
Kingsbarns Dream to Dram Whisky Review: Good texture for a new/young whisky, delightfully not over-vanillic or over-oaked, the fruit and spice is delicately balanced. 85/100
Lowland single malt scotch whisky
Kingsbarns Dream to Dram Whisky Review: Good texture for a new/young whisky, delightfully not over-vanillic or over-oaked, the fruit and spice is delicately balanced. 85/100
Littlemill 40 Years Old Celestial Edition Whisky Review: Definitely sherry influenced, perhaps some of the sweeter and dried fruit/nut flavours belie that cask-driven final maturation, however they do not mask that florality of Littlemill’s spirit character. 92/100
Littlemill 1992 Vintage Whisky Review: Superb, aged and woody but still with a great sweetness and florality which is really fresh for its age. Fruity and zesty too in places, overwhelmingly maple syrup plus a wee hint of smoke and meatiness in here too. 90/100
Glasgow 1770 Triple Distilled No.1 whisky review: An interesting expression with plenty of florality and character, very drinkable and didn’t strike me as particularly young – even though I know it must be. 83/100
Glasgow 1770 Peated No.1 Whisky Review: A lovely expression with plenty of new oak character, sweet and sublime smoke. A gentle smokiness and traces of youth in the spirit which is entirely expected, I hope as this expression is matured and ages this retains its smoke. 84/100
Daftmill 2008 Single Cask The Whisky Bars of Scotland Whisky Review: Well-received by other tasters, almost a complete opposite to the last dram (Imperial). Unfortunately for me this didn’t taste right and had me thinking of early Kininvie releases. Something in this suggested poor distillation or perhaps over-oxidation? Very buttery. 68/100
Auchentoshan Sauvignon Blanc Finish Whisky Review: I haven’t been a huge fan of Auchentoshan for a while, or rather I haven’t had an OB expression that I could really say I liked or enjoyed from their older range. Admittedly I haven’t tried an awful lot of their new standard range. This one however is very different from their older expressions at least. Hugely drinkable and smooth but not light in character by any means. The Sauvignon Blanc cask influence is very complementary to Auchentoshan’s spirit character here and really adds much more sweetness, fruit and florality. Perfectly drinkable at room temperature, however that sweetness would probably last if this one was chilled slightly also. 83/100
The Borders Distillery New Make Spirit review: A great base spirit for maturing. Fruity and very cereal/malt heavy – I look forward to trying some more matured variants of this in a few years time!
Inverleven 1985 Private Collection whisky review: A lovely old ex-bourbon matured expression, unfortunately I have little frame of reference for this as I haven’t previously sampled Inverleven output. Certainly display’s its age and is full of lively and entertaining flavours that I enjoyed very much. 86/100
Lindores Abbey Cask Blend review: A little too feisty at 60% ABV, but packed full of dried fruit, spice and toffee, well-reduced with water it reveals some cask and some new make spirit characters and suggest that things are maturing quite nicely at Lindores Abbey distillery – a taste of things to come. 82/100