This is a somewhat useless review even by my standards as it is not only of a bottle released in 2004 but also from an unidentified cask (but at least it’s a beautiful sample bottle picture). Yes, when I got this sample in a swap I failed to ask for cask information and failed to follow up later. Whiskybase lists three Old Malt Cask releases of single casks of Laphroaig 17, 1987 and since all OMC bottles are released at 50%, the abv is of no help either. “Why don’t you just ask the person you got it from?”, I hear you ask. It’s a good question but the problem is this was a UK member of the WWW forum who has since given up whisky and drifted away from the whisky parts of the net. Also, this was three years ago, so even if I were to intrude on him out of the blue I highly doubt he’d remember. I’m writing it up anyway because I haven’t had too many 1980s Laphroaigs and in any case I don’t really worry too much about the utility of my tasting notes: if you like Laphroaig you may find it of interest anyway. Continue reading
Category Archives: Laphroaig
Laphroaig 10 (Bottled in 2000)
I think I had my first pour of Laphroaig 10 in 2005. Until now I’ve not had any iterations of this classic malt distilled/bottled in earlier eras. The whisky in this sample, which I received in trade from Sku, was bottled in 2000, so it’s not so very much older than the earliest I’ve had but it will still be interesting to compare it with very recently bottled Laphroaig 10. Everyone says Laphroaig’s character has changed in just the last 10 years or so (and for most people this is a narrative of decline)—it’ll be interesting to see if I find it to be very different, and if so, in what ways. Accordingly, I am nosing and tasting it alongside an equivalent pour from my previously reviewed bottle of Laphroaig 10, which was probably bottled in the last couple of years (I’ve still not found time to hunt for and squint at its bottling code).
To make things easier I’ve pasted in the notes from the previous review in brackets above each section of this one (I didn’t bother taking fresh notes on the other bottle this time as it doesn’t seem appreciably altered since my review).
Laphroaig 14, 2000 (Old Malt Cask)
I purchased this Laphroaig in knee-jerk mode. Laphroaig is my favourite distillery; sherried Laphroaigs are thin on the ground; the marriage of peat and sherry is great when it works out; almost every sherried Laphroaig I’ve had has been very good. So this seemed like as sure a bet as I was ever going to make.
I opened this bottle for one of local group’s tastings earlier in the fall and it did not do so well. One person did like it a lot but almost everyone else had it as their bottom whisky of the night (we drink an ounce each of four whiskies at each tasting and everyone other than me drinks blind). It wasn’t my bottom whisky but I didn’t give it a high score either. The problem? Sulphur. Now, it’s been my experience that sulphur can sometimes dissipate and so I let the bottle sit for a long time before coming back to taste it again. I could tell that there was a very nice whisky under there somewhere and I hoped time and air would pull it out. Did it happen? I’m sorry to kill the suspense, but no, it did not. There was some improvement but it remained a sulphured mess.
Laphroaig 13, 1998 (Van Wees)
Van Wees seem to have released a number of sherried Laphroaigs from 1998, all drawn from casks with fairly proximate numbers. I’ve previously finished a bottle from cask 700348, but that was before the blog. My spreadsheet shows that I went through it at a very rapid rate. I recorded 85 points but didn’t keep notes on it, unfortunately (one of the reasons why I originally started this blog was to make sure I had an easily searchable database of my own notes); but I do remember it being a fairly raw beast (like this one it had a very high abv). Sherried Laphroaigs, especially at cask strength, are no longer easy to find and their prices have gone up. It’s hard to imagine very many more showing up from budget bottlers like van Wees.
Anyway, let’s get to it. Continue reading
Laphroaig Cairdeas 2014, Amontillado
Here is Laphroaig’s Cairdeas release for 2014. Last year’s release was double matured in bourbon and port casks, and this year’s release is double matured in bourbon and amontillado sherry casks. Laphroaig did not send this whisky to space, and nor is it being sold for $150 or more in most American markets. As a result, perhaps, there’s no disproportionate fuss being made about it. I’m not sure how old this is or what relationship it has to their Quarter Cask or regular 10 yo releases but given the rarity of official sherry matured Laphroaig and the high premiums the independents have begun to charge for their releases of sherried Laphroaig, there was no way in hell I was going to think twice about paying just about $60 for this bottle.
