Scottish Whisky

Compass Box Peat Monster Arcana

/ / Review, Scottish Whisky /

Compass Box Peat Monster Arcana
Blended Malt Scotch Whisky

46% ABV
$100
Website
Compass Box Peat Monster Arcana Blended Malt Scotch Whisky

What the Blender Says

How does French oak influence peated whisky?
A combination of American oak bodies with toasted French oak heads, our custom barrels generate compelling flavours for us. Yet until 2016, their effects on smoky whisky remained something of a mystery.

We took three French oak custom casks which had already been used to mature our Highland Malt Blend and filled them with a cask strength version of The Peat Monster. More than two years later, the French oak had imparted extra creaminess, spice notes and a chocolatey profile – it had also mellowed the whisky’s smokiness. What started as The Peat Monster became something rather different.

Peat Monster Arcana celebrates mysteries but there will be no secrets. This is a blend of malt whiskies from the Talisker, Miltonduff and Ardbeg Distilleries, together with our assertive and spicy experiment. We sense that there are plenty more discoveries to be made regarding the impact of French oak on Scotch whisky.

Transparency is incredibly important to us and we believe that you deserve to know what is in your whisky. On this occasion however, we must also inform you about what didn’t make it into the bottle.

To further complement the French oak character of our experimental parcel, we wanted to add part of a cask of our French oak-finished Highland Malt Blend. Unfortunately, this component was not included in the final bottling. So closely did the final liquid match our blending room prototype, we did not discover the error until after the whisky was bottled and shipped.

The recipe as published on the back label for Peat Monster Arcana is therefore incorrect. From bench-top prototype to the full-scale blend, our experimental parcel grew in influence – we want to understand why this was so. The whisky remains true to the delicious fusion of oak and smoke we envisioned, in spite of the Highland Malt Blend’s absence, but we are sorry that the recipe table does not reflect the contents with total accuracy. We are adjusting our processes to better meet the new challenges we face.

FLAVOUR PROFILE: Chocolate, cinnamon and boat tar appear on the nose while the palate is fruity and compellingly waxy. A dry smoky presence steadily builds.

TECHNICAL DETAILS: Natural colour | Not chill-filtered | A limited edition of 8,328 bottles | August 2020
LEAD WHISKYMAKER: James Saxon

What Gary Says

Nose:  Peat, gentle smoke, distant smoked meats, seaweed, coal tar, iodine, pears and milk chocolate.
Palate:  Sweet and fruity, pears, peaches and vanilla cream, honey, salted toffee, a bit of graham cracker.
Finish:  Moderate in length with fruit notes amidst peat and light smoke.
Comments:  While virtually every Compass Box whisky I’ve ever seen is non-chill filtered, this one clouded up really quickly with just a few drops of water (which always makes me excited to see!) The nose is quite smokey with the palate being more balanced with fruit notes. I didn’t find anything objectionable, but also it didn’t seem to be remarkably better than the standard Peat Monster (which I should note is not my favorite of their Malt Whisky Collection).

Rating: Stands Out

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The Balvenie DoubleWood 17 Year

/ / Review, Scottish Whisky, Speyside / ,

The Balvenie DoubleWood 17 Year
Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky

43% ABV
$160-$180
Website
Balvenie DoubleWood 17 year Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky

What the Distillery Says

To craft The Balvenie DoubleWood 17 year old single malt whisky Malt Master David C. Stewart MBE returned to one of his most celebrated achievements – consecutive maturation in two different types of cask, a process often referred to as ‘cask finishing’.

This technique is at the heart of The Balvenie DoubleWood – it sees the whisky matured first in American oak barrels, which impart soft sweet vanilla notes, before being transferred to European oak sherry casks, where the second cask ageing adds rich spicy flavours and a depth and fullness of flavour.

The DoubleWood 17 year old is an elder sibling to DoubleWood 12 year old and shares its honeyed, spicy characteristics, but it is distinctly different, with deeper vanilla notes, hints of green apple, creamy toffee and a striking richness and complexity.

TASTING NOTES
NOSE: Elegant and complex oak, vanilla, honeyed sweetness and a hint of green apple.
TASTE: Sweet with dried fruits, sherbet spice, toasted almonds and cinnamon, layered with a richness of creamy toffee notes and traces of oak and deep vanilla.
FINISH:Vanilla oak, honey and spicy sweetness.

What Gary Says

Nose:  Green apples, cinnamon buns with raisins, heather, honey, a floral perfume, vanilla.
Palate:  Creamy mouthfeel with dried fruit notes of apple and pears, vanilla with soft spices, nutmeg, slightly nutty with a touch of oak, pepper and tamed cinnamon.
Finish:  Long with fading cinnamon dusted fruits.
Comments:  I’ve always found Balvenie to be an elegant whisky, and this is no exception. Really nice balance between the two casks where neither is dominating the other, and the combination is lovely. A bit of water tilts this toward more tropical fruit notes of papaya and mango, although wouldn’t blame anyone for sipping neat and never thinking to add water!

