Cragganmore 12 Year Old

/ / Review, Scottish Whisky, Speyside /

Cragganmore Highland Single Malt Aged 12 Years
40% ABV/80 Proof
$50
Website

What the Distillery Says:
Speyside today is widely revered for its sublime malt whiskies and for its fine salmon fishing. It is here, in this fertile triangle of land between mountain and sea, long been known as the Garden of Scotland, that Cragganmore single malt whisky is distilled.

Barley is naturally a major crop, and the presence of Scotland’s fastest flowing river – together with peat from the uplands to the south – was the reason original Cragganmore owner ‘Big’ John Smith felt that it would be the perfect place for the perfect distillery.

And who could argue with his genius? Successive managers of Cragganmore have strived to continue his vision to deliver the sweetest, most complex of malt whiskies. Fruity, honeyed notes are often found and many a taster has talked of fruitcake and toffee flavours.

NOSE – A combination of sweet floral fragrances, riverside herbs and flowers with some honey and vanilla.
BODY – Firm, rounded, light to medium.
PALATE – A strong malty taste with hints of sweet wood smoke and sandalwood
FINISH – A long, malt-driven finish with light smoke and hints of sweetness.

What Richard Says:
Nose: Treacle tarts jump out initially but quickly mellow to a more subtle earthy sweetness. Meaty and herbal with a honey sweetness.
Palate: It starts off very soft and mellow. There is a light floral sweetness to it as it picks up steam toward the finish.
Finish: Dry and spicy. It is a little brawny compared to what you might expect from the palate.
Comments: Why doesn’t Cragganmore get more love? It’s an enormously pleasing dram and stands above the likes of it’s more popular 12 year old brethren like Glenlivet, Glenfiddich, and Macallan. I actually know the answer to my own questions. Diageo prices it out of popularity. At $50 a bottle it’s well above the three Glens and near $10 more than the perennially overpriced Dalmore and Macallan. The value proposition makes it hard to tell you to seek it out over other drams but from taste alone I find it to be a benchmark 12 year old.
Rating: Stands Out

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SMWS Cask 3.184

/ / Review, Scottish Whisky, SMWSA Whiskies /

SMWS Cask No. 3.184
Islay
61.0% ABV
Distilled October 1996
$115
US Allocation: 60 bottles
December 2012 Outturn Release

What the SMWS Says:
This nose was complex – perfumed smoke, candles, black tea, vinegar on coal and buckets of brine – but sweet (barley sugars, sherbet lemons, cinnamon sweets, pineapple cake) and floral (lavender, geranium, jasmine). The taste swung from sweet (Edinburgh Rock) to savoury (smoked pork loin, honey glazed ham); also charcoal and witch hazel. The reduced nose had fragrant vanilla, lemon, roses, soap and White Linen perfume sprayed on driftwood. Flavours now danced around the tongue with leaps of liquorice, lavender and lemon, whirls of white pepper, arabesques of ash and high kicks of coal. 1779 distillery at the centre of whisky island.

Drinking tip: Perfect ceilidh dram – or as a reward for some other strenuous achievement

What Richard Says:
Nose: A very nice brined smokiness and Big Red chewing gum. Water makes it more fruity and floral.
Palate: Smoky, honey sweetness, a little vanilla, and astringent.
Finish: Old polished wood furniture. Water tames to wood and makes it a little more peppery.
Comments: This is all around very nice Islay. It has nice smoke and brine notes with a depth and complexity that will keep you coming back.
Rating: Stands Out

Review sample provided courtesy of the SMWSA and is available to society members through their website or 800.990.1991.

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SMWS Cask G9.1

/ / Review, Scottish Whisky, SMWSA Whiskies /

SMWS Cask No. G9.1
Grain
57.8% ABV
Distilled September 2000
$100
US Allocation: 48 bottles
December 2012 Outturn Release

What the SMWS Says:
The nose balanced toffee, marzipan, glace cherries and lemon puff biscuits against some spritzy, slightly acidic sherbet; we also found waxed paper, hazelnuts, greenery and geraniums. The unreduced palate had sharp, tropical fruits and lemon peel; also new wood and then something spicy and savoury. The reduced nose suggested peaches, cheesecake, woodland paths and a ruined castle by a lily-pad loch – quite a landscape. The reduced palate seemed a reasonable mixture of sweetness and astringency – a sweet and sour melange of toffee, pineapple, green sappy wood with some white pepper spicy heat in the finish. Captain Haddock’s favourite dram, apparently.

