Whisky Review: Glenfiddich Vertical Tasting

Much like the Balvenies I tried recently, I picked up a three pack of Glenfiddich miniatures over the holidays. I'll reiterate the point I made then that I feel like more distillers should be putting out these kinds of sample packs because it provides a very economical way for people to try their whiskies, especially the older end of their standard ranges. This gets people to try whiskies that they might otherwise stay away from due to cost and will probably encourage them to buy full bottles that they wouldn't otherwise be willing to take the risk of buying. Glenfiddich pulls out all of the stops with the packaging of these minis, producing custom bottles and giving each one a miniature version of the cardboard tube that the full size bottles come in. There's a reason this was put on shelves around Christmas and it is definitely a classy setup if you want to give this set as a gift. But with that said, here are my thoughts about each whisky.

Glenfiddich 12 Year


Nose: pleasantly malty, honey, citrus, apple skins, a touch of raspberries and sherry, which becomes a bit sweeter with a bit of brown sugar and maple syrup after a couple of drops of water

Taste: not very sweet up front, sour malt mid-palette, becoming cleaner malt with a bit of pepper and sherry going into the finish

Finish: slightly bitter peat, malt, pepper and sherry

It's unsurprising that this is one of the best selling single malts in the world. It presents bits and pieces of very classic Speyside single malts, with emphasis on the malt and light sherry influence. Being bottled at 40%, it goes down easy and doesn't present the drinker with anything challenging. With that said, if you prefer more robust whiskies, the 12 Year will be somewhat disappointing. Except for the malt flavors, everything is extremely light and it often felt like I had to hunt for it. At the same time, it is rather pleasant and wouldn't be out of place in a situation where you want something to drink that won't be a distraction.

Glenfiddich 15 Year


Nose: more sherry-driven, with raisins and a bit of chocolate, a strong red wine note at first, which fades with time, and a bit of malt, which becomes maltier and weaker after dilution

Taste: not very sweet up front, malt and light sherry mid-palette, with sourness and dry cacao going into the finish, which becomes sweeter and more malty with less sherry presence after adding a few drops of water

Finish: bitter chocolate with a bit of peat and malt

I had fairly high hopes for the 15 year. I really enjoyed the similarly aged Glenfiddich Distillery Edition, which was real knock-out. The standard 15 year bottling is touted as being enriched by solera-style aging, where barrels are dumped into a large vat, about half the contents are withdrawn for bottling, then more whisky is dumped to top off the vat. Theoretically this should provide a heady mix of whiskies that are aged for a minimum of 15 years and who knows what upper bound. It can even be a good deal, if you look in the right places. However, I have a feeling that the low bottling strength of 40% betrays all of the work that goes into making the whisky before it is bottled. While richer and more obviously sherry-influenced than the 12 year, it still feels a bit tepid. I would love to try the 15 year bottled around 100-proof, at which point I'm guessing it would probably shine. Instead I will content myself with my bottles of the Distillery Edition and dream of what the regular 15 year could be.

Glenfiddich 18 Year


Nose: a hefty dose of oak, orange marmalade, a bit of sherry lurking underneath, malt and chocolate oranges, which becomes lighter with more malt and less sherry and oak after dilution

Taste: not too sweet up front, a burst of sherry and cacao mid-palette, segueing into heavier oak tannins near the finish, which becomes malty sweet up front, with sherry, raisins and apples, then astringent oak after adding a few drops of water

Finish: malty sweetness, then the oak returns, bringing some peat with it

The 18 year is definitely the stand out of the bunch, which, you know, given the age and price, one would hope so. It clearly shows its age by the healthy oak smells and flavors throughout the experience. Additionally, it's generally more robust because of its 43% bottling strength. Even with all that said, I don't think I'll be buying a full bottle, even at $57. For one, I feel like the oak influence is a little too in your face, trying a bit too hard like a teenager insisting "No, really, I'm old enough!" I've got to wonder if this is an intentional move to assure buyers that they're really getting an older whisky. While there are some nice things going on, the bottling proof is still a bit on the low side (please, 46% at least!) and a bit less emphasis on the oak tannins could let the other elements shine. Give me that whisky at sixty bucks and it'd be in my liquor cabinet already.

