Appearance – This Irish Single Malt Whiskey is a rich deep amber colour with a very slightly pinkish tinge, it beads up on the swirl line, and it takes a while to drop slow medium thick legs.
Nose – Straight away the ABV is fizzy in the nostrils, and the first aroma is very sweet cocktail cherries, there’s menthol freshness here too, bbq meats, sweet lemon, a note of marzipan, and a dustiness seems to hang in the glass. There are darker notes too, with raisins, black currants, black liquorice, furniture Polish, pontefract cakes and a feint note of old window glazing putty. During all of these darker notes there is an enveloping icing sugar sweetness, which creates a lovely balance.
Palate – The palate is much darker in character and has a nice mouthfeel, there’s plenty of stewed dark fruits, raspberry and cranberries, along with a generous helping of spice, ginger, cinnamon and chilli’s blend together with bitter dark chocolate, black pepper, cigar leaves, lots of oak, and black cherries, there’s also an oily flavour in there, and right before the finish arrives I get a little salinity, it’s certainly not short of flavour.
Finish – The finish is long, loverly and spicy, oily and warming, it makes me salivate to be honest with the dark fruits.
My thoughts – In my opinion this is a loverly drop of Whiskey, I like these Sherry cask notes, so rich and deep if done well. The level of spiciness did surprise me, and was a welcomed surprise to be honest. There is some fruitiness too, but in general it’s dark fruit dominant or me.
Would I buy a bottle? – If I had the funds I would by a bottle, part of the reason is that I’m having a fight with Ex Sherry butt whiskies in general because of sulphur/phosphorus notes, this bottling has none that I can detect, a win straight away for me.
Thanks to – @dramofthemonth (Twitter).
Pic credit – Home delivery wine.
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