The OCUK Whisky (and Whiskey) review thread
- Thread starter Uriel
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@Illgresi yep I love the Ugge but it's £60 odd compared to the £24 at the moment for the Laphroaig QC. That was my point, just that the QC is really good value for money.
I love the Bunnah 12 and always have it in, FYI it goes on offer to £30 fairly often even at Waitrose. And this is the G&M bottling I have. It's superb! I'll have to check out the Corryveckan…
I love the Bunnah 12 and always have it in, FYI it goes on offer to £30 fairly often even at Waitrose. And this is the G&M bottling I have. It's superb! I'll have to check out the Corryveckan…
Latest bottles from my 'Whisky Syndicate' have arrived. Looking forward to trying these this weekend. She's already robbed some of the 1792, and says it's delicious. Going to have that in a Manhattan tonight.
We've got:
1792 Single Barrel
Ardbeg Wee Beastie
Benriach 12
Yamazaki Distiller's Reserve
As part of this Syndicate, we've managed to wangle a free Zoom tasting of 'Elements of Islay'. Got 6 free drams from them which will be drank tonight.
https://islay.com/elements-of-islay/about/
We've got:
1792 Single Barrel
Ardbeg Wee Beastie
Benriach 12
Yamazaki Distiller's Reserve
As part of this Syndicate, we've managed to wangle a free Zoom tasting of 'Elements of Islay'. Got 6 free drams from them which will be drank tonight.
https://islay.com/elements-of-islay/about/
£50 on Amazon if you get it with S&S. You can cancel the sub at any time after the order arrives if you don't want more.
Ahh, someone else pointed that out after I'd already ordered it! I also got a bottle of Kilchoman Sanaig just so I didn't have to pay delivery!
I'm surprised my credit card and debit card haven't melted this past week!
So far I have ordered:
Laphroaig Quarter Cask
Tamnavulin Sherry Cask
BenRiach The Twelve
Benromach 10 year old
Talisker 10 year old (replacement)
Tomatin Cask Strengthx2 (one for father in-law's xmas)
Bunnahabhain 12 year old (backup)
Bunnahabhain Toiteach a Dhà
Arran 10
Talisker Port Ruighe
Deanston 18 year old
Kilchoman Sanaig
I also have a couple of bids in on auctions, but I doubt I'll win them.
Probably go a few months without spending now!
Agreed. This CS is quite spirity, but you do get a nice sherry roundedness. I think the Arran 10 is my favourite so far, stunning whisky and stunning value. Still waiting on the Deanston and the Kilchoman. If the Deanston is even better than the 12 year old then it must be quite exceptional.
Kilchomann is an interesting one. See what you think. I thought it was a bit meh and I don't think it's that great - yet. Lovely distillery, great people, interesting tour etc, but the end product is still lacking something IMO. Give it 5 more years though and I think it'll start to round off some of the corners on it. 10-15 years and more matured? Some things need time. I suspect the best is yet to come from this distillery.
So it turns out I did win the auction bids
Kilkerran Heavily Peated Batches 1, 2, and 3. Worked out at £150, which is £45 a bottle (minus commission). So the seller only made £5 ish per bottle. Lovely.
I also picked up a Glenlivet 12 Illicit Still for £38. Heard very good things.
Had a dram last night. Interesting. Very different to other peated Islay malts. It's more a sort of bonfire smoke as opposed to the medicinal smoke usually prevalent. Also I wasn't getting the usual blast of sea notes you associate with Islay. Perhaps that's the influence of the sherry cask?
Kilkerran Heavily Peated Batches 1, 2, and 3. Worked out at £150, which is £45 a bottle (minus commission). So the seller only made £5 ish per bottle. Lovely.
I also picked up a Glenlivet 12 Illicit Still for £38. Heard very good things.
Had a dram last night. Interesting. Very different to other peated Islay malts. It's more a sort of bonfire smoke as opposed to the medicinal smoke usually prevalent. Also I wasn't getting the usual blast of sea notes you associate with Islay. Perhaps that's the influence of the sherry cask?
Soldato
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I only find Laphroaig 10 medicinal (the Quarter Cask not so), whereas all Lagavulins and Ardbegs I've tried are very campfire smoky to me, but still different to one another in that note. Taste and smell are very personal things though.
Yeh I know what you're getting at. I would say the three south-east distilleries are all medicinal. Some are a bit more just a regular smokiness, like Caol Ila. This was different though, it was almost like a hickory or applewood smoked bit of meat. Very unusual.
Soldato
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Have tried a few over the last couple of years, I love Auchentoshan American Oak, Chivas Regal 12 is nice, but my favourite so far has been JW Black Label - just with some ice, absolutely love it! May try double black soon! Any recommendations always welcome along the lines of JW Black Label...?
PS> I tried 'Whyte & Mackay' whisky, it is the first time I have been unable to drink a whisky, it was truly, truly awful, I couldn't even have it as a mixer, it was THAT bad (IMO).
PS> I tried 'Whyte & Mackay' whisky, it is the first time I have been unable to drink a whisky, it was truly, truly awful, I couldn't even have it as a mixer, it was THAT bad (IMO).