So with all that said, I can't really fault Glenfiddich. They do what they do for a reason and it brings them in an awful lot of money. If you're new to scotch whisky, the 12 Year is a totally reasonable choice to ease yourself in. I might also suggest Glenmorangie 10 Year, which is about the same price but offers a lot of the same flavors in a slightly more robust form, or even Balvenie Doublewood. For an alternative to the 15 Year, give Arran 10 or the aforementioned Glenfiddich Distillery Edition a try. But while the Glenfiddichs aren't quite to my taste, this tri-pack is definitely worth a buy if you can find it. At ~$15, it's a nice and rather inexpensive way to do a vertical tasting for one or two people.

New Tiki Classics: the Ancient Mariner

This drink comes from Beachbum Berry himself. During the process of trying to work out the secret ingredients in the Navy Grog, Jeff came up with this drink, which is quite reminiscent of, but subtly different from, the original.

Ancient Mariner
1 oz Demerara rum
1 oz dark Jamaican rum
0.75 oz lime juice
0.5 oz grapefruit juice
0.5 oz simple syrup
0.25 oz allspice dram

Combine all ingredients, shake with ice and pour unstrained into a chilled rocks glass.

The sip leads off sweetly, quickly segueing to a combination of the Jamaican and Demerara rum flavors mixed with the spice of the pimento dram. The drink finishes with the tartness of the lime juice and the slightly bitter notes of the grapefruit juice.

While not as smooth as the Navy Grog, the allspice dram adds its charms to this drink. There's a reason why the Jamaican/Demeara rum combo shows up in countless tiki drinks and the Appleton and El Dorado 12 year rums bring an incredible amount of richness to the cocktail. However, using Appleton V/X and El Dorado 5 Year would probably transform this into a more fruit-forward drink. To really pump it up, try adding a bit of the ever-useful Smith & Cross Jamaican rum. If you're interested in tweaking this drink, it would be interesting to try substituting in orgeat or cinnamon syrup to emphasize different elements of the drink.

Whisky Review: Cragganmore 12 vs. Yamazaki 12

After discovering the Brooklyn Park Pub's Whiskey Club, I decided to take a trip down the way to check out their selection of whiskies. While it leans towards bourbon and rye whiskies, there were a few single malts in stock that I'd been meaning to try. As always, these are only provisional reviews, but I feel like I got a decent sense of what's going on.

Cragganmore 12 Year


Nose: malt, fresh apple, floral, hints of sherry, which becomes a bit sweeter, with a bit of honey and chocolate, plus overall a bit more richness after adding a few drops of water

Taste: light honey heather up front, fades into drier malt, which also becomes a bit richer, with a touch of pepper near the back after dilution

Finish: very light, with a bit of peat and cacao

This whisky is one of the Speyside offerings from Diageo. It feels a lot like a younger Glenfiddich, but with a bit more richness. Unfortunately it's also significantly more expensive than the 12 year old Glenfiddich, which makes it a bit of a tricky sell to me. But if lighter whiskies are a thing you like, this is a good one to try.

Yamazaki 12 Year


Nose: a healthy dose of toasty oak, bright, fresh fruits, sweet malt and vanilla, which becomes a bit lighter and more perfumed, with less oak and more brown sugar, a general ruminess, and sweetened porridge after dilution

Taste: honey and brown sugar up front, an interlude of pepper, cinnamon and oak, then cocoa powder, which gets more sugary and malty, with a bit less oak

Finish: berries, malt and cacao

Now this is more like it. One of the younger whiskies from Suntory, this is quite reminiscent of a Speyside single malt. At the same time, it also reminds me quite a bit of Scarlet Ibis rum, both because of the toasty oak and general rummy flavors. I was much happier with this dram and will probably buy a whole bottle to explore it more. Also looking forward to trying its elder 18 year old brother.

