Deanston Virgin Oak

This was our first experience with Deanston. There was a moment of panic when I realized there are 2 versions of this, a 700ml and a 750ml, which are otherwise the same, including price. The 750ml had been purchased and the panic eased. At $49.99 this is pretty reasonably priced, but still, I'd prefer to have the extra 50ml.

This Deanston scotch is un-chilled filtered and has nothing added (such as caramel colour). It comes in at 46.3%. Without an age statement, this scotch accepts its youth, but has balanced it out by finishing in some freshly charred virgin oak casks.

The nose begins with charred oak (maybe a little hint of some toasted barely) blending together with some rich fruit, possibly some overripe plums, hints of cherry and just the overall general sweetness of fruit. While underneath with some investigation lies chocolate, vanilla, orange zest, and honey. A subtle feeling of seaside air brushes in.

The oak burst on the palate and then instantly turns into candied textures, fudge and a smooth creaminess.

There's some oak on the finish as well that again draws away and then fades entirely. A hot spiciness flares up, that itself is replaced with a sugary barely and general sweet feel, possibly toffee.

A really interesting youthful single malt that's deliciously sweet. The ebb and flow of the flavours is also quite enjoyable and demands attention. Definitely going to purchase this again.

The Macallan Sienna - 1824 Series

We were fans of the Macallan brand of scotch. It was awesome. However, they've now opted to re-brand their whole line; gone are the age designations. Maybe you can get the other Macallans in other parts of the world, but here in Nova Scotia, we can only get this new line: the "1824 Series" of scotch. This new line, which mentions no years and are separated only by some made up names: Gold, Amber, Sienna, Ruby and Rare Cask.

Sienna is the 3rd most expensive, coming in at $199.99 for a 750ml bottle and 43% alcohol.

This scotch is pretty fine, but we're disappointed that it's not the old Macallan. So our opinion is sort of tainted by this disappointment. We want to say it's good, but its a step down from what it was.

The sienna is definitely rich and even with the first smell the flavours are strong and full. There's a beautiful smell of chocolate and strangely the leather scent does not disturb. Why would someone want to drink something that smells like leather? That's a good question, but sometimes there's that in scotch... Pine needles and overripe fruit are some other examples that aren't in this one, but would seem like a weird scent to mention in a good way. But with scotch it seems fine. Yeah, it's a liquid that has a bit of a leathery smell but that's just ok. These smells mix with the sweetness of plum and vanilla.

The palate bring out the oak and a nice creaminess. Vanilla again appears with orange and nice warm feel, sort of like the hotness of ginger, without being really ginger in taste.

The finish is sweet and smooth with a little fudge. The oak flavour continues well past any other.

Pretty expensive and doesn't hold up to what Macallan used to be. So even though its good, its not what it could be and could be so much better.

Strathisla 12 Year Old

Strathisla 12 Year Old was suggested to us by one of the liquor store employees. She seemed like she knew what she was talking about and was telling us about a bar in New Brunswick that was maybe the best scotch bar in Canada and said that the people there really "knew their shit." I like it when people in stores use profanity so I decided to trust her.

The key selling points on this scotch are that its a 12 year old and reasonably priced at $51.99. It's a standard 40% alcohol bottling. Strangely, however, this is a 700ml bottle, as opposed to your usual 750ml.

The nose is full of fruit flavours, including orange zest, cherry, and dried fruits. There a tiny hint of bananas and an apple boarding on pear (Asian pear) scent mixed with a prevalent sultana aroma. The sweetness continues with caramel or sweet candy background. The sweetness of the nose has quite a range. Maybe there's even some sugary barley in this. Topped off with a salty air feel that seems to be common among Speyside scotches.

The Palate is nice and spicy but creamy as well. Cinnamon mixed with oak and a sweet creamy maltiness (does that even make sense?). Some nougat and underlying pear and apple (more pear than apple) in the background.

The finish starts hot and spicy (more cinnamon) with more sultana and sherry notes. Then there is a slow rise of almond that comes out bold and strong and then blends with a delicious flowing creamy flavour.

Overall a good purchase.

