Monday’s Laphroaig 10 CS, Batch 013 was fine but nothing more. Wednesday’s Caol Ila 8, 2013 was a lot better. Islay peat week now concludes with the oldest whisky of the trio: a 16 yo Port Charlotte or peated Bruichladdich. Will this keep the positive trajectory going? I hope so even though I am not a fan of that buytryic sour milk/parmesan rind note I get off almost everything from Bruichladdich. Like the Laphroaig and the Caol Ila this is bourbon cask matured; from a single bourbon barrel, in fact. It was bottled a few years ago by the Whiskybase lads for their Archives label. Once upon a time I used to buy those Archives releases on the regular. Alas, in recent years it’s become very difficult to purchase whisky from abroad in the US. And even though some Archives releases have come to the US, intra-state shipping here has also become all but impossible—and I don’t think any of their releases have come to Minnesota. And so I am compltely out of touch with what they’ve been up to in recent years. Anyway my sample of this one comes to me from the redoubtable Michael Kravitz of Diving for Pearls. His review of the same whisky—which I have not read yet—can be found here. Continue reading
Category Archives: Bruichladdich
Port Charlotte 14, Batch 7 (That Boutiquey Whisky Co.)
Last week’s reviews were all of peated whiskies that had spent at least some time in port casks. The week began with a Bunnahabhain that spent three of its eight years in a tawny port cask and ended with a Longrow that spent all of its 11 in a refill port pipe. In between was an 8 yo Kilchoman that was finished in a ruby port cask. This week’s whiskies do not involve port—not that I know of anyway—but they are all also heavily peated. First up is a Port Charlotte 14 bottled by Master of Malt’s That Boutiquey Whisky Co. label. I’m not too sure about how these TBWC batch releases work. This one apparently comprised 662 bottles but they were all 375 ml, which makes it not the largest batch. Indeed, the total volume would approximate 331 regulation 750 ml bottles—which is between a hogshead and a butt. So if a batch was put together from more than one cask (as you would expect) it might be the marriage of a bourbon hogshead and part of a sherry butt. This is all speculation, of course—but in the absence of detail from the bottlers it’s all I’ve got. My sample came to me from the redoubtable Michael Kravitz of Diving for Pearls (see here for his review). Continue reading
Port Charlotte PC9, “An Ataireachd Ard”
Let’s stay on Islay and continue with the distilleries I didn’t cover in December. After Monday’s Kilchoman detour here is a stop at Bruichladdich. This was the fifth limited release of the peated Port Charlotte distillate en route to the eventual regular release of the 10 yo. I’ve previously reviewed the PC6, PC7 and PC8: here now is PC9. This is from the 2002 vintage, bottled in 2011 at the age of 9. The series was supposed to end with PC8 but they decided to keep going with more limited releases (this is bottle 1086 of just 6000; compare to the 30,000 of PC8). Well, they did say at the time of the release that this was going to be the last limited release before the “full-scale bottling” in 2012 but as it happens there was a PC10 (I have an unopened bottle). And then the PC11 and a PC12 were also released later. Both of the latter were travel retail releases and I do not have bottles of those. I assume the series ended there. By the way, the info sheet for PC9 only mentioned American oak but the official tasting notes refer to Spanish sherry casks. As it was not touted as a sherry-matured release, I think we can assume it was a vatting of ex-bourbon and ex-sherry casks (most sherry casks are also made of American oak). Let’s see what it’s like. Continue reading
Port Charlotte 13, 2001 (Rest & Be Thankful)
As long-time readers of the blog—the few, the ashamed—know, I almost always pick up a strong butyric note on Bruichladdich’s whiskies. Ranging from scalded milk to sour butter to parmesan rind all the way to more vomitous associations, this quality is not my favourite. I find it more pronounced, ususally, in the unpeated Bruichladdich line. In the heavily peated Port Charlotte the peat and smoke tend to neutralize it after a while. In the case of this release, a 13 yo bottled by an indie outfit named Rest & Be Thankful, there is also a wine cask involved. This is rarely good news when you’re dealing with Bruichladdich who’ve made a lot of wineskys. I had not heard of Jurançon wine before looking this cask up. Jurançon is a French AOC that produces white wines, dry and sweet, apparently known for their tropical fruity character. I’ve no idea which kind of Jurançon wine this cask had previously held but a) I’m glad this is not from a red wine cask and b) I’m intrigued by the theoretical promise of fruit. Let’s see how it goes in practice. Continue reading
Port Charlotte 17, 2001 (Maltbarn)
Four reviews in a week—what is this? a spirits blog?
