Bourbon cask #701188 NCF, NC, CS.
Appearance
Lemony yellow gold in colour, the medium thick swirl line beads up immediately in my Glencairn glass, and drops quick medium and slow thick legs.
Nose
That’s the nose hairs gone lol, and initially it’s a mix of sweetness, cereal/grain, balsa wood. Bitter lemon leads us in, with apricot pastry, slightly over toasted bread, weetabix and tea cakes.
More time and I’m thinking grapefruits and it’s becoming a dusty dram. The balsa wood aroma does become quite strong.
Palate
The mouthfeel is rather nice, and the palate is quite different to the nose. The palate is a mix of tropical/stoned fruits, with tobacco leaves, and spices. White and black pepper, cinnamon, faint root ginger, and becoming floral now.
Dunnage starts to come through with time, milky coffee, black treacle, more tobacco leaf notes, rum and raisin ice cream and black liquorice.
Finish
The finish is long, remaining quite spicy with icing sugar sweetness, cloves, raisins, nutmeg, star anise, and Nutella.
My thoughts
I had a feeling that this was the first Tormore whisky iv’e tasted, and after checking my (very nerdy) spreadsheet it turned out that is indeed my first Tormore. So i had no expections of it at all, though iv’e drunk many drams from A.D.Rattray, and thoroughly enjoyed them all.
@ChrisXWhisky on Twitter asked my opinion of this Tormore, and i have to say it’s definitely a dram of two halves. The nose isn’t overly impressive, this could be partly due to the ABV strength. At this point i was wondering if this was going to be the first A.D.Rattray i wasn’t fond of.
Well, the palate is completely opposite to the nose, that lovely Bourbon cask spiciness is quite strong 🥰, and there are plenty of flavours to keep me entertained. The spices do last through to the end, where the spices are of the darker fruit side. Whiskies that have aromas that are completely different to it’s flavours fascinate me to be honest, and i’d love to know more about why this happens.
Overall i did enjoy it, the palate redeemed the whisky overall, and i’d definitely like to try it again, if i can. I very likely would have a bottle in my whisky cupboard as it did grow on me quite a lot.
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