Review #122: Longrow Peated Campbeltown Single Malt Scotch Whiskey, NAS, 46%, OB

Halloween blogging

So this is the basic Longrow, which is the double-stilled and heavily peated Springbank. Probably a mix of ages (from young to very young) and probably not a mix of casks (refill bourbon).

Nose: crazy stuff. Well, maybe not, but there's lots of paraffin and plastic, greasy varnish, smoky pears, toasted oats, tonic, and, eventually, some sweet, creamy notes and citrus comes through. Lots of peat and rather youngish, but no monster.

Palate: rather dull, actually. ginger tonic plus some phenols.

Finish: lots of smoky, vegetal peat and then a burst of sweetness -- banana creme pie, I think -- plus herbal tonic.


This is good, dependable stuff. If there are any eccentricities, they are interesting ones. It falls apart on the palate for me, but otherwise very enjoyable.

score: 84

Review #121: Brora 30yr, 2009 release (8th edition), 53.2%, OB, 2652 bottles

birthday blogging

Seems like a good time to open this. From the dead distillery across the way from Clynelish.

nose: peaches, honey, a bucket of seawater, an almond, some rocks, roses, salted caramels, baked apples with oak spice, creamy beeswax, and muted but biting peat. More sherry fruit comes out over time. Tiny hints of loam and ricola and bacon. Nothing seems particularly profound or intense, but it's like a greatest hits album. Everything is sedate, balanced: it moves nicely between fruit and peat and wax.

palate: smoky wax, lemony apples. Really very waxy, and the peat coats everything. Some sauvignon blanc flavors, old oak, and some nice herbs (tarragon, lemon balm).

finish: the peat tingles and settles into smoke, lots of fruity sweetness with vanilla, and a little menthol. really lingers.


This doesn't rock my world, but it comes pretty close. It's basically a peaty Clynelish with some extra depth and richness. But that's pretty good!

score: 91

Review #120: Glen Spey 25 yr 1988/2014, Archives, 47.3% abv, bourbon hogshead, C#356079, 163 bottles

found another one!

I happened to have another Glen Spey sample lying around (just like #119), so let's get to it. It's from the Fish of Samoa series from Whiskybase. Very cheap for 25yr whisky these days.

Nose: wow, really minimal barrel effect, unlike the last one. Very, very pale and straightforward: malt, pear, vanilla cream, hay. After a while it opens up to some very soft fruit: peaches, currants, lemon, maybe even some blueberries. Marzipan. There's some charred oak in there, too. It's all very mellow.

Palate: Soft and creamy. The fruit comes out more, and there's a nice herbal sting that's not quite bitter and not quite minty.

Finish: well, pretty short.


This is very subtle stuff, but develops nicely and shows maturity without relying on any big barrel effects. It requires some attention, but I like this a lot.

score: 87

Unnumbered review: some Barbera

not from the wine lake

Here's some Barbera. It's hard not to think of Barbera as supermarket wine at best, when it's grown in somebody's uncle's vineyard in Piemonte that can't ripen nebbiolo, and wine-lake-wine at worst, when the grape is grown for high yields and no particular reason somewhere else. But then someone thought that it was possible to make excellent wine from barbera, and they were right.

These are all Barbera DOC (but not DOCG) from Piemonte. They're all good -- call them B/B+ -- and they go well with food.

Querciola Barbera D’Alba 2005, 14% abv

intense black cherry and berry nose, with some interesting pitchy/woody and acetic notes.

deeply flavored palate with smooth tannins and a little acidity, but finishes a little thin.

Giulin Barbera del Monferrato 2008, 14.5%

densely colored. smells like the inside of an old barrel, in a nice way, and then some very dark and dry fruits open up. chewy and slightly sour entry, but then it becomes light and fruity. it feels very old-fashioned – like it was vinified (although I have no idea) in a big wooden vat with lots of stems and wild yeast – which I like. But nothing about it really stands out otherwise.

Boroli Quattro Fratelli Barbera D’Alba 2007, 14% abv

softer and more brightly acidic than the others, with some simple red fruit and minerals coming out on the palate. wood spices and minty herbs come out next, and the finish is the best part: the fruit becomes deeper and more tarry.

The Boroli is probably a little too simple and thinly-flavored to stand up on its own, but holds up well with food. The Querciola is the most concentrated of the bunch, but the Guilin is definitely worth trying, especially if you prefer a woodier, less fruit-forward style.

Review #119: Glen Spey 21yr 1989/2010, 50.4%, OB, first fill American oak, 5844 bottles

is this for real?