Mortlach Rare Old

Mortlach Rare Old is a fancy looking scotch that comes in a very nice display box. It's listed at 43.4%. Mortlach Rare Old looks really good, and we've heard that's part of it's problem. Its interesting too that this doesn't have any list of year and "Rare Old" is actually the lower tiered one of their branding. It might be rare and old but everything else is maybe older and rarer... or at least more expensive. We've seen other comments about it only being 500ml rather than your standard 750ml, but the one we got in Canada, in its fancy box is 750ml. At $99.99 it sits as being expensive, but there are plenty of others that are more expensive.

The nose starts off with overripe apples mixed with sultana. But further in there's orange zest, ginger, and a little chocolate feel. Hints of sweetness and caramel.

The fruitiness continues on the palette, but combining into a dried fruit taste which intermixes with the sweetness of chocolate. We thought there might even be a very subtle taste of pineapple, but if there is, its sitting back there hidden behind everything else, with a bit of oak and orange zest blending it all out.

The finish bursts with  sweet cinnamon that intermixes with ginger notes. There's almonds and dried fruit with the sweetness coming through to make it almost candied fruit. Definitely very sweet and if you search further there may be some middle eastern spices and a heavy sweetness reminiscent slightly of baklava. In the end, the oak again makes an appearance, and begins to dominate the more you drink it.

Overall a very interesting scotch with lots of layers, but perhaps not worth the price, in that there are other less expensive ones that offer everything this one has and more. Maybe if you want to impress someone with this as a gift, you'll look extravagant and the taste won't disappoint.

Although enjoyable, we don't think this will be one we'll be buying again.

The Arran Malt 14 Year Old

The Arran 14 year old separates itself from other scotches with its slightly unusual ageing. Most scotches are 10 or 12 and then skip up to 18. This one sits at a 14 and so perhaps blends the younger scotches with the more expensive older scotches, without adding too much to the price.

This scotch comes at 46%. A definite plus.

The nose is quite complex. Fermented over ripe fruit mixed with musky grape, the fruitiness continues with a definite feel of sweet apples, pear and orange zest. There was a blend of flavours that we noticed at first to be chocolate, and then maybe chocolate ice cream and then maybe even Neapolitan ice cream. Definitely very interesting. You can linger over the nose for quite a long time. You can come back to the nose too, maybe there are some delicate hints of coffee, dates, caramelized toffee.

The palette brings out the toffee taste and adds a salty tang. To be honest, we weren't sure what that taste was, until we checked some other reviews about it. You know, during your day to day life you don't encounter a 'salty tang' often, even when you live by the ocean, but when you read 'salty tang' in a description of this and then actually taste it, yeah that's right, you can definitely taste the salty tang. Who would have known?

There's a chocolate taste that turns into an orange taste and then back to chocolate again. It's quite remarkable and delicious. The flow of great tastes continue with nuts and chocolate swirling about on your tongue.

The finish starts off with oak and then develops into chocolate, with some orange zest and a slight sweetness of raisins or dates. There's a slight hotness, with maybe a candied ginger feel.

I had this scotch a few days ago and found that the lingering taste of chocolate lasted hour and hours later. I could taste this scotch well into the night and it was so scrumptious. It got Arran on my mind, it made me think it of and how much I enjoyed it. This is probably my current favourite scotch. Highly recommended!

Would we purchase this again? Most definitely! In fact, I already plan to.

Bulleit Rye

Bulleit makes a Bourbon which we tasted recently and were quite impressed with. I've picked it up a few times and at one point said it was the best Bourbon I've ever had (I'm not a huge Bourbon drinker, so I haven't had too many).

But seeing a Rye by the same company did perk the interest.

This Rye is strong at 45% alcohol: a good sign.

The nose starts off with a floral vanilla scent, but underneath there are are lots of flavours mixing. A very suable hint of lavender and some caramelized brown sugar, maybe some fruits like cherry, possibly pineapple and peach. There's also just a touch of pine.

The palette mixes oak with dried fruits (raspberry or mixed berry, orange zest). It's creamy and pretty smooth with a development of cinnamon and dark chocolately oak (there's chocolate and there is oak and they seem to combine and intertwine). The orange zest comes out more as you drink more, but so does the chocolate.

Bulleit, you definitely didn't let us down.

Canadian Club Small Batch Classic 12

Let's review something shit.

