After a week of single grain whiskies (from Cameronbridge, Cambus and Carsebridge), let’s end the month with a couple of whiskies in Diageo’s Special Release slate for 2023. The first two weeks of December will feature the rest of the whiskies in the lineup. First up is the Talisker, which is such a special release that it does not have an age statement. It does have a silly name though: The Wild Explorador (I’m sure there’s a reason for this but I will try not to find out what it is). Last year’s Special Release Talisker also had a silly name though—The Lustrous Creature of the Depths—and I quite liked it anyway (it also had an age statement). So, what makes this one special? Perhaps it’s the complicated finish regimen. It would be easy to say that this is a port finished Talisker, and it is; but it was finished in casks that had previously held not one, not two, but three types of port (cue Diageo’s Head of Silly Concepts next year, saying “Fuck it, we’re going to seven”). The port casks involved had previously held white port, tawny port and ruby port. In case the white port thing sounds familiar, this year’s Laphroaig Cairdeas was also finished in white port casks (along with madeira). Typical: you go more than a decade without encountering whiskies from white port casks and then two come at once. Anyway, let’s see what this is like.

Talisker, Special Release 2023 (59.7%; port casks; from a bottle split)

Nose: Leads with the trademark peppery peat and a lot of it. And there’s even more on the second and third sniffs as it keeps exploding out of the glass. Some sweet fruit begins to emerge tentatively from below after a minute or so and then expands a little: a mix of dried apricot and orange peel; some pastry crust to go with as well. As it sits the pastry crust turns to milky cocoa and the peat picks up a fair bit of soot and ash. With water some phenols emerge along with some citronella.

Palate: Lots of peat here too to begin but it’s as sweet as it’s peppery—not particularly fruity though. Approachable at full strength with decent texture. The citrus begins to come through as it sits but this needs water to open up properly. Ah yes, with a few drops there’s a lovely mix of peat and pepper and orange and brine.

Finish: Medium-long. Not much to it at first with the pepper dominating. As on the palate with time and water with some ash emerging at the end.

Comments: Well, this is the best port cask Talisker I’ve had—which, I realize, is damning with faint praise. It’s mostly because the port is not very palpable. It rounds out the pepper and peat without blunting their bite. Neat, I was thinking I much preferred last year’s more austere release by a good margin; but with water it almost caught up to it.

Rating: 87 points.