Category Archives: Scotland

An evening with Krishna Nakula

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Evenings with Krishna Nakula, India’s Malt Maniac are always a pleasure. This time we meandered through a malty mix.. with our evening featuring a duo from Amrut!

Added to the mix was an amiable amble through the contrasting:

Plus a sniff and swish through:

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Blair Athol 12 year 43%

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Blair Athol is a Diageo whisky that previously was found either in blends or independent bottles… our previous brushes with Blair Athol was the robust sherry cask strength Signatory 27 year and the Hunter Laing 16 year.

We sampled it blind….

Blair Athol 12 year 43%

  • Nose – Initially quite organic, sharp old cheese, fresh rain, slight salt behind the spice, cranberry sour not sweet, a bit acetone sharpness, narrow profile, edgy fume, nutmeg… After sipping, spice, yoghurt. Leave for some time and get caramel and fruits, then goes back to spice, then gulkand rose.
  • Palate – Very smooth, silk, sweet, fruity spice, buttery oily, liquorice, so easy and light, nice and enjoyable. Such spice, fruit and something else.
  • Finish – Grapey, coffee
  • Water – Absolutely no need

We found it had no off notes, quite a “happy” whisky. We thought it likely did not have natural coloured likely low alcohol.

And the reveal?

Not one we would have guessed but also only had limited past opportunities to sample whiskies from Blair Athol.

The official tasting notes share:

A rich, sweet malt best drunk with only a drop of water, when it holds its sweetness better.

  • Nose – Muscat grapes and Madeira wine, brimstone in the background, even tar. Dried apricots in the foreground, and treacle toffee.
  • Body – Medium to full bodied, but not cloying.
  • Palate – Rich and mouth-filling, with a good balance.
  • Finish – A curious sweetness is introduced at the end, after the acidity and dryish finish has passed.

What else did we sample that evening?

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Glengoyne Distiller’s Gold 15 year 40%

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One fine evening our original Mumbai tasting group settled down to sample a trio… completely blind followed by the reveal.

We began with a Highland single malt picked up by our host’s father-in-law in Russia.

Glengoyne Distiller’s Gold 15 year 40%

  • Nose – Clear stamp of an ex-Bourbon cask, banana, vanilla, boiled sweets, honey, a bit floral, quite sharp, scented erasers, candied orange, lavender, marigold, like wandering through a garden, bit oily, grapes and wine tannins. After the first sip, the perfume settled down and the spice stepped back too to make way for a more vegetal, honey, caramel, biscuits, something heavier underneath, pumpkin seeds, yeasty
  • Palate – Starts off quite mild, quite thin to the point it almost evaporated, none of the oiliness promised on the nose…. after consideration it had a light to medium body, quite “neutral” in character. Keep sipping and found a light hint of brine, a hint of tobacco or leather, nescafe coffee powder
  • Finish – Began a bit bitter yet a nice bitter, white pepper corn, black raw licorice, mineral, while not long shifted between different elements
  • Water – While it seemed a contradiction given how light we found it, the whisky is quite enjoyable with a bit of water. It rounds it out, particularly if you let it sit for some time. It also then reveals fruits like  green apple.
  • Return – And be rewarded with butterscotch!

What did we think?

There was a familiar quality with a classic approach. We found it quite nice and all shared how it grows on you. Easy to sip and while there were no distinctive qualities that shouted out one particular distillery over another, it was quite pleasant.

For most, the nose was its best quality – enjoying how it would change and evolve. We also found it best to give more time, let it sit – worth the wait.

As we speculated about it, our general conclusion was that it was Scottish, low 40%s, primarily bourbon cask. One suggested it came from “pedigree”.

And the reveal?

What complete surprise! Previous Glengoyne’s had a much heavier sherry influence – it was quite different than what we recalled. We wanted to learn more about the casks used and were surprised to learn it spent six years in a sherry cask? Really? Could it be a 3rd fill…..? The wording on the bottle was a imprecise.

It was originally released only for travel retail, only natural colour.

Official tasting notes for the standard 15 year:

  • Nose: Fresh hay, malt flour, citrus and dried fruit.
  • Mouth Feel: Smooth and clean
  • Initial taste: Clean with a gentle sweetness.
  • Finish: Long with gentle spice and lingering oak.

What else did we sample that evening?

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Trio of Glengoyne, Blair Athol, Powers

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A warm evening in Mumbai brought a trio of drams… Our original group kept with tradition and sampled completely blind, giving us an opportunity to discern and dissect our impressions without the distraction of past experience with any of the distilleries.

Here is what we tried:

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Vault Collection – Spice Tree 46%

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Last in our original club’s “The Vault Collection” trio was a a Compass Box blend. Our guest writer Nikkhil had the following tasting notes to share.

