol Ila for the above reasons, and also the fact that if anyone had casks of 25yo Ardbeg it would be worth a lot of £££ to sell it with Ardbeg name on the bottle.
Here's a bit on the whiskies :

The 25yo was delicious lightbodied, apple and pears, with a tobacco smokyness and slightly floral

The 17yo was meaty and more fullbodied but much of the same with the apples and pears being more subtle. This will definetely suit peat fanatics more than the 25yo will

The NAS cask strength version, was a lot more powerful but wellrounded whisky with clear relations to the older bottlings. 

Its a set of good simple classic Islay malts which I'd probably rate around 85, with no particlar favourite, theres a different one for whatever mood you're in

Here's the whiskybar of Cockney

Well I thought I could manage one more dram before heading home so I picked up a

4. Benriach 1984 24yo 49.2% Pedro Ximenez sherry finish

(Bottom shelf, bottle no 5 from the left on the photo above)

When Benriach was bought by the new owners they discovered a range of peated casks in the warehouses, and they have bottled quite a lot of it over the last few years. This includes a few port and sherry finishes, the 1986 Plowed Benriach is also a Pedro Ximenez finish)

This is a magnificient dram. Often the heavy wine finishes can disguise the peat but here the peat and the dark sherry works together very well with neither overpowering the other. It's a sweet mellow kind of peat, the dark sherry is classic dried fruits with underlying vanilla. There's actually a span of peat giving this a playful complexity. I also thought I picked up a tiny bit of wet rubber..latex  (sulphur?) in it, not really unpleasant, I didnt find that when I had the same malt the week before! 

Rating 94

Well, pubs forces me to enjoy myself and be social opposed to be too analytic, but I tried to concentrate a bit on these. When I was about to go home and relax, an old friend from out of town "unfortunately" walked in, which cost me a few extra and not planned hours in the pub and quite a bit of hangovers the next day! 

EDIT summer 2011. After retasting this at home, this is one of my all time favourites!