Here’s an indie Port Charlotte (the heavily peated whisky produced at Bruichladdich (but not as heavily peated as Octomore)). This is the oldest Port Charlotte I’ve reviewed and probably the oldest I’ve had. It was distilled in 2001, which may have been the year Port Charlotte started being distilled (please let me know derisively in the comments below if that’s wrong). I have reviewed another 2001 Port Charlotte; that was an 11 yo bottled by the German outfit, Malts of Scotland. I quite liked that one. This one is also bottled by a German outfit, in this case, Maltbarn; it was apparently their 105th selection—I had no idea they’d bottled that many; I think my first Maltbarn reviews were of some of their earliest releases (indeed, my first Maltbarn review was of their 8th release, an older Glenrothes). How the kids have grown up and so on. Continue reading
Port Charlotte 10, 2018 Release
I have not really been keeping track of what has been going on with Bruichladdich’s official releases in recent years, and that extends to their heavily peated line, Port Charlotte. The regular Port Charlotte 10 yo—as opposed to the various annual releases in the PC5-11 line that led up to it—was first released in 2012 or 2013 but its status after that was not very clear. I don’t think it ever became a regular part of the range. I reviewed a bottle from that early release—back then they came in the same clear bottles as the then-new Bruichladdich 10 did—and thought it was solid but nothing special. Since then my Port Charlotte exposure has been limited to the PC releases and the occasional independent release (see, for example, the excellent Pl1 from the Whisky’s Exchange’s Elements of Islay line, a heavily sherried iteration). But a new version of the Port Charlotte 10, in new Octomore-dark livery, showed up last year and was positively reviewed by people I trust. That put it back on my radar and when I saw a bottle at a reasonable price in a local store I picked it up. I opened it for one of my local group’s tastings and it was received very well. At the time I thought there was way too much of the butyric note on the nose that I find in almost all modern Bruichladdich, but I did like it. Curious to see what it’s like now with more air in the bottle. Continue reading
Port Charlotte Pl1 (Elements of Islay)
The malts bottled by the Whisky Exchange in their Elements of Islay line have been of a uniformly high quality—at least, all the ones I have had have been very good. I remember the very first Lagavulin, Ardbeg, Laphroaig and Caol Ila in the series were particularly good (I reviewed those in the early months of the blog: Ar1, Lg1, Lp1, CI1). They were also quite reasonably priced. Since then, as with the whisky market in general, the prices of these releases has risen sharply, making it harder to justify the value of what is after all NAS whisky. Don’t get me wrong, I still buy these when I get the opportunity—now that TWE no longer ships to Minnesota, that opportunity is when I am in the UK—but I am conscious of the fact that I am inclined to cut the Whisky Exchange some slack for their NAS releases that I do not extend to big whisky companies. Anyway, here is my review of the first Port Charlotte released in this series. Unlike the 1s linked above, this was bottled from a sherry cask. It was released in 2012 and I have no idea why I waited six years to open it. I’ve not had any of the others in the series; the Pl2 was from rum casks and the next two from wine casks, and I passed. I see that the Pl5, released this year, is from a bourbon hogshead. I’ll keep an eye out for that one. Anyway, let’s see what this is like. Continue reading
Port Charlotte 2007 CC: 01
I said I was going to post my write-up of a visit and tour of Tomatin today but I have roughly 37,573 photographs from the day and when I sat down today to make a selection, resize and upload it was all too much. Accordingly, I have punted that to next week and I have another whisky review today. If you are disappointed you can always ask for your money back. Since this was going to have been an all Islay week (with Monday’s Laphroaig, Wednesday’s Bowmore and yesterday’s Kilchoman), I decided to at least be consistent with that. Here, therefore, is a review of a Port Charlotte (Bruichladdich’s peated malt, if you don’t follow this stuff closely). The distillery is, of course, known for a wide range of wine cask finishes, but the fact that they produced this from eau de vie casks (or is it a single cask?) surprised even me. I fear that my jokes from past years that the brain trust at Bruichladdich would eventually release Jägermeister and then septic tank finishes may soon come true. Continue reading
Port Charlotte PC7
After a very timely review on Friday (the new Laphroaig Cairdeas) let’s go back to another late 2000s release. This is also from Islay but was released a year after last Monday’s Caol Ila. It’s also a fair bit younger: 7 years old, to be exact. It was the third release in Bruichladdich’s limited edition run towards what became the regular Port Charlotte 10. I’ve not had the PC5; I’ve reviewed the PC6 (good, but nothing special, I thought) and the PC8 (which I really liked). I have unopened bottles of the PC9 and PC10 on the shelf—I’m not sure where the series stands now.