Pour 3​: Compass Box Spice Tree 46% | Non-Chill Filtered & Natural Colour​

  • Color: Pale Gold
  • Nose: Boiled confectionery, a little varnish, lemon citrus. Then very quickly a lot of cloves and nutmeg. Notes of walnuts, apples, orange rind and ginger follow. Almost perfumey.
  • Palate: Gorgeous mouthfeel. Lovely arrival with a bouquet of spices and vanilla. Warm bread pudding. Follows the nose very closely. Oily and waxy. Some old leather, pencil shavings and that ginger from the nose. I did get just a wee hint of smoke. Again, nicely balanced.
  • Finish: Medium with lingering spices. A perfect after dinner dram on a cold night.

The “reveal”…

We couldn’t place this one even though most of us have had it in the past. That’s the beauty of blind tastings. You think you know your whisky but blind tasting is such a leveller. The reveal surprised us. Compass Box Spice Tree. Enough and more has been said about Compass Box and Spice Tree in the past so I will not repeat myself but instead I urge you to pour yourself a dram and enjoy this expression. Sláinte!

Official notes:

Big, sweet aromas of clove, ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg and vanilla. The palate is full, round and sweet, with the spice and vanilla complementing the core distillery characters and leaving a long finish.

The Vault Collection trio:

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Vault Collection – Benromach 10 year 43%

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Next up in our original club’s “The Vault Collection” trio was a single malt from the Speyside region. Our guest writer Nikkhil had the following tasting notes to share.

Pour 2: Benromach 10yr 43%

  • Color: Gold
  • Nose: Red fruits, buiscuity and an immediate waft of gentle peat smoke. Lovely! With time honey ham, lightly smoked apples and sweet meats. Something immediately familiar about this one.
  • Palate: Lovely sweet sherry notes with the gentlest lick of peat. I’m a sucker for this style and balance. Nice mouthfeel despite the low abv. That irresistible sweet savoury note of a bacon and honey combo! Lots of complexity for a 10yr old and top class stuff. This is just a breath behind the Kilkerran 12 which is saying a lot. Now only if it were bottled at 46% and naturally presented!
  • With Water and 20 mins rest, lovely notes of coconut, roasted walnuts and gentle spice along with light bonfire smoke.
  • ​Finish: ​Long with smoke that just lingers along with sweet sherry fruits.

Our guessing game to reveal?

This was a class Scottish act and all of us were unanimous on that. There was a tossup between Benriach and Benromach. One member was bang on with Benromach and sure enough it was that. It just proves yet again that if the focus is on quality and if it is followed up with the right decisions in production (local barley, long fermentation times, top quality wood) then it’s very hard not to have a cracking dram on your hands. It is little or no surprise that the distillery is owned by Gordon & Macphail who in my opinion are the finest independent bottlers in Scotland. Keep up the good work!

Official notes:

  • Nose: Rich sherry with fruit & nut chocolate, delicate spice, green apples, malty biscuit and a touch of light peat smoke.
  • Palate: Juicy raspberries and brambles, sherry, creamy malt and a light peat

The Vault Collection trio:

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Bowmore “BBQ Mango Salsa” 1989 46%

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Every once and a while a Whisky Lady treats herself or is treated to a special whisky… and is generous enough to share it with all of the Whisky Ladies. That was exactly the case for this particular 27 year old Bowmore bottled by Wemyss.

Bowmore “BBQ Mango Salsa” 27 year (1989/2016) 46% (Wymess) Bottle 234/234

  • Nose – Random tropical fruit, nose gets sweeter and sweeter, then out comes a true barbecue delight
  • Palate – Smokey, balanced, surprisingly light and very tasty
  • Finish – Long, subtle, light spice, brown sugar and vanilla

Yes there is grilled pineapple and rich barbecue sweet flavours. It is indeed aptly named. And a most enjoyable whisky.

Here is what the Wemyss folks have to say about this dram:

“This hogshead serves up charcoal smoked mackerel with a mango salsa side.”

Curious about other Bowmore’s sampled? Here are a few…

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Whisky Ladies “Trans Tasman Tour” to New Zealand & Tasmania with a nod to Crazy Uncles!

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The Whisky Ladies adventures continue… this time waaaaay down under with drams from  Tasmania and New Zealand.

Often with our Whisky Ladies sessions, there is a particular bottle which “anchors” an idea and we build a theme around it. In this case, over two years ago our host picked up from Australia Whippersnapper’s Crazy Uncle Moonshine. She then stumbled across in the UK a pair of New Zealand whiskies from a closed distillery… and thus a Kiwi plus Australian dram discovery in Mumbai theme was born!

And while we technically had 3 bottles, our core focus is whisky, so when we learned another Whisky Lady had been hanging on to a celebrated Sullivans Cove from Tasmania, it naturally had to join the mix! And I had a “back-up” Hellyers Road Pinot Noire…. just in case it was needed…which proved be handy as traffic conditions on that particular evening were atrocious!

So what specifically made it into our “Trans Tasman Tour” explorations?

We closed with regaling each other with personal tales of our crazy uncles toasting to their quirks, maddening qualities that sit side by side with remarkable generosity and sparks of brilliance… with the spirit that kick started the evening idea in the 1st place:

Those who successfully navigated Bombay traffic to reach on time were rewarded with a birthday bonus:

It was indeed a memorable malty evening of fabulous fellowship over a different dram or two or three or four or more! 

