Alright, I started the month with a heavily peated whisky from Islay’s south shore, and so it’s only fitting to close it with another. Circle of life and what not; as written in the Ink of Legends. That’s a non sequitur, you’re thinking, but really it’s a very smooth transition. You see, “The Ink of Legends” is the silly name Diageo has given the 2023 release of the hallowed Lagavulin 12 CS. You may recall that that Monday’s Talisker bore the sobriquet, “The Wild Explorador”. Possibly that name has some connection to the fact that the Talisker contains spirit finished in a trio of port casks; quite possibly “The Ink of Legends” similarly has some connection to this Lagavulin’s own finish. Yes, it’s not a pure ex-bourbon Lagavulin 12 as used to be the norm. When did they stop being pure ex-bourbon releases, you ask? The 2021—which bore the name “The Lion’s Fire”—was ex-bourbon. The 2022 edition—“The Flames of the Phoenix”, if you must know—included virgin oak casks in the mix, and was—as far as I know—the first to depart from the ex-bourbon tradition (I never did get my hands on any of that one). Well, this year the distillery has gone from fire and flames to ink, and they’ve also gone quite a distance from virgin oak. No, the ink in question was not secreted by last year’s “Lustrous Creature of the Depths“; this year’s Lagavulin 12 was finished in tequila casks. I don’t believe I’ve ever reviewed or tasted a tequila cask finish before. Well, I’ll try anything once. Okay, so I tried the Balcones Brimstone twice—I’ll obviously try anything twice.

Lagavulin 12, Special Release 2023 (56.4%; tequila cask finish; from a bottle split)

Nose: Not much sign of the tequila here at first; instead it’s the familiar carbolic peat (Dettol, bandages) along with some cereals and some coastal sweetness. Continues in this general vein. With time the peat recedes a bit and there’s a light vegetal note, which might well be the tequila. A few drops of water and the sweetness moves from kelp and shells to something rounder, which is probably the tequila talking.

Palate: No tequila here either at first sip; instead there’s some vanilla along with all the rest of the stuff from the nose. Very approachable at full strength; decent texture. Lemon emerges on subsequent sips and the vanilla recedes. Okay, let’s see what water does for it. Well, it doesn’t bring out any obvious tequila notes here either; instead it pushes the vanilla back further and brings out some cracked pepper.

Finish: Long. The mix of cereals and vanilla and bright carbolic peat continues here as well. Gets sweeter as it goes and there’s something about the sweetness that isn’t obviously tequila but is also not the usual Lagavulin sweetness. As on the palate with water at first; more salt as it goes.

Comments: Blind, I doubt I would have guessed this was anything but an ex-bourbon Lagavulin. I would probably have thought it was not the most typical bourbon cask Lagavulin 12—and that’s really how the tequila finish seems to have affected the spirit here: more by rounding off the phenols and coastal notes than by expressing a tequila profile per se (and no, I didn’t find it inky either). Not bad but nothing I would ever dream of spending $150+ on.

Rating: 87 points.