The Glenrothes 1998 Vintage

By Barry Bradford on April 11, 2014 • ( 2 Comments )

The Glenrothes 1998 Vintage (43%, OB, 2009)

Category: Speyside single malt scotch whisky
Origin: Glenrothes distillery
Bottling: Berry Bros & Rudd
ABV: 43%
Cost: £40.50

What they say

The Vintage 1998 is the next Core Vintage to follow the Vintage 1991 and 1994. It is the first of the vintages that we have bottled that was expressly laid down at origin to be bottled as Glenrothes on maturity and as such has a greater availability of stock than any of the previous bottlings.

This is also Gordon Motion’s first bottling as Malt Master and he describes it as: “It’s said that pictures speak a thousand words and this is like Carmen Miranda’s hat in a bottle. Tropical fruits lead with pineapple and mango developing into sweet bananas, coconut and classic Glenrothes vanilla pods.”

Official tasting notes:

Appearance: Medium golden, clear and bright
Bouquet: Rich, spicy vanilla, golden syrup and lemongrass
Palate: Soft, mature, sweet vanilla with a hint of cinnamon
Finish: Smooth, long, rich vanilla

What I say

Glenrothes for me is like buses, you wait for ages and then two come along at once!

We picked up both these 10cl hand-grenade miniatures during a recent visit to Glenturret distillery.

Glenturret and Glenrothes are both owned by the Edrington Group (along with Highland Park and Macallan, though not Tamdhu any more since it was sold to Ian Mcleod Distillers Limited) and so there is a good chance that some Glenrothes ends up in Famous Grouse blends also.

This 1998 vintage was distilled 17/12/1998 and bottled 11/02/2009 making it around 11 years old.

My tasting notes:

Colour: Gold
Nose: Sweet lemon citrus, barley malt, estery banana and green apples
Taste: Malted barley, vanilla, cinnamon, barley sugar sweets, apple crumble and creamy vanilla custard, sweet lemon, like limoncello liqueur
Finish: Short, lemon barley sugar and sweet

Overall

Pleasant dram, smooth and sweet and a little lemony, but for me not as much bang per buck as the Glenrothes Select Reserve on which I would rather spend my money.