New Tiki Classics: the Marlin

While much of the tiki canon was created around the middle of the 20th century, that hasn't stopped people from innovating, especially over the last decade. This one comes from Clancy Carroll via Beachbum Berry Remixed and is presented with only a few minor tweaks.

Marlin
1 oz amber rhum agricole
1 oz light rum
0.5 oz lime juice
0.5 oz lemon juice
0.5 oz orange liqueur
0.5 oz orgeat
0.25 oz simple syrup

Combine all ingredients, shake with ice and strain into a chilled rocks glass rinsed with Maraschino liqueur.

This is a riff on the classic mai tai made brighter, both literally and figuratively. The original calls for blue curaçao, giving the drink an almost sky blue hue. I don't have any around, so I went with my standard orange-kumquat liqueur. The original is also spiced up with a hefty dose of Maraschino liqueur. I find that it all too easily overwhelms a drink, so I went with a smaller rinse and added back in sweetness with simple syrup. The light rum is intended to be Puerto Rican, but I think this cocktail works fantastically with a dose of Banks 5 Island to compliment the agricole funkiness.

The smell is dominated by the Batavia arrack in the Banks 5 Island rum. Poking around it is the spicy notes of the Maraschino. The sip leads off with the rum's funkiness, leading into sweet & sour from the citrus and syrups, finishing up on the peculiar notes of the Maraschino liqueur. Slipping through everything is the orange liqueur and orgeat, which help to smooth things out. Overall this is a really tasty drink and a great way to tame the strong flavors of rhum agricole. With that said, you'll want something robust to punch through all of the other strong flavors in this drink.

Whisky Review: Clynelish 14

Clynelish is a somewhat less well-known member of the Diageo family of whisky distilleries, having recently been a part of their "Hidden Malts" collection of single malts that were previously rare or unavailable. In the case of Clynelish, much of this has to do with the tumultuous history of the distillery.

Scotchwhisky.net

It was established on the Dornoch Firth in 1819 to serve as a market for grain grown by the Duke of Sutherland's tenant farmers. Clynelish quickly built an extremely strong reputation during the 19th century. However, the distillery fell on hard times in 1931 and closed its doors. The distillery reopened briefly after 1938, but was once again shuttered amid the grain shortages of WWII. Reopening once again in the post-War years, the distillery was updated in the 1960s and a new distillery was built alongside the original in 1967, copying the old stills as closely as possible but installing a significantly greater number of stills to increase production capacity. The original distillery closed for a short time and was then renamed and operated as Brora starting in 1969. The old distillery began to make a more heavily peated whisky to fill a gap in the owner's portfolio as heavier Islay-style whiskies were an important component in their blends. This ended in 1983, at which point the old distillery was closed for good. The new distillery continued to operate under the Clynelish name, primarily producing whisky for the Johnnie Walker Gold Label blend. Single malt Clynelish bottlings were semi-available during the 1990s in the "Flauna and Flora" incarnation, but got a bigger push in 2002, releasing the now standard 14 Year bottling.

Clynelish 14 Year


Nose: briny, a bit of sherry, malt and peat, which becomes saltwater taffy, malt and bitter chocolate after dilution

Taste: sweet & sour up front, then malt, leading into sherry, salty chocolate and vegetal peat, which becomes sweeter with water, gaining gobs of creamy malt and honey up front

Finish: malt, sherry, a touch of salty peat, bittersweet chocolate and pepper, which becomes drier with water

This whisky really introduced me to the concept of maritime flavors in a single malt. While there are long, heated debates about whether or not whisky can really taste salty, my guess is that much like the way that a whisky can smell sweet even though there's no way for the nose to directly detect sugar (check out the first video around 2:30), there are flavors and smells in the whisky that the brain associates with saltiness, so it assumes that there must be actual NaCl present and fills in the perceived blank. But whatever it is, this whisky really reminds me of a seashore, with the salt tang and wet vegetation all swirling around.

