Ben Nevis week has so far featured two young casks from the Scotch Malt Whisky Society. Monday’s 9 yo was from a first-fill hogshead; Wednesday’s 8 yo spent its last three years in a second-fill oloroso hogshead. Here to close out the week now is another bourbon hogshead, this time from the Single Malts of Scotland. This is older than the previous two combined. It was distilled in 1996 and bottled in 2021. As per Whiskybase, the bottlers seem to have got their hands on a large parcel of these 1996 casks of proximate age bottled across both their Single Malts of Scotland and Whisky Trail lines. This one was bottled for the American market. Let’s see what it’s like.

Ben Nevis 24, 1996 (48.8%; Single Malts of Scotland; hogshead 1730; from a bottle split)

Nose: Everything Ben Nevis: salted nuts, powdered ginger, Makrut lime, a hint of mineral peat, sweet floral notes. Continues along these lines, with the fruit becoming more acidic as it goes. With water the acid recedes and there’s more floral sweetness.

Palate: More exuberantly fruity here as the Makrut lime is joined by pineapple and tart-sweet mango. All the other stuff from the nose is beneath the fruit. A bigger bite than the abv would suggest; oily texture. On the second sip there’s some spicy oak mixed in with the powdered ginger. Continues in this vein. On the palate, water brings out more of the fruit, while pushing the oak back.

Finish: Long. Gets maltier here as the fruit fades. The oak spice tingles at the end. More fruit here too with water: sweet citrus and tart-sweet pineapple.

Comments: Oh, I do love bourbon cask Ben Nevis. There’s nothing quite like it. The only thing missing here is more development on the palate: in some ways this tastes younger than it is. Which is not to say it’s not very good.

Rating: 89 points.