Rating: Stands Out/Must Try

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Tomatin 14 Year Old Port Casks

/ / Review, Scottish Whisky, Speyside / ,

Tomatin 14 Year Old Port Casks
Highland Single Malt Scotch Whisky

46% ABV
$70-$80
Website
Tomatin 14 Year Old Port Casks Highland Single Malt Scotch Whisky

What the Distillery Says

Cask Type: Matured in a combination of Bourbon barrels and Port casks

The Tomatin 14 Year Old is soft, smooth and sweet, benefiting from its time spent in Tawny Port casks which previously held port for around 50 years. Rich but balanced aromas of red berries, sweet honey and rich toffee develop into aspects of light fruits and nuts on the palate and an abiding finish of smooth fruit salad.

What Gary Says

Nose:  Fruity with banana nut bread, berries, toffee, honeysuckle, heather and port.
Palate:  Loads of fruit with berries, apricots, cherries, freshly cracked white pepper, oak, touch of peat with a mineral note.
Finish:  Moderately long, drying with pepper and nectarines.
Comments:  Fruity but with a bit of a sharp edge. I really dig the nose, but the palate wasn’t quite as complex. Nothing off-putting, but nothing particularly special either..

Rating: Average/Stands Out

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Duncan Taylor ‘Dimensions’ Highland Park 20 Year Single Malt Scotch Whisky

/ / Island, Review, Scottish Whisky /

Duncan Taylor ‘Dimensions’ Highland Park 20 Year
Single Malt Scotch Whisky

53% ABV
$150-$180
Website
Duncan Taylor Dimensions Highland Park 20 Yr

What the Bottler Says

Bottled at cask strength of 53% ABV and without chill-filtration or artificial colouring, this single malt has matured beautifully as a result of 20 years in an ex-sherry butt. The traditionally lightly-peated notes of Highland Park are still present, however they have softened over time and have been complimented with a hint of salt and notes of mixed fruit, baked apples and honey from the sherry cask.

What Gary Says

Nose:  Peat fire with salted sea mist, fruity with cherries, peaches, raisins, vanilla, chocolate with cedar-smoked pork roast.
Palate:  Rich mouthfeel with honey, apples, cherries, pepper, chocolate, toffee, walnuts and peat.
Finish:  Long and damp with fruity peat notes.
Comments:  A rather nice Highland Park bottling. Before researching the bottle details, I would not have pegged this as being fully matured in sherry (first the color isn’t what you’d expect for that age in sherry), so guessing it is a second or maybe third fill sherry (as they have a lot of sherry casks around Highland Park). Which isn’t a bad thing by any stretch – since the retail Highland Park gives you that big sherry take on their distillate. A nice balance that lets the distillery’s character shine through while giving you some of those luscious fruit notes from the sherry.

Rating: Stands Out

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Dewar’s Double Double 21-Year-Old

/ / Review, Scottish Whisky / ,

Dewar’s Double Double 21-Year-Old
Blended Scotch Whisky

46% ABV
$50 (375 mL)
Website

Dewar's Double-Double 21-Year-Old Whisky

What the Blender Says

Our unique Four Stage Ageing Process for Ultimate Smoothness finished in Oloroso Sherry Casks.

Dewar’s Double Double 21-Year-Old is finished in Oloroso sherry casks, this blend delivers subtle notes of cinnamon and ripe vine fruits with a silky smooth finish.

4 STAGE AGEING PROCESS FOR ULTIMATE SMOOTHNESS

Innovation comes in many forms, and in 2019 our Master Blender, Stephanie Macleod, released a new range of Blended Scotch Whiskies with a Four Stage Ageing Process for Ultimate Smoothness. This may sound like an indulgence but the series has been picking up gold medal awards the world over since being released.

We believe that in order to do things right and get the best results you should put in double the effort. So we asked ourselves how we could put in double the effort to our range that was already Double Aged for Extra Smoothness…and it was obvious..double it!

Our Double Double Series has been aged, blended together, aged again, then finished in sherry casks for the Ultimate Smoothness.

What Gary Says

Nose:  Dark fruit, bit of toffee, earthiness with smoked brisket, leather, sherry and a subtle vegetal note.
Palate:  Rich mouthfeel with plums, pepper spice, nutmeg, cinnamon, bit of an earthy/mineral note, dark chocolate, toffee, almonds and black cherries.
Finish:  Moderately long with dark fruits, pepper spice and a touch of peat.
Comments:  This is a really interesting dram – a tad sharp on the palate at first but a bit of water really smoothes it out nicely. Quite well balanced, with a complexity that introduced me to something new with each sitting. I like this being offered in a 375 mL too because that puts it in reach of many consumers who might otherwise not have access to it, and there aren’t a lot of well aged blended whiskies like this available to them at that price point. AND I appreciate the ABV, as some other offerings from Dewar’s I haven’t enjoyed as much – but suspect would have at something closer to this ABV than 40%. In fact, I can comfortably say this is my favorite Dewar’s to date.

Rating: Stands Out/Must Try

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