Lately I tasted a few Travel Retail exclusive expression that left me unimpressed with their quality. Luckily there were a few that bucked that trend, but when you factor along the news on more NAS whiskies coming up, dropping standard age-statement whiskies from the TR market, you can not but worry about the overall change we’re witnessing at the Travel Retail channel.

Although big conglomerates as Diageo and Pernod Ricard drop the age statement from new Travel Retail releases with Mortlach Special Strength, Glenfiddich Casks series and many other examples, the smaller players in the Travel Retail market kept age statement for their...

2015 was a packed year for Arran with a lot of releases and the last one, released last oktober, is Arran ‘The Bothy’ which is a homage  to the use of small casks used for whisky back in the 18th & 19th centuries.

Arran ‘The Bothy’ is initially matured in first-fill ex-Bourbon barrels which should impart some good and juicy fruit notes and then finished in quarter casks (for spiciness and vanilla notes) for a period of over 18 months.

12,000 bottles were made and it was bottled at cask strength of 55.7%

Arran The Bothy Batch 1 (55.7%,  £54.45 / €59,99 )

Nose : Starts with a pleasant fruity,...

Personal taste is what makes tasting whiskies so interesting. One can like a whisky a lot while the other looks at it disgusted. Is that a familiar scenario to you? Sometimes, it’s even going beyond a single whisky and it’s a distillery lineup which you find yourself too often than not, wondering why people like it.

I admit that in my personal notebook Auchentoshan is such a distillery. Based on what I tasted to date, I think most of the Auchentoshan official lineup is meh or OK at best. However, that’s true for the OBs I’ve tasted but if you go...

You don’t need to know much about the indie bottler WhiskyBroker except for the facts he’s bottling interesting whisky and does so with very fair prices. Even closed distilleries bottlings can be found for good prices, just like this Littlemill.

Littlemill distillery is a lowlands distillery that had a lots of up and downs during its life before closing down at 1994 and then finally dismantled at 1997. This Littlemill was distilled on 16th mars 1992, put in cask 493, and was bottled on 24th augusti 2015 for an age statement of 23 years and total of 228 bottles.

Littlemill 23...

After previously reviewing the first two whiskies in the BenRiach heavily peated wood finished series (Albariza which I liked a lot and Dunder which I didn’t like much ), it’s time review the third offering in the series, BenRiach Latada.

The Latada (named after the trellised vine system on the island of Madeira) was matured in American oak casks and then finished in Madeira casks for unspecified time. Only 4001 bottles were made (gotta love the non-round number!), bottled at 46% ABV, natural colored and is non chill filtered.

BenRiach Latada 18 Year Old (46%, £79.99 / €105.00 )

Nose : Light and sweet gentle...

I would like to state it’s been a while since I last posted a Laphroaig review but this is not the case after reviewing Laphroaig 16 earlier this week ;-) But as a Laphroaig fan I’m trying to taste and review as many Laphroaig whiskies, good and bad (or less good?) as I can, and I got one more for you this week.

Today the victim is the European Travel Exclusive Laphroaig, Brodir (Which means ‘Brother’ in old Norse language), Batch 002 which was bottled in 2015. Brodir is a NAS bottling, matured in Ex-bourbon casks and then is finished...

Earlier today I published some big  Glenmorangie news  and I thought it merit a self-punishment of sitting down and finally completing the cobwebs-coated blog post detailing my visit at Glenmorangie last augusti.

Like I said, I visit Glenmorangie last augusti, but it wasn’t a planned visit and I didn’t book a tour. We were on the way south to from Old Pulteney (my visit recap is here ) toward Dornoch Castle and then Inverness. It was rainy and foggy on the coastal road but just as were near Tain, the skies were mostly blue with a few scattered clouds and then there was a...

Seems like today is Glenmorangie Day on the blog. We have some big Glenmorangie news (With massive thanks Tom for delivering the news!) and later today we’ll have another blog post with a review and short recap (and many photos) from the distillery visit last summer. But first things first: the news!

First of all, there’s a new Glenmorangie Travel Retail bottling out there called “ Glenmorangie Tayne “. Yes, it’s Tayne and not Tain (Tayne is an older form of Tain).

Glenmorangie Tayne is whisky matured in amontillado casks, without an age statement, bottled at 43% ABV and currently is priced...

As part of their 200th anniversary celebrations, Laphroaig released multiple exciting expressions in 2015 – from the “hero coming back home” 15 yo , through the 21 yo and up to the 32yo . The last Laphroaig expression from 2015 not yet reviewed is the 16 year old that is targeted exclusively at the Travel Retail market and it’s time to amend this!

Laphroaig 16 is the second expression this year that is bottled in half size bottles of 350ml (35cl). The first one to do so was the 21 yo that was available for FoL members and the decision deemed smart...

Last month Kilchoman Distillery auctioned a single bottle from the first cask that was filled in the distillery in december 2005. All the proceeds went toward The Beatson Cancer Charity (a very worthy cause!) and the winner had to shell £7,000 to enjoy the bottle and the first 10 year old Kilchoman whisky.