Drinking tip: While watching (or reading) Tintin

What Richard Says:
Nose: Brown butter, marzipan, and fresh baked scones. Water makes the nose very green. Lots of fresh grass, wet forest floors, and your mom’s flower garden before the flowers bloom.
Palate: Ooooh yum! At only 11 years this is one tasty grain. Richer that you wold expect. Lots of polished wood and spicy peppers (black and white). Water adds a little lemon zest.
Finish: Dry with lots of fresh cut raw wood. The finish is my least favorite part. I guess you will just have to keep drinking it. 😉
Comments: Very lovely. You don’t often get access to single grain scotches and they are usually really good or really bad. This is a good one.
Rating: Stands Out

Review sample provided courtesy of the SMWSA and is available to society members through their website or 800.990.1991.

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SMWS Cask 125.51

/ / Review, Scottish Whisky, SMWSA Whiskies /

SMWS Cask No. 125.51
Highland, Northern
57.4%% ABV
Distilled August 2001
$90
US Allocation: 150 bottles
December 2012 Outturn Release

What the SMWS Says:
The nose took time to develop – eventually producing sharp zesty fruits, grated orange peel, vanilla, caramel, hint of mint and polished or waxed furniture. The palate was more immediately defined – the sweetness of Danish pastries (with vanilla cream and apricot jam) and the perfumed astringency of lime sorbet, starfruit and grapefruit; pepper and chilli arriving in the finish. In reduction, the nose expanded to include papaya, strawberry split ice-lollies, toffee, magic tree vanilla and yankee candles. The reduced palate delivered rich, perfumed sweetness (‘biting a woman’s neck’ someone suggested); oak sharpened the after-taste. The distillery was a brewery until 1843.

Drinking tip: The character comes through more in the palate than the nose

What Richard Says:
Nose: Out of the bottle this one doesn’t want to play ball. If you really put your nose to it a little vanilla custard comes through but it’s very faint. Water opens a little orange zest but not much else.
Palate: Much sweeter than the nose would foretell. Cream cheese danishes come to mind (Henri’s for those in Atlanta) and very peppery. Water lightens the sweetness but brings on a dry chemical flavor.
Finish: Hot peppered wood out of the bottle. Water leaves a sweeter and fruity finish in contrast to bottle strength.
Comments: Add water but do so sparingly. Balance it right and it’s a soft drinkable dram but add too much and it goes downhill fast.
Rating: Average

Review sample provided courtesy of the SMWSA and is available to society members through their website or 800.990.1991.

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SMWS Cask 48.26

/ / Review, Scottish Whisky, SMWSA Whiskies /

SMWS Cask No. 48.26
Speyside, Spey
50.5% ABV
Distilled March 1988
$155
US Allocation: 120 bottles
December 2012 Outturn Release

What the SMWS Says:
Distinctly floral to start – jasmine, lilac – with earthy, ‘mushroom grow-bag’ notes behind. We were reminded of a wild garden, but the heavy scents balanced by emerging lemon sherbets – and this citric note also modifies the sweet taste, with traces of paprika. Fresher and more Speyside-like with water, but still earthy, with a whiff of smouldering leaves, and a fresh note of ‘lemon-scented fabric-softener’. The taste is soft, sweet and quaffable; rounded and centre-palate – ‘mashed strawberries with black pepper’ – with a medium length finish. This remote distillery overlooks the Haughs of Cromdale, where once a battle was fought, and its make is not currently bottled by its owner.

Drinking tip: Whilst watching someone else gardening

What Richard Says:
Nose: Cherry hard candies, heather, and sauteed mushrooms.
Palate: Lightly sweet reminding me of mixed berries followed by a pinch of cayenne pepper. Water opens up more flavors of orange peel and Ouzo.
Finish: Black pepper and old oak.
Comments: Lovely, very drinkable, but not terribly complex. I really did enjoy this dram but it was a bit of a one trick pony.
Rating: Stands Out

Review sample provided courtesy of the SMWSA and is available to society members through their website or 800.990.1991.

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