A whisky review on a Tuesday for a change: my last restaurant report from the Twin Cities will be posted tomorrow.

As I said yesterday, we will remain in Campbeltown to close out the year in whisky reviews. After three Glen Scotia festival bottlings (here, here and here), this week began with Springbank’s Campbeltown Loch release, a blended malt that incorporates malts made by the three extant distilleries of Campbeltown. Springbank itself contributed malts from all three of its lines for that blend: the eponymous Springbank, the heavily peated and double-distilled Longrow, and the unpeated and triple-distlled Hazelburn. Today I have for you a single cask Hazelburn. This is an oloroso sherry cask that was released in 2020 and was doubtless snapped up immediately and re-flogged on the secondary market, as is the case, seemingly, with almost everything Springbank produces. I suspect the heavy sherry influence (palpable just from the colour in the sample bottle) will cover up what might otherwise distinguish the Hazelburn line from the Springbank line. Let’s see if that’s the case.

Hazelburn 13, 2007 (50.3%; oloroso sherry cask; from a bottle split)

Nose: Big sherry off the top, a mix of raisins and more savoury, meaty notes with a hint of struck matches. Sweeter as it sits. With more time there’s some dried orange peel and some creme brulee. A squirt of water brightens up the citrus and pushes the sulphur almost all the way back.

Palate: Comes in with the savoury gunpowder leading the way, followed by brine and the familiar Springbank mix of damp earth and cracked coriander seed. A bigger bite than the abv would suggest (thanks to the sulphur); good texture. The brine expands with each sip and the sulphur recedes. The dried orange peel emerges here as well with time. With water the sulphur returns in the form of rock salt and merges nicely with the orange peel (brighter here too now).

Finish: Long. The damp earth and brine are the top notes here, getting saltier as it goes. The orange peel hangs out here as well once it arrives on the palate; it’s woodier here and just a little bitter. As on the palate with water.

Comments: Well, this is a Hazelburn but it could just as easily be a sherried Springbank (or even a sherried Kilkerran). It’s also very tasty—though the true sulphur-phobe would likely disagree. I liked it better with water.

Rating: 87 points.