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Minis – Nomad Outland Whisky 41.3%

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Many of us have a bit of “Nomad” in us… a wandering spirit that takes us from beyond the land of our birth. No surprise, some whiskies also take a little jaunt too… in this case from Scotland to Jeerez, Spain.

We sampled it in a lovely relaxed evening exploring a few minis… all of which had a bit of a boost through finishes – in this case Pedro Ximenes. And what did we think? Read on…

Nomad Outland Whisky 41.3%

  • Nose – Greeted by great big luscious caramel toffee. Possibly a bit of cream Amaratto? An interesting sweet and sour, stewed fruits especially peach, shifting into almost overripe fruits… then allspice, nutmeg, cinnamon… apple pie with nuts, especially hazelnut, doughy, baked pineapple. After the 1st sip, nicely restrained, vanilla. Much later shifted to orange bitters. Sip again, back to caramel pecan pie… Sip again then citrus…. and a long time later boiled sweets. How fabulous!
  • Palate – Pure applesauce with jaggery, a bit tart too, some tannins, stewed fruits. Quite light almost like sugar water, not much body but very refreshing.
  • Finish – Subtle finish, quite pleasant, light spice, anise and lime zest

What a perfect summer afternoon dram. We thought it might be rather nice chilled – as in chilling the bottle not adding ice.

So what do we know about this whisky? According their website, this whisky blend is a collaboration between master distiller Richard Paterson and expert Sherry producers Gonzalez Byass.

They share that it is:

made with a selection of over 30 malt and grain whiskies aged between 5 and 8 years old, which are blended together and matured in Sherry butts in Scotland for three years. Following that, the whisky is shipped off to Jerez, where it is finished in Pedro Ximénez casks for a year before it is bottled. Richard Paterson and Gonzalez Byass’ master distiller Antonio Flores experimented with different Sherry casks, including Oloroso and Fino, but ultimately decided on the Pedro Ximénez casks for this enticing expression.

And what do they have to say about the whisky profile?

  • Bright, topaz coloured whisky
  • It has a unique aroma with malty notes, reminiscent of oak and sherry due to its ageing in american oak barrels.
  • Smooth and elegant on the palate. With prominent flavours of raisins, honey and distinctive bouquet as a result of the finishing of the whisky in Pedro Ximénez sherry barrels.
  • A long finish, pleasant
  • With hints of vanilla and dried fruits. A very elegant whisky with a complex aftertaste.

Our minis “finishes” eve included:

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Minis – Glen Scotia Double Cask 46%

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I will admit, I didn’t really know what to expect with this one. My minis sampling cohort had picked up a set in London more than a year or so ago – sparked mostly by a “What the heck! Let’s try a set from Cambleton.” Then this extra bottle somehow made its way back to Mumbai too!

The double cask in this case is  PX Sherry and Bourbon. And it just so happened to kick off our minis evening exploring a few different finishes.

Glen Scotia Double Cask 46%

  • Nose – Pear and apple combine like the New Zealand hybrid papple! Or raw guava…. with a lovely honey vanilla, fresh, then caramel stroopwafel, shifting into a Christmas pudding or mince pie, sweet spices, orange… After tasting, delicious baklava dripping in honey, nuts, doughy, cinnamon. Then shifted to dusty vanilla rose. Kept moving back and forth between citrus and white fruits, hard core treacle and denser rich cake. Wonderful!
  • Palate – Strong character – spice, more of that Christmasy flavours – this time a Christmas orange with cloves, some wood, some real depth without being too “heavy” and sweet, a bit dry too
  • Finish – Bitter spice, long with black pepper

I will admit to having very modest expectations and was completely impressed. What a fabulous range of aromas, robust palate, citrus then morphing between pastries and citrus oranges and back to treacle.

Glen Scotia Double Cask is their “entry” level whisky before shifting into a range of age statements. Here is what they have to say about this whisky:

Our Double Cask is matured in the finest first fill bourbon barrels before being finished for up to twelve months in Pedro Ximenez sherry casks producing this outstanding single malt whisky that provides the perfect balance of rich spicy fruits, overlaid with the characteristic sea spray and vanilla oak finish for which the house of Glen Scotia is famous.

  • Nose – Amber. Very sweet. Initially it is all creme caramel, caramelised fruit sugars, wood sugar, toffee and fudge before some apple and peach come through. In time a charred note of bourbon with a pleasing dusty dryness. Has some power.
  • Palate – Sweet start and quite fat and though the alcohol gives a little tongue-tingling buzz the result is a good mid-palate weight. The dry distillery character is there still, but there is now depth to counter. Water slightly dismantles the different elements, but adds some dried mint.
  • Finish – Deep and dark.

What a terrific start to our minis sampling – set the bar high with substance. And now I cannot wait to try a small sample set of Glen Scotia minis waiting in the wings for another session…

Our Fabulous Finishes Minis eve included:

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