No, I haven’t already rolled back my commitment to slow the pace of my whisky reviewing and to restrict it only to bottles that have lain unopened for years in my stash. It’s only that I still have a few samples left over from before I left for Bombay in early January and I may as well get through all of them as well. And so here’s a Bowmore 15. This was distilled in 1992 and bottled in 2007 from a refill hogshead by Douglas Laing in their Old Malt Cask series. Back when this came out a lot of whisky geeks were still very wary about Bowmores distilled in the early 1990s. This was on account of the proximity to the long problematic preceding decade at the distillery. As I’ve noted before on the blog, my random sampling suggests that by the early 1990s most of those problems had been worked out. Indeed, I’ve had quite a few rather nice indie Bowmores distilled in the early 1990s. That’s not to say, of course, that there aren’t casks from that period that still bore/bear traces of the major problems of the distillate in the 1980s, particularly a strong soapy note. Let’s hope this cask is not one of those. When teenaged bourbon cask Bowmore is good it’s very good indeed, with that unique mix of smoke, fruit, florals and coastal notes. Let’s see where this one falls on the spectrum.
Bowmore 15, 1992 (50%; Douglas Laing; refill hogshead #DL 3972; from a bottle split)
Nose: Ashy peat mixed in with citrus and greener notes (unripe mangoes, lime). A fair bit of custardy cream on the second and third sniffs and some sweeter fruit (berries of some kind) join the tart-sweet complex. The fruit gets more tropical as it sits with a bit of passionfruit joining the party. Water pushes the ash back and pulls out citronella and chalk; the sweeter fruit trumps the tart now.
Palate: Comes in with the smoke and the citrus leading the way here as well, trailing a slightly soapy note in their wake. Good drinking strength at 50% with decent texture. Those “green” fruit notes expand bigly as it sits. The pepper emerges earlier with time and the soapy note disappears. Okay, let’s add a few drops of water. Less smoky and acidic here too with water; the soap/glycerin comes back again.
Finish: Quite ashy here with some cracked pepper mixed in. The soapy/glycerine note, thankfully, does not linger too long. Sweeter with time. As on the palate with water.
Comments: I quite enjoyed this, especially on the nose. That soapy note is not overly pronounced on the palate and finish but it’s there and it’s a distracting flaw. If not for that, this would be headed to the high 80s for me. I’m not sure when in the bottle’s life this sample was poured. If any of my readers went through a full bottle of this over a decent period of time, I’d love to hear any notes you have on how the soap and fruit may have waxed or waned.
Rating: 85 points.