Soldato
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I started on Chivas 12 many moons ago! Still have a bottle somewhere; it's a very drinkable and accessible blend for starters. JW 12 is another good one to keep in stock, as it's still accessible but has the beginnings of a peated character to it, I believe by including some Caol Ila in the blending.
I don't personally enjoy JW12 any more, but I recall Blair Atholl 12 being almost an enhanced JW12. That may be because it's actually in the blend? Not sure.
If I were you, I'd keep exploring the JW range and see which ones you prefer; do a bit of compare and contrast with their taster bottles and see which piques your interest.
Have you tried Glenfiddich Vintage out of interest? It's a peated Glenfiddich, but also IMO somewhat odd in flavour and lacking as a result. There seems to be a good way to add peat and a bad way. I don't know enough about the details of how they're doing it to comment in any detail but I also thought the peated Kilchomann lacked something. I didn't think the Sanaig was the peated one though, I'll have to look up which one was their heavy peat offering.
if you're into blends and can find one still in stock then try the Collectivum XXVIII - single malts from every Diageo distillery blended into one. Really not bad.
A lighter, but quite pleasant blend is the Shackleton which is a recreation of whisky taken on his expedition to the south pole. There's an affordable version from the usual places and a more complex (and expensive) version that may or may not still be obtainable - I haven't checked recently.
Soldato
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It's a very detailed process these days, but originally peat influence in whisky was solely because it was the only fuel Islay had to burn to heat the barley and stop it germinating. The smokey influence from the peat (it imparts phenols and other compounds into the barley) was therefore not as a result of wanting to make the resulting whisky taste 'peaty', but almost just a by product of the production process.
These days, it's entirely by choice as the maltings use very precisely controlled heating to stop germination, and the peat smoke is wafted through the barley by fans; the heat from the peat is not required, but the smoke produced is.
The process of malting (and adding peat influence) is part of a distillery's character, and as such it's extremely precisely controlled with detailed instructions for the maltings. There are some great documentaries on the likes of the Port Ellen maltings on Islay. They do the malting for the majority of the distilleries on Islay, but each distillery has their own peating profiles they use.
Bruichladdich have their Octomore line, which takes things to the extreme, and it's all about the methods used to impart the phenols into the barley. They typically aim for the highest parts per million (ppm) of phenols in the barley of any Scottish distillery, but they do multiple releases each year with different ppm levels too.
Phenols do decrease over time though (I think it's as they oxidise?), so a newmake spirit that's fresh off the still is going to be more phenolic than one that's older. If you can, I'd recommend trying a distillery's multiple different aged releases (ideally all aged in similar casks like just ex bourbon) and seeing how/whether the peat influence seems different between them. I did this with multiple Lagavulins, and I really don't get on with the young stuff (aggressive smoke and new rubber tyres), but the older stuff just clicks.
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All agreed - that's a very good summary. Sadly when I was touring Isla PEM was closed for refurb and maintenance so we didn't get to see it other than driving by to get to places. What I was meaning by my comment is adding "peat" in the wrong way doesn't benefit a whisky. To me the GF Vintage tastes weird, almost fishy rubbery and it jars with their sweet core. I could just have got a bad sample, but tried twice at different times with same recoil. Equally a heavily peated Bunnahabhain (when available) tends to be worth snapping up as it does add a nice twist to things. Their current PX Moine offering is one I'd love to try but well out of my price range. I'll have to see if anyone wants to chip-in and do a group tasting.
The really peaty Kilchomann is their "Loch Gorm". If I can find my taste notes I will add them later but from memory the blue Sanaig was the more popular in our tasting session.
It is most likely due to oxidation I suspect. There are other possibilities, like the phenols being in solution with the alcohol, and because of the low and consistent temperatures in Scotland alcohol is lost during maturation before the water is, meaning phenols would be lost at the same rate as the alcohol. It would be interesting to see how it would affect a peated American whiskey, a lot of that is matured in areas there are high temperature variations, meaning the water is lost before the alcohol which would leave it with a peatier flavour over time if that were the case.
I may have mentioned it in here before but I really dislike the current PPM usage. Because the reading is taken before distillation and maturation is is pretty much useless as a guide. It should be taken before bottling to be of any use for direct comparison.
Evening all, wanted to share a sneak peek at a spreadsheet I've been working on. Currently have every single malt, core range product in, plus a few selected others. I've taken the ratings from Whiskybase to produce this, however there are certainly criticisms of that site (I have a list). For me, aggregating as many as possible opinions on something as subjective as the enjoyment of whisky is the only way to approach an objective opinion. Whiskybase is the only site I know with the depth of data. I have created a value figure based on this rating, along with ABV and price. This is a work in progress and I'm actively gaining opinions through the Aqvavitae (if you haven't checked out the Aqvavitae youtube channel go do so right now!) community, on ways to improve the sheet. I haven't released it as yet, as I'm working on an interactive dashboard, but thought you all might be interested in some of the raw data.
I plan on having a price guide on the dashboard, which will be the main tool, but will also have distillery information (including a list of bottlings), and anything else the community suggests. Really interested to hear your feedback and questions.
I plan on having a price guide on the dashboard, which will be the main tool, but will also have distillery information (including a list of bottlings), and anything else the community suggests. Really interested to hear your feedback and questions.