I opened this bottle for my local group’s August tasting. It was a big hit there, garnering some big scores from a few people. I quite liked it too and have been looking forward to sitting down and taking some formal notes. Here they are. Continue reading
Bruichladdich, Barely (Summer 2017)
Here is my penultimate distillery visit report from our recent visit to Islay. I’ve already gone over my longer visits to Lagavulin, Laphroaig and Bowmore (where I did tours) and to Ardbeg (where we ate lunch) and short stops at Bunnahabhain and Caol Ila. Here now is a brief look at Bruichladdich. We stopped here a little after my tour at Bowmore. We were on our way to Portnahaven, trying to figure out where to have lunch, and stopped at Bruichladdich to see if they might have a cafe (for some reason I’d thought they might). They do not, but I took the opportunity to take a quick look around and take a bunch of photographs. Continue reading
Port Charlotte 11, 2001 (Malts of Scotland)
I believe this is the oldest Port Charlotte I’ve yet tried—it was bottled in 2013, just short of its 12th birthday. I’ve liked most of the Port Charlottes I’ve had a fair bit (the PC 8 most of all), with the heavy peat masking more or less effectively—as it does in Octomore as well—the sour milk note I usually get from current era-Bruichladdich’s distillate. This one, a single cask from the German bottler, Malts of Scotland, is a sherry cask to boot, and a sherry hogshead at that. It will be interesting to see how the combination of sherry, heavy peat and a bit of age work with this spirit.
The age also makes me wonder what Bruichladdich’s plans for the Port Charlotte line are. The Port Charlotte 10 was released a couple of years ago: are they going to be releasing and older version of that as well? And is the cask strength PC series going to keep going?
Bruichladdich, The Laddie 10
The Laddie 10, first released a few years ago, caused great excitement on arrival as it marked the coming of age of the reopened and rejuvenated Bruichladdich under the Reynier-McEwan regime. There had been limited edition releases of their peated Port Charlotte and Octomore lines along the way but this was the first release of whisky aged to a more traditional 10 years of age and was meant to be the cornerstone of what would become their new core range. This was a secondary cause of celebration for many whisky geeks as it also marked the end of a decade of tomfoolery at Bruichladdich, when to keep the cash-flow going they’d released about 30,000 different “high concept” releases, almost all of which were dodgy old stock jazzed up in wine casks or brightly coloured tins. (Some of these were actually very good, by the way: the Infinity 3, for example.)
Since then, of course, the distillery has been purchased by Remy-Cointreau, Mark Reynier has been forced out and the status of the Laddie 10 has been up in the air: not easy to find in all markets and constant rumours and denials that it’s been discontinued. Continue reading
Bruichladdich, “The Laddie Twenty Two”
The Laddie Twenty Two appeared in 2012 alongside the Laddie Sixteen, and following the Laddie Ten, and together the series promised a departure from the wild profusion of Bruichladdich’s releases over the previous decade. Unlike the Laddie 10, which was entirely the spirit distilled and matured by Jim McEwan and co. after the distillery was purchased by Mark Reynier and co., this 22 yo is from stock remaining from the previous owners. Given the generally dodgy nature of much of this inherited stock—some hold that the endless finishes and experiments Reynier, McEwan and co. threw out were due to the need to find a way to make it palatable— it must be put together from some of the very best casks they had. Of course, since its release the distillery has been sold again and Mark Reynier has been pushed out, and the fate of the Laddie Ten is not clear either—and I’m not sure if this 22 yo is a going concern either.
I do know that it’s unpeated (as in the classic Bruichladdich style), entirely from American oak casks (and ex-bourbon at that, I think), that it’s quite expensive and that it was also very well received. Now to see what I think of it—the previous oldest Bruichladdich I’ve had (one of those dodgy cask experiments) was really not to my taste.
Octomore 5.1
Another highly peated whisky from Bruichladdich this week, this time the far more ludicrously peated Octomore 5.1. I believe at 169 ppm this is the most heavily peated of the Octomores yet. Of course, as Jordan Devereaux and other people with actual knowledge of chemistry have pointed out, the ppm rating of barley before distillation is always a more spectacular number than the ppm rating of the matured whisky, and still shape and size can also have tremendous influence on how much of the phenols make into the distillate (Bruichladdich has very tall stills).