To me this whisky falls somewhere in between Arran 10 and Highland Park 12 in terms of peat. Much like the Arran the peat seems more vegetal than smoky, but unlike Arran, Clynelish does use a medium-peated barley malt. This makes it an excellent way to ease into peat-ier single malts without going all the way into heavier Island and Islay whiskies. In terms of sherry influence, Clynelish is much closer to the Arran than Highland Park. Though if you want to try a version with greater sherry influence, there is a Distiller's Edition, which is unfortunately seems to be difficult to find in the States. But the regular Clynelish 14 is still solid and usually runs somewhere between $45 and $55, which makes it a rather good value given its age and the quality of the whisky.

Tiki Classics: Tinkering with Dr. Funk

Recently Doug over at the Pegu Tiki Blog posted a review of various recipes for the Dr. Funk cocktail. This is in a sense one of the ur-tiki drinks, having been invented in the South Pacific long before Don Beach touched a bottle of rum. You should really go read the full history that Doug posted, which includes figures like Robert Lewis Stevenson and Paul Gauguin. However, it seems that none of the recipes available make for a really inspiring drink. Looking over the lists of ingredients, I could see that there should be a good drink somewhere among them, so I decided to tinker a bit.

This was basically an attempt to split the difference between Don's version and Trader Vic's.

Dr. Funk Mod-1


1.5 oz Appleton V/X rum
0.5 oz Smith & Cross rum
0.25 Herbsaint
0.75 oz lime juice
0.5 oz simple syrup
0.25 oz gredadine
0.5-1 oz soda water

Combine all ingredients except for soda water, shake with ice and strain into a chilled rocks glass full of ice. Top with soda water. and stir briefly

The sip leads off with a tingle of soda water, followed closely by the Jamaican rum dunder funk. This segues into lime and sugar, which quickly transforms into a melange of Herbsaint anise and grenadine fruitiness, with just a hint of the soda water's carbonic acid.

It took a couple of tries but I'm pleased with how this drink turned out. I was quite happy to find that the Smith & Cross/Appleton V/X combo did an excellent job of tying down the quarter ounce of Herbsaint. I was worried that it would overwhelm the drink, as six drops is usually enough for most of the drinks I enjoy that contain Herbsaint. The soda water helps to leaven the drink and its carbonic acid works to counterbalance the hefty doses of syrups. Go with half an ounce of soda water if you want a more spirit-forward drink and an ounce if you want a more fruit and anise-focused drink.

Whisky Review: Arran 14 Year

I reviewed the younger 10 Year whisky from Arran a few months back, so now it's time for it's elder sibling. I got very lucky and was able to get my hands on these two whiskies for very reasonable prices because the state of Oregon has a bit of a glut of Arran and decided to heavily discount them. The 14 Year runs in the mid-70s most of the time, but has been available for only $50 for the last few months. Unfortunately that comes to an end on March 1st, so if this sounds like a scotch you'd like to try and you live in the NW, I'd suggest picking up a bottle sooner rather than later.

Like the 10 Year, the Arran 14 Year is bottled at 46% without chill filtration, giving is a decent amount of heft and a nice mouth feel. It's somewhat inconsequential, but I have to hand it to the people who do the packaging for Arran. The standing stone motif is a nice touch. It's a very good balance between showy and simple, which lets it stand out on the shelf without overreaching. Nicely done.

Arran 14 Year


Nose: milk chocolate, mint, orange peel, a hint of vegetal peat, malt, a touch of sherry and rum

Taste: a burst of citrus, raspberry and mint up front, which glides into sweet chocolate malt and dark berries mid-palette and back, with allspice, cinnamon, sherry, peat and pepper leading into the finish, which becomes more intensely honey sweet throughout the palette and diminished peat influence after dilution

Finish: honey, bittersweet chocolate malt with slightly bitter peat, dark fruit and black pepper

This is a really excellent whisky. With that said, I think I actually like the Arran 10 Year a bit better. The 14 Year cranks up the sweetness of the 10 Year while losing some of the peat and other Island influence that provided such a nice balance in the 10. If you live in Oregon or can make it here by the end of the month, it's mostly going to be a matter of personal taste. There's only a $10 difference between the two expressions right now. But once March rolls around, the 10 Year will become a much better deal, especially if you order it online.