I don't know much about Glen Spey, but the name seems like a joke, as if someone named a French wine "Mas de Domaine Château," or something like that. But this makes more sense than that -- it's just a little plain, as far as names go. This one is still pretty widely available, oddly enough. I'm looking forward to it.

Nose: grassy -- more than I expected -- with a lot of chewy, meaty bourbon funkiness. What is bourbon funkiness, you ask? It's leather and corn and crème caramel and extracted oak spices, mostly, with some savory herbs and a distinctive sour note. Underneath all that there's a toasty malt core, and some fruit come out after a while, but you could almost mistake it for an unusually dry, oaky, savory bourbon.

Palate: Oak in your face. There are lots of soft, candied flavors, too, and some bananas and coconut, but the oak really grabs you (me).

Finish: lots of spices (clove, cinnamon, coriander) and toffee appear for the finish. I think it might be the best part.


Although this is enjoyable whisky, I'm a little disappointed: I was hoping to learn something about Glen Spey distillate, and instead I feel as if I learned more about distillate that sits in American oak for a long time. Still, I like American oak, and I like the departures from bourbon (the dry, savory herbaceousness) that this stuff does make.

score: 87

Review #118: Kavalan King Car "Conductor" Taiwanese Malt Whisky, NAS, 46%, OB

What is this, anyway?

It's single malt whisky from Taiwan, obviously, but I don't understand the range. The single-cask bottlings, that may or may not be called "Solist," are easy enough to understand; the others are more confusing. But I think it goes like this: the one called either nothing or "Classic" is mostly ex-bourbon barrels with a few sherry barrels; the one called "Concertmaster" is all ex-bourbon, and then finished in port barrels (definitely either barriques or pipes); and this one is a vatting of eight different barrel types, including a lots of different wine casks, but is mostly just Classic with a higher proportion of sherry barrels.

nose: soft sherry fruit with a little banana and coconut. It's a little young and grassy, but there's are some nice almonds and marshmallows, too. Some oak and that's about it. Very clean gentle nose.

palate: still very soft and maybe a little prickly, but the flavor is nicely rounded. the profile adds some toast and a lot of buttery toffee, but otherwise stays the same.

finish: the sherry fruit becomes juicier for a second and lingers nicely.


This is nice whisky -- very pleasant drinking and nothing objectionable. It's hard to see how it's worth the $110 or so that it costs, but I guess that's the way of the world.

score: 83

Review #117: Benromach Peat Smoke 2005/2013, 46% abv, OB, 67 PPM, aged in first-fill bourbon barrels

more Benromach

67 ppm is really a lot of peat -- it's higher by a fair measure than any of of the Kildalton distilleries. Of course, the phenols in the malt might not make it through the still ...

nose: well, yes, there's peat, but no, not twice as much as Lagavulin. It's an oily and sooty peat, with some funky vegetal notes in back, and then something like the inside of an angry vacuum cleaner (I imagine). There's not a whole lot else going on, but there are lots of nice sweet lemon drops, some furniture polish, and a cracker.

palate: sweet and then peat. gumdrops for an instant, and then the peat: inky and phenolic at first, opening up into weird humusy notes.

finish: sweet, oily, prickly, long. it really is very sweet -- maybe they should put ppm of sugar on the bottle, too.


I find it a little strange that (almost) all the peat monsters (that's lower case) have taken to sweetening up their distillate so much. But it works well in this case -- everything is well integrated and comfortable, even if not super-exciting.

score: 85

Review #116: Benromach 10yr Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 43%, OB

everybody's doing it

There have been a lot of reviews of this recently, occasioned, I guess, by the new packaging. I still have a bottle in the old kit, which I like better anyway. I haven't actually seen the new design in person yet.

This is the little distillery that Gordon and Macphail bought and re-fitted so that they'd still have access to whisky. The 10yr, I hear, is 80/20 bourbon casks and sherry casks, and then gets another year in oloroso butts for fun.

nose: stunningly deep and complex. lots of malt character under layers of smoke and sherry fruit. apples and pears, metallic notes, mint, dried apricots and plums, vanilla custard, toast, and oak spice. The peat is gentle and sooty, but runs through everything else. Some rubbery notes, too -- maybe that's from the sherry?

palate: curiously rich for 43%. smoke and honey, butter and tangy marmelade. bread and exotic wood.

finish: more phenols, sweet creamy fruit, a little licorice.