Anyway, I don’t mean to give the impression that I know very much about these things. I do know, however, that despite these eye-popping ppm numbers the Octomores have not been particularly outlandishly smoky in the glass and that I’m increasingly sceptical about the point of this series (see my comments in my review of the 6.1; I’ve also reviewed the 2.1, the 4.2 and the Octomore 10.)
Let’s see what this one is like. Continue reading
Port Charlotte PC8
Here is the fourth release in Bruichladdich’s cask strength series of releases of their heavily peated Port Charlotte whisky, the PC8, “Ar Duthchas”. (The barley for the Port Charlotte line is peated to 40 ppm, putting it in the Lagavulin and Laphroaig range.) It was released in 2009 and represents the last release in the PC series of spirit from the original 2001 distillation, making it 8 years old. That is to say, PC 9 is not a nine year old—I’m not sure what year the spirit used in that and subsequent releases is from.
The series is now up to PC11—I’m not sure if there’s an endgame for the series or if there’s always going to be an ever-older annual cask strength PC release. At any rate, with unopened bottles of the PC7, 9 and 10 on my shelf I’m not in any danger of catching up to them. I’ve previously reviewed (and emptied) the PC6 and I was not a huge fan of that one. This PC8, however, I thoroughly enjoyed and am looking forward to tasting it again.
The bottle is long gone and so this review is from a 6 oz reference sample saved from when the bottle was in its prime. Continue reading
Bruichladdich “The Organic”
This review is being published simultaneously with Michael Kravitz’s at Diving for Pearls. Michael was the source of the sample. As always, we have not discussed our notes or score ahead of publishing the reviews. Once I’ve woken up and had a cup of tea I’ll post the link to his review here. (And here it is.)
I’m not quite sure where “The Organic” falls in Bruichladdich’s welter of experimental and one-off releases. As per the sample label this was bottled in early 2013–as to whether this is one of the last gasps of the experimental Reynier era at the distillery or if it reflects directions in ongoing production, I don’t know. If you do, please chime in below. And for a proper appreciation of Bruichladdich’s marketing department’s efforts with this whisky, please read this (the blog appears defunct, which is a shame). Continue reading
Port Charlotte 10
Bruichladdich’s new 10 yo came online a couple of years ago–the first release of 10 yo spirit distilled and matured by Mark Reynier’s team after they purchased and re-opened Bruichladdich (Reynier himself, alas, has since been pushed out with the purchase of the distillery by Remy-Cointreau). The status of that 10 yo is under a bit of a cloud at present with low availability and not much clear information about its status. I am not too worried about this as I was not quite as excited about my bottle of that whisky as a lot of people were about theirs– but that’s neither here nor there. A year after the new (unpeated) Laddie 10 appeared this 10 yo from their peated Port Charlotte line also showed up, right on schedule.
Unlike the PC5-11 (I think we’re at 11) limited releases this is not at cask strength, and not, as far as I know, the product of any exotic double maturation or vattings. It’s also a fair sight cheaper, retailing in the $50 neighbourhood in the US, which is cool to see: given the prices the experimental PC series goes for it is good to see the distillery keeping faith with customers and not charging a premium for their regular release. (For a very differently priced 10 yo from the distillery see the Octomore 10). Continue reading
Octomore 6.1
This edition of the very highly peated Octomore line from Bruichladdich tops out at a peating level of 167 ppm–though, as always, this is a number measured before distillation and the peat levels in the spirit that makes it into the bottle are not anywhere close to that level or even proportionately higher than malts made from barley with a lower peat ppm count before distillation. At any rate, I enjoyed my bottles of both the 2.1 and the 4.2 (Comus) and didn’t find those to be insanely peated in the glass. Ditto for the 3.1, which I got a taste of at a gathering in March (though I didn’t like it quite as much as the 2.1 or 4.2). Let’s see what the story is with the 6.1 which is also distinguished in that it’s made from Scottish barley.
Octomore 6.1 (57%; from a purchased sample)
Nose: Peat, slightly rubbery and quite sweet. Gets very phenolic very fast and also rather briny–both salty sea air and olive brine. Some oily, almondy notes below all that and some vanilla and cream that begins to come to the fore. With more time and air there’s lemon as well, salty and ashy. With even more time there’s a butyric note. I wonder if water will expand or banish it. Okay, good: water does push it down and brings out more of the salted lemons. Continue reading
My Annoying Opinions 