London’s Whisky Show brought many delights. One was time spent at Decadent Drinks – the folks behind the irreverent Whisky Sponge – which has “retired” as a brand! We didn’t quite get through the full range – yet we definitely covered a gamut from light to heavy moderately aged to mature!
Glen Garioch 21 year (2003 / 2024) 1st fill bourbon hogshead 55.1% 1 of 248 bottles (Decadent Drinks)
Our explorations began in the highlands…
- Nose – Fruity, juicy, then shifts into hazelnut chocolate nougat
- Palate – Lovely fruits n spice n everything nice! Waxy, with a roll around the palate kinda substance
- Finish – Almost a hint of copper
What a wonderful way to begin with fruity fabulousness. Yum!
Aberlour 33 year (1989 + 1991 / 1999) Ed No 29, Refill Hogsheads 49.7% (Whisky Sponge) GBP 365
- Nose – Gorgeous sherry! Unlike some heavy sherry drams – this was not “in your face” – instead just beautiful dark fruits
- Palate – More elegant and refined than your typical Abelour, lovely balance
- Finish – Sweet and long
A proper “grown-up” whisky! Sometimes Aberlour with its devotion to full-on sherry can be a bit much – this was incredibly nuanced and complex. Just wow!
Glen Grant 31 years (1993 / 2024) 52.7% 129 bottles (Decadent Drinks – Whisky Land Chapter 3) GBP 595
- Nose – Surprisingly strong – rich fruits and how!
- Palate – What fun! Prickly ginger spice, buttercream
- Finish – Sponge cake
If the Glen Grant 12 year old from the 1970s was elegance and refinement, this was the crazy cousin showing very different colours!
Notable Age Statements Blend 17 year 53% (Decadent Drinks) GBP 95
As a play on NAS – No Age Statement – the folks at Decadent Drinks have a series of Notable Age Statement whiskies!
- Nose – Classically elegant
- Palate – So balanced, sherry berry
- Finish – Don’t laugh – but my tasting companion dubbed this quite a “bitchy” finish!
What more do we know? This is what the folks at Decadent Drinks have to say:
This bottling is composed of a 1st fill sherry butt of 2001 blended malt and a 1st fill sherry butt of 2006 Aultmore. The resulting, multi-vintage mix was bottled with slight reduction at 53%.
This is our attempt to create an older style, sherry matured malt whisky profile. Designed to be easy, fruity and highly drinkable with plenty of classical, earthy and elegant sherry character.
- Nose – Sherry joined by glazed maple with a hint of peat
- Palate – Sweet and a bit sharp – young and brash, then it settled down to become super fruity and juicy, stewed fruits
- Finish – Quite active
This was a whisky of contrasts – active and sharp then balanced, vacillating in between quite different characters. It was almost as though it had a kind of identity crisis!
It all made sense when I looked up more details. Here is what they had to say:
This is Whisky Sponge Edition No.100. It’s a 2016 and 2017, 7 year old Ardnamurchan small batch. It’s a potion that Angus cooked up in collaboration with the good folk at Ardnamurchan Distillery. It’s a mix of 1st fill and 2nd fill, peated and unpeated sherry octaves. We mixed them all together and married them in a refill sherry butt for over six months until the whole potion turned 7 years old, then we bottled it with slight reduction at 57.1%. For those of you that deify transparency, here’s the recipe…
- 2017 – Unpeated 1st Fill Sherry, Peated 1st Fill sherry, Peated 1st Fill Sherry, Peated Refill Sherry
- 2016 – Unpeated Refill sherry, Unpeated Refill Sherry, Unpeated Refill Sherry, Unpeated 1st Fill Sherry
We wanted to celebrate and mark the final edition of Whisky Sponge with a whisky that was excellent quality, one that was collaborative and that we’d had a role in creating and making unique to us, and that was modern in the best sense and looked to the future. We feel we have succeeded in this – we hope you agree.
It was quite an interesting experience!
Ledaig 29 year (1995/2024) 52% (Decadent Drinks – Westie Sponge 4)
- Nose – Coffee, cinnamon, sweet spices, cakey
- Palate – “I’m here now!” Big, bold, brilliant flavours! Sherry and coffee, cherry, chewy… lightly peated
- Finish – Long and strong
Westie Sponge is a series devoted to the Western Highlands and Islands – which naturally needed to include this Ledaig from Tobermory distillery from Isle of Mull.
Bowmore 20 year (2004) 53.3% 171 Bottles (Decadent Drinks – Whiskyland Chapter Two)
- Nose – Fresh and bright, a delightful sea breeze, perfume then dark fruits, lush
- Palate – Sweet peat, fruity in perfect harmony, elegant and well-rounded
- Finish – Lingers
What more do we know? It is a refill hogshead from 2004. In some ways it was an un-Bowmore-like Bowmore – less forceful and more restrained. Lovely.
Ardmore 22 year (1997 + 2000) 53% (Decadent Drinks – Whisky Sponge – Equilibrium 3rd Edition) GBP 215
- Nose – Love it! Peat and sweet
- Palate – Perfect balance of peat and sherry, unctuous mouthfeel, meaty yet soft too
- Finish – Marshmallows and cherry
The deep ruby hues (without any added colour!) means there has been some serious contact with an ex sherry cask! Here’s what else they have to say:
For this final bottling in the Equilibrium series, we took a refill matured 1997 and sherry finished 2000, medium peated highland malt and married them together in a 2nd fill sherry hogshead. That mix was then bottled as this 22 year old with a few degrees reduction at 53%.
The result is the softest of the three Equilibrium bottlings in terms of peat level, and probably the richest in terms of sherry character. But overall, this is a wonderful, complex and beautifully quaffable sherry and peat influenced dram, one where age and time have also worked some pretty delicious tricks…
Mortlach 16 year (2007) 48.5% (Decadent Drinks – Equinox & Solstice Summer Edition)
- Nose – How extraordinary? There was a distinctive chaat masala aroma of black salt! Tangy, tropical fruits
- Palate – Sherry edge, no lightweight at all. Oily, big and bold. Fruity and full. More of that chaat masala too!
- Finish – Coffee
It was muscular without being heavy-handed.
Miltonduff 11 year (2012) 1st Fill Sherry Hogshead 48.5% (Decadent Drinks – Equinox & Solstice Winter Edition) GBP 110
- Nose – Rich yet not overpowering, juicy fruits then shifts into a mocha sundae, creamy eggnog
- Palate – Think of a delicious black forest cake with dark cherries, yet restrained too
- Finish – Beautiful
A clear Speyside hero in its best form.
Thank you Elise from Fredericton New Brunswick for making our time with Decadent Drinks so rewarding!
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This wasn’t our first Old Orkney expression. We tried their 20-year-old expression at the 2024 Whisky Show, so we were curious to see what their 4th bottling in this series was all about!
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