This is so far beyond most other standard bottlings it's hard to know what to say. There's no way that the price and quality stay on this level -- look for it to double in price and become half as good. (There must be some older whisky, and some really amazing sherry casks, in there.)

score: 88

Review #115: Laphroaig 20yr 1990/2010, 52.8% abv, The Nectar of the Daily Drams

and let's keep going with Laphroaig

Here's an older one, don't know much about it. No idea what to expect.

Nose: somewhat subtle, actually. a black, oily peat with rubber tires and lots of smaller wildflower and vegetal notes. Very faintly: toasted muesli with yoghurt and bits of orchard fruit. If you give it a long time to open up, there's a plummy meatiness, too. Like memories of a breakfast that was set on fire.

Palate: much less subtle. Oily and mouth-filling smoke, tempered by a plummy sweetness.

Finish: the peat still burns, but there's suddenly a lot of licorice, and peaches and plums and a little custard shine through. Becomes a little salty and seaweedy at the end.


This is all curiously subtle for Laphroaig -- it really demands a lot of attention, which is not how I think of Laphroaig. But the attention is well repaid, at least. Nice stuff.


score: 89

Review #114: Laphroaig Quarter Cask, NAS, 48%, OB

another day of  Laphroaig

This is the Quarter Cask, which I think was a duty-free special that was made into a regular bottling. It's NAS, but I think it's only about 5yr old, plus a short finish in a quarter cask. (Where do those little casks come from? What do they do with them afterward?) They bottle it at 48%, at least.

nose: fairly soft but distinctively coastal peat, with some salt and iodine in it, in addition to the smoke and wet dog. a whiff of clarified butter, too, along with butterscotch and cotton candy. smoky candy.

palate: lots of prickly smoke and wet dog, not a whole lot else going on. nice mouthfeel, though: 48% works well here. I thought it would be sweet, but it's not.

finish: long on the smoke. the buttery sweetness comes back a little, but it tempers the young whisky more than being a thing itself.


It's interesting to me that this manages to be more coastal, and less aromatic, than the 10yr. The added weight helps it, but the 10yr is still the more distinctive whisky. "Distinctive" isn't always better, but in this case I'll give it a point difference, even though I'm really happy to find the coastal notes.

score: 83

Review #113: Laphroaig 10yr OB, 43% abv

I've been putting this one off ...

It's hard to know where to begin. When I first bought a bottle of Laphroaig in the early 90's, it seemed miraculous -- compared not only to all whisky, but compared to everything else at all. The sheer intensity of it -- and of the 10yr in particular -- and the distinctness of the flavors set it apart from anything else I had tried. Not that there was much to try back then -- it was hard to find anything apart from Glenfiddich, Glenlivet, maybe Macallan. But Laphroaig stood out as a school for whisky by itself, and indeed, for other flavors, too, for things I wouldn't have tried otherwise.

It was accessible, too. I didn't have any money then, but I could afford a bottle. I think it was about $25 for the 10yr. What's more, they seemed to be grateful for the business: there was a while when bottles came with a coupon for a free rugby shirt (and a square foot of Islay), which was mailed back from Scotland. I was sort of disbelieving and embarassed to fill out the coupon, but I did it anyway:

More recently it's been harder to love Laphroaig. In part, this is just the way of things, but I've had sips from maybe half a dozen bottles recently and they all, somehow, disappoint. The smoke is still there, but the intensity and the distinctive coastal elements -- that seaweedy medicine -- isn't really there. It's become a little blander, a little gristlier maybe, and a whole lot sweeter. There's a lot of Maker's Mark in there now, and lot less Kildalton peat. (I did have a bottle that reminded me of Basil Hayden, too -- I thought I noticed that Jim Beam sour milk taste and rye spice behind the smoke.)

I think it's not too hard to find bottles from the 90's still around, but I'd feel foolish trying to hold on to my past that way. But I do still wonder whether I'm just imagining the marked decline of Laphroaig, or if it's real. The best I can do, then is to compare a current bottle with a mini that I have left over from the 90's. I just have one left, somehow, from a ziploc bag that I bought about 20 years ago. (I can say it wasn't stored very well.) 67 Wine and Spirits in NYC was selling, at one point, 15 minis in plastic bag for slightly less than a full bottle. So I bought a bag. Here's the last mini:

So, here I go:

Laphroaig 10yr from the 1990's:

More color than I remember. More sweetness and less smoke, too -- I think this has changed in the bottle. It's salty peaches with a smokiness that moves from smoldering leaves to a tarry, oceanic wet wool. Menthol and seaweed, too, along with spring flowers. But peaches and honey and a little mint are stronger than the smoke, amazingly enough. Palate is oilier than sweet. The peat is still sharp and turns a little ashy. The fruit is still thick and rich and the coastal notes are still there. Nice long mentholated finish. Not that intense, but there's lots of peaches and cream, and a little iodine.