However, it’s not the first bottling to use whisky from this cask. During Feis Ile 2015, Kilchoman released a special bottle to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the distillery and check this paragraph from their website:

The 10th anniversary release is a vatting of sherry and bourbon casks...

Today we have a review of the last of the four samples that spearheaded “The Wood Makes the Whisky” Campaign from Gordon & MacPhail. It’s a Glen Grant that was distilled way back in 1954 and was bottled in 2006 for a whopping 52 years in the cask.

While G&M did release recently a 65 year old Glen Grant (for Wealth Solutions), even this ‘young’ whisky can teach us a lot on cask selection. Think about it: 52 years in the cask. You can’t pick up just any cask if you want the whisky to age well for such long time...

It’s Sunday, the first official workday of 2016 here and the last vacation day for most of you so something strong and bold is needed here, but not something mundane, it should be something special, like a bold Karuizawa.

Well, all Karuizawas I tasted were bold and this one ain’t no exception. It was bottled in 2014 for LMDW from a single cask that yielded 595 bottles at 55.3%.

Karuizawa 1981 33 Year Old (55.3%, LMDW, cask #136)

Nose : That’s a nose that isn’t taking prisoners – oriental spices, tea spices, menthol, sweet, some cigar leaves and tobacco, old books and leather...

So, how is your hangover after the new year parties last night? :-)

I guess many of you aren’t feeling 100% well today so go take some painkillers, drink a lot of water and I’ll go easy with you today with a “debt” review, the 17th dram, one before last dram, of the Blind Competition Tasting 2015.

Well, we knew it’s no highlander after the Inchmurrin the day before, so by default, the suspected region was Speyside. But this dram with the peat and burnt rubber notes totally threw me off. There is peat, but it’s not of the Islay peat type as it felt...

It’s the last day of 2015 which personally was a pretty good whisky year. The blog readership is on the rise and I got to taste some awesome whiskies this year and thankfully only a handful of bad whiskies.

I was torn between two possible whiskies to review today to celebrate the end of the year and I finally decided to stick with the 35 year old whiskies theme, at least for one more day, and finish 2015 with a delicious sherried whisky, the Glengoyne 35 Year Old. Only 500 bottles  decanters were produced and the price is high but it’s really...

After reviewing a 35 year old Brora, let’s stick with a few more reviews of 35 year old whiskies, shall we?

This time it’s an affordable 35 year offering from BenRiach. The BenRiach 35 was introduced in late 2014 (a year ago or so) as a replacement to the 30 year old which is quite buckling the trend of going young ah? Although the ABV is relatively low by no means it’s punch-less.

BenRiach 35 Year Old (42.5%,  £358.33 / €575 / €590 )

Nose : A great fruity start with dark and deep fruit, peaches, pears and apricots, honey, rich...

Following yesterday’s 25yo Brora and with the premium theme for the last week of 2015, here’s another Brora review, but this time it’s the 2013 Special Releases edition that was bottled five years later in 2013. Although only five years has passed between the bottles, this one contains whisky distilled in 1977 and so we got ‘extra’ 5 years :)

It’s a vatting of refill American Oak and European Oak casks and 2944 bottles were made in this round at a lower than usual strength of 49.9%.

Brora 35 Year Old (2013 Special Releases) (49.9%, £750 / £900 / €1.099,99 )

Nose :...

It’s the last week of 2015 and we’ll dedicate it to a few good premium whiskies, which some you can still buy if you have the money. The BTC 2015 recap will follow next week.

The first dram will be a youngster, a mere 25 Year old whisky but it’s a closed distillery and a good one at that – the 25 Year Old Brora from Diageo 2008 Special Releases. It was distilled in 1982 and bottled in 2008 yielding 3000 bottles.

Brora 25 Year Old (2008 Special Releases) (56.3%,  £999.95 / £1200 / €1299 )

Nose : It’s plainly a Brora...

As soon as I opened dram 16 of the competition, I knew it’s something special but I had no idea how nasty Ewald can be. With my guess I went for Cadenhead Littlemill 23yo but instead of basking in the light of my new 100 points, we got another Loch Lomond whisky (a different brand so somehow it’s legal) and I was left with an utter surprise and zero points.

How big of a land mine is that dram? It doesn’t even have a whiskybase.com page! Oh well, I did guess the bottler correctly!

Cadenhead’s Inchmurrin 1974 41 Year Old (47%)

Nose...

Last night was star wars night when I went to view “The force awakening” on the first screening (a minute past midnight). But I paid dearly for this adventure as I missed the opportunity to delve into the daily dram and majbe get a full slate of 100 points. It was clear to me that it’s a Campeltown whisky, aged 10-12 and mid fifties ABV but since I had no time, I entered a generic guess of Springbank, 12yo, 54% which yielded me 69 points, the highest daily amount of the competition. Oh, there was a whisky too and it...

The Blind Tasting Competition rages on and I fell back a bit with a few bad guesses and with some whiskies I didn’t like much. But then, dram #15 arrived and oh my, what’s a lovely drink it is. My first instinct was some nicely aged whisky (23 year old or so) and the floral note should have lead me to Linkwood. but instead I went for a 12 year old from a different region and so I got no points (AVB was close but not close enough). I guess I deserve it if instead of working hard on the dram, I...