Now, let’s see what it’s like. Continue reading
Laphroaig Quarter Cask
Yesterday, the Laphroaig 10, today its younger sibling, the Laphroaig Quarter Cask. My understanding, probably wrong, is that this is the regular spirit that would normally be destined to reach 10 years of age for the 10 yo release being re-racked at a younger age into smaller quarter casks which impart far greater wood contact and influence to it (claimed by some to “speed up” the maturation process). How much younger this is than 10 years old, I’m not sure. I’ve seen references to at least the original release (from 2004, I think) comprising five year old spirit that was re-racked for less than a year, and I think I’ve also seen references to it being a little older—the official website does not mention any ages for it. At any rate, it’s one I’ve liked a lot in the past, but I haven’t tasted it for a couple of years now and so I’m interested to see if I still like it as much.
This bottle was split with friends and had, I think, been open for at least a few months before I took my share (it’s another of the bottles left behind by a friend who left the country.) I’m pretty sure the bottle code was for 2011 or 2012—I looked when I took my share, but that was more than a month ago now and I forgot to write it down. Continue reading
Laphroaig 10
Laphroaig is my favourite distillery and in some ways the entry-level Laphroaig 10 may be my favourite real world whisky. By this I don’t mean this is the whisky I rate more highly than any other; I mean that it presents most of what I like about Laphroaig at a price that would allow me to drink it everyday if I were so constrained, and that I would not be unhappy drinking it every day—it rewards attention and it’s very pleasurable even when you’re doing other things that require more of your attention; it’s direct but it isn’t dumbed down. There may be a different whisky that fits this bill for you but this is mine*.
The only problem with it is that when I have a bottle open I go through it alarmingly fast. I took this photograph of the closed bottle a few days ago and I’m almost approaching the halfway mark already. For that reason I haven’t opened a bottle for a while now, which is why I’ve failed to review it for the blog until now. Continue reading
Laphroaig 15
Here is my review of the Laphroaig 15, beloved of many, which was phased out a few years ago in favour of the newly introduced 18 yo. Imagine that, a time when an iconic distillery replaced a 15 yo core expression with an 18 yo. Imagine if you will, as well, a store in Minneapolis that sold this Laphroaig 15 for less than $40 more than a year after it was discontinued. And imagine, finally, an idiot who did not buy a couple of cases of it at this price to put away for his dotage. Well, I do have two bottles left–and frankly, I like the 18 even more and so don’t really mourn the passing of the 15.
Laphroaig 15 (43%; from a reference sample saved from my own bottle)
Nose: Phenolic, medicinal but not overwhelmingly smoky. Quite salty too and after a bit there’s some sweeter notes of kelp as well. Air brings out a little bit of vanilla as well. With even more time there’s a savoury/meaty note and some lime (which eventually comes to the fore). Water pulls out more vanilla but also more ashy smoke. Continue reading
Laphroaig 13, 1998 (Archives)
It’s been too long since I last reviewed a Laphroaig. And considering the last one was from port casks it’s time to get back to bourbon cask basics. This was bottled by Menno and CJ of Whiskybase for their Archives label. It’s the first of two 1998 Laphroaigs they’ve put out (I have a bottle of the other but who knows when it will be opened). This is claimed to be 13 1/2 years old, but let’s not upset the Scotch Whisky Association.
Laphroaig 13, 1998 (54.2%; Archives, bourbon hogshead #700228; from a purchased sample)
I don’t actually remember purchasing this sample. Those of you who’ve purchased from Whiskybase know that they always kindly include a few 20 ml samples. But as I have two of these, and as I’ve been purchasing samples in pairs (so as to have more to taste) I think these must have been purchased too. Continue reading
Laphroaig Cairdeas 2013, Port Wood
The 2013 edition of the Laphroaig Cairdeas was double matured in bourbon and port casks and was met with the usual gnashing of teeth by the usual suspects who decry single malt whisky going near any sort of wine cask (never mind that the most traditional of all casks used to mature single malt whisky previously held wine too: sherry). Well, I guess I’ve said rude things about the Glenmorangie Artein and the Bruichladdich Black Art as well, but that’s because I don’t think those whiskies quite work. I don’t rule out the possibility that port/marsala/madeira/etc. cask matured whisky can be very good, and as it happens I think this Cairdeas is very good. At least so I and all the others (including a couple of people who’re not big fans of peated whisky) thought at our local group’s October tasting where I opened this bottle. It’s now past the halfway mark—let’s see how it holds up. Continue reading
Laphroaig 10 CS, Batch 004
On the heels of my review of Batch 003 of the Laphroaig 10 CS, here’s Batch 004, bottled in January 2012. I believe this version at 58.6% may only have been released in the US, with a 58.3% version released in Europe. Whether the abv dropped between bottling runs or if the US is receiving a separate set of batches, I don’t know (though it appears that way–Batch 002 here has a different bottling month listed on the label than the EU Batch 002). Also, I think I’d read somewhere that the latest batch (005) was only going to be released in the US but Whiskybase shows a 700 ml Batch 005 that’s been rated by a bunch of Europeans. Can anyone clear all these Laphroaig mysteries up so we can all get some sleep?