score: 90


Laphroaig 10yrs, +/- 2014:

Intensely smoky, like someone threw a box of band-aids on top of a campfire. That's the main thing, along with a little camphor and burnt rubber and an intense but fairly generic vanilla sweetness. There might be a little fruit in there. No seaweed or iodine that I can tell -- it's still medicinal, though, with sugar to make it go down easier, I guess. Palate feels very, very light -- smoke on the water. The peat becomes a little ashy, which is nice, I think. Lots and lots of fructose-like sweetness. The finish becomes almost sickly sweet (not really, but compared to what I expect), but lots of little coastal notes -- like iodine and seaweed and seashells -- start to come out. They're overwhelmed by the sugar, though: most of the appeal here is in the room-filling bandaids-on-a-campfire nose.

score: 84


Well, I don't think I learned anything here about the past or the present, except that I can't drink whisky in 1994 any more, and that it wouldn't have been so bad if I had set aside a few bottles from back then.

Review #112: Caol Ila 1999/2011, 43% abv, The Whisky Trail

what is this? where did it come from?

The label says it was bottled in 2011 but it's just popped up everywhere, from what I can tell. Not a lot of other information on the label, but it looks like it was barreled with something red. The brand is from Specialty Drinks, which I think is the The Whisky Exchange house bottler, but they don't have any. It's cheap -- 44.50 at Whiskybase.

nose: has a kind of Talisker peat -- earthy and peppery -- along with some fruit candy. Eventually it opens up into some more Caol-Ila-like soot and lemon notes, but I might just be imagining that. A little bit of salt and seaweed, too. A very expressive peat and sweet nose -- it goes through a range without anything dominating.

palate: the phenols hold up ok, but becomes thin and even a tiny bit green (vegetal, hot). some fruity/spicy sweetness is there, but again, it's really thin.

finish: not much. smoky peat lingers and some residual sweetness.


This is a huge bargain even though it's taken on too much water. Whatever wine finishes they used work brilliantly with the Islay peat.

score: 84

Review: Absolut Tune Sparkling Fusion, 14% abv, OB

vodka, white wine, and carbonation

The blessed among us receive, as a result of their dedicated patronage, first dibs on allocations of Pappy and Stagg. The rest of us are gifted whatever detritus the sales reps have left behind. It's hard to believe that this exists, but it does. Here is some evidence.

nose: pleasant sweet-tart fruit (artificial cherries and grapes), a bag of wet gravel, and cheesecloth. some vegetal notes, too.

palate: oh no, oh no this is sparkling vodka. it tastes like vodka, with bubbles. It's sweet and stemmy, too, but mostly this tastes like vodka soda. Not like: vodka and club soda. But rather like: vodka-flavor soda. With grape stems and sweet.

finish: lasts much too long but ends pleasantly, back on the fruit candy flavors.


This is an abomination, not because it tastes terrible (though it's quite bad), but because there is no reason for it to exist and yet it does. Sparkling wine continues to be a better option for sparkling-wine-type-products.

score: 60

Review #111: Cooley 13yr 1999/2013, 51.4% abv, The Whisky Mercenary, peated

so basically this is single-cask Connemara

It would be nice to get in a Cooley High reference, but sometimes things don't work out. All the same, this recently reappeared at Whiskysite.nl, so it seems like a good time to write it up. Casks of Cooley should be drying up since the distillery, I hear, stopped selling them out (except to Teeling?). I don't know why -- it's not like they have the "Cooley" brand to protect, but it seems to be Beam's way. This is single malt, from a pot still, I believe.

nose: it's not overwhelming, but it's a slightly acrid peat, with lots of dark smoke and forest floor. behind that there's some creamy malt and melon. Beyond that there's some banana, lemon drops, chamomile, and marshmallows, but that all takes a while to open up. It's nice when it does.

palate: sweet and indistinct. I got berries and bourbon vanilla for a second, and then it disappears.

finish: the peat comes back strong and sharp, until some Juicy-Fruit sweetness washes it away. And then peat comes back, at once creamier and more medicinal.


I can't quite figure this one out. Every sip seems different: sometimes it's a mouthful of acrid peat, sometimes it's melons and candy, sometimes it becomes creamier and maltier. Maybe it just takes more patience than I have, but the parts don't seem to come together for me. This is almost great, but I might just not like Cooley as much as some others do.

score: 85