Spey Fumare 46% ABV

Those of you that know Latin might know what to expect from SPEY Fumare, but those of you that don’t and try this single malt from the Speyside distillery without hearing anything about it might be a little surprised – it’s their first release of peated whisky! Launched in the latter half of 2016, Fumare (Latin for ‘Smoky’) is quite an interesting malt, with 18,000 bottles produced.

Master of Malt

Appearance

Light gold/white wine in colour, nice thick swirl line and thick legs. #SpeysideDistillery

Nose

Who said peated whisky has to come from Islay? The peat is quite strong for me, there’re also botanicals, a hint of eucalyptus, HP brown sauce and cooking juices sizzling on fire coals. #SpeysideDistillery

Smoked cheese, some germoline, evergreen boughs are coming through, with tropical fruit pastries. #SpeysideDistillery

Palate

Mouthfeel is medium, and lots of smoke comes at me. Those juices from cooked meats sizzling on the fore are here too. It’s quite spicy too once the peat dies down a little. White pepper, cinnamon, poached pears, lemon sorbet. #SpeysideDistillery

Those mini lemon slice shaped jelly sweets, fire embers, raisins, cigar leaves and molasses. #SpeysideDistillery

Finish

Long side of medium in length for me, and a delightful playoff between peat/smoke and fruity sweetness. Though seared pineapple chunks does cover both rather nicely. #SpeysideDistillery

My thoughts

Who says you have to go to Islay to get a good peated whisky. I enjoyed this whisky very much. I got quite a lot of peat with dram, and it definitely has medicinal tones like Islay peated whiskies. It also comes with fruit notes, all in all i think it’s a cracking dram, and coming in at £48 it’s not a bad price either. It’s another i’d have at home for sure.

A big thank you goes out to @SpeySingleMalt and @TheWhiskyWire for the opportunity to take part in this Tweet tasting, and again to @TheWhiskyWire for the use of his bottle images.