Laphroaig 10 CS, Batch 003
Laphroaig is my favourite distillery, as I have noted before, and it is unlikely that I will stop buying and drinking various indie single casks even though I know they’re often operating in a very narrow band of variations. However, if the only cask strength Laphroaig available were the official 10 CS I’d still be happy. It’s a quintessential expression of all the extreme qualities associated with Laphroaig, yes, but it also conveys the mellower pleasures that usually lurk beneath. Until a few years ago there was just one official 10 yo cs, released year after year, usually at 55.7% abv. Then for arcane reasons having to do with the Scotch Whisky Association they began to be released in batches. This has, I imagine, been a boon for the distillery as idiots like me now want to try every single batch even though we’d probably not be able to tell them apart in blind tests.
Nonetheless, here is a review of Batch 003, released in the US in January 2011. A review of Batch 004 will follow tomorrow.
Continue reading
Laphroaig 7, 2000 (Signatory)
Another sherried Laphroaig, half the age of the Whisky Fair bottling I reviewed two days ago. No need for any further preamble here either, except to note that this was my first ever sherried Laphroaig, and I’m not sure if at the time I even knew that most of the official Laphroaigs had no sherry aged malt in them (this was well before the Triple Wood and the PX were released).
I got it at Blue Max Liquors in Burnsville, a store in an unprepossessing mall in an unprepossessing suburb of Minneapolis, which has a killer beer and single malt selection. Thankfully, they have no online store and so we don’t have to compete with whisky geeks outside driving range for their inventory; less thankfully, their prices for whisky aren’t very good.
Continue reading
Laphroaig 14, 1998 (Whisky Fair)
I have nothing new to say about Laphroaig, so let’s get right to my notes for this 2013 bottling for the Limburg Whisky Fair.
Laphroaig 14, 1998 (53.9%; The Whisky Fair, sherry cask; from a purchased sample)
Nose: The phenols come wafting over the lip of the glass before I’ve even finished pouring: cereally, minerally (wet stones), carbolic; not smoky as much as pungently peaty. With a bit of air the peat gets quite sweet and there’s some wet coal smoke too. This must have been a refill sherry cask; at least there’s no obvious sherry influence on the nose. Gets increasingly ashy with time. With more time, gets quite briny. With a few drops of water the coal smoke wakes back up and gets a little acidic. Then there’s some citrus–somewhere between lime and tangerine peel.
Laphroaig 25, 2009 Release
Laphroaig, as I have noted, is my very favourite distillery and I’d long wanted to be able to try one of their older expressions. As I don’t believe in paying close to $100 in a bar for not very much whisky, and as there is no way that my love of Laphroaig could lead to my shelling out $500 for a bottle (which is what the going rate for Laphroaig 25s is in most parts of the US), I’d resigned myself to not ever tasting, let alone owning a bottle of Laphroaig 25. But then a fellow member of a whisky forum alerted me to a startling low price being asked for it by the state run Pennsylvania Liquor Board. As good friends of mine live within walking distance of one of the state owned stores I was able to purchase it as a splurge to celebrate the birth of our second child, and eventually it made its way to me.
Continue reading
Laphroaig, Lp1 (Speciality Drinks)
After last night’s not very heavily peated Hakushu Heavily Peated let’s try a whisky that is very unambiguously heavily peated: Lp1, the first Laphroaig release in the Whisky Exchange’s Elements of Islay series. I have noted before my love of young bourbon cask Laphroaig and so I will not repeat myself here.
However: in a comment on my review of the Lg2 in that series, Billy Abbott of TWE noted cryptically that it may be an error to think of the whiskies in this series as young on account of there being no age stated on the labels (an assumption that is otherwise a safe one to make in today’s Scotch industry). Well, my memories of this one are that it is pretty youthfully aggressive. Let’s see what I make of it tonight:
Continue reading
Laphroaig 11, 1999 (The Nectar)
This is a rather well-received Laphroaig from the Belgian bottler, The Nectar. I was lucky enough to score a bottle of this (and also the Whisky Agency 1990, 20 yo) right before the prices of Laphroaig from the boutiquey indies went through the roof. I am a sucker for the marriage of peat and sherry when it works well, and I am an even bigger sucker for Laphroaig. And I am pleased to report this bottle did not disappoint. I opened it right away in late 2010 and have slowly, jealously been drinking it down (and I can report that it did not degrade noticeably in that time). When it recently got past the halfway mark, I poured off a 6 oz reference sample for future comparisons and sped up my rate of consumption. Tonight I bade farewell to the bottle and decided to finally record some notes.
Continue reading