Of course, there were no expectations of this. Even though it's labelled as something sort of special, apart from your normal Canadian club. This so called Small Batch Classic 12 is pretty damn boring. Smelled the cork and couldn't smell anything. There's maybe something in the nose, maybe watered down brown sugar, but it is not very exciting. Again, a bit of watered down sugary palette but little else. Nothing as far as finish.

If you don't like whisky, have no interest in whisky and all its beauty, but need to drink whisky for some reason, then this should be your go to pick.

It's bland and boring. But...hey... it's inexpensive! Drink enough of it and it'll fuck you up. That should be the only reason for drinking this.

Woodford Reserve

Time to digress from scotches and check out some American Bourbon. Woodford Reserve seems to be much beloved by people on the net and also by a mysterious unnamed manager at the local liquor store. Picked this one up today on just a whim from the 'manager selection.' I like that they never try to explain why the manager would or could or should recommend different picks. But to be honest, the manager has never let us down.

Woodford Reserve kicks in at 45.2%. There's a bit of a disagreement on how much water to add. Start with a little and if you like it, stick with it. Find it too strong... put some more in.

The first thing we noticed with the nose is the brown sugar; very strong and sweet, with a nice blend of vanilla and warm butterscotch. With further investigation there are hints of orange zest, clove, and maybe a possible sultana scent, but maybe that's just the alcohol speaking.

The palate has a dry oak taste with chocolate and amaretto blending into a nice coffee taste.

The finish continues the oak theme, with a strong almond feel. A very delicious bourbon indeed. Nice and sweet with chocolate, almonds and a plethora of other tastes to discover? Who wouldn't like it?

Old Pulteney 12 Year Old

So this is a new scotch for us. We've been coming across it in checking out other sites and other reviewers. It's mentioned as a damn fine scotch and good starter scotch for people. We've never heard of it, and it's only just recently been added to the liquor store here in Nova Scotia.

We're used to adding quite a lot of water to scotch lately to bring out the nose and flavours, but upon checking out another review of this, we did a second shot with less water. The second one was better, with only around a teaspoon of water. There was more bite from the alcohol, but the flavours were stronger and the experience was more enjoyable.

The nose was a little subtle maltiness with hints of almond, vanilla, toffee, and a sweet fruity something. With less water, there were more floral notes that seem to dominate the others. I hate to say sultana because I don't use the word and have only come across it from other scotch reviews. But I've tasted other scotches that had that sultana taste and there's that in the nose of this one too.

The big thing about the palate for us was the buttery toffee feel, like Werther's Originals. There was a touch of oak and general fruitiness. We've read and watched people list off a whole bunch of different specific fruits, but we didn't taste that. We experienced more of a general fruity flavour.

The finish continues with the sweet buttery toffee, the winter spice flavours added by the higher than normal alcohol (it's only 40% but we haven't watered it down much). And a crisp oaky feel that ends fairly quickly.

Penderyn Madeira Finish

This light coloured Welch whiskey comes in a cool box. But a box isn't going to be enough if the whiskey is crap. However, the Penderyn Madeira Finish is excellent so the box just adds to its cool. Clocking in at 46% it's nice and strong, but may require a little more water to get to the more delicious flavours.

The dominant scent in the nose is vanilla, with an underlying sweetness and fruitiness, more leaning towards slightly fermenting grapes, probably from the Madeira (fortified Portuguese wine) casks they were finished in. Lots of blending smells so it's interesting to linger on. Perhaps there's even a very subtle hint of coffee in there.

The palate brings out more sweet with maybe caramel or vanilla fudge. There's a dispute about there maybe being some oak or malt, maybe a cereal wheaty taste. It's very slight, whatever it is.

The finish is nice and medium. Slight malty and tingles of spiciness that may be due to the higher alcohol content. Kind of the nice slight burn of ginger with a little more vanilla fudge.

Te Bheag Nan Eiliean Bottling

Maybe I'm immature... no correction. I am immature. So I originally bought this because when you look at it quickly it looks like Tea Bag, and as an immature person this makes me think of the sexual activity of placing one's balls into someone else's mouth. But I digress a bit and this scotch is nothing like having someone's balls put into your mouth.

Anyway, apparently the proper pronunciation of this is "chey vek", which is fine to say but not as fun as saying, "Would you like me to Tea-Bag you?"

This Gaelic Whisky is advertised as a connoisseur scotch. What I think this means is that even though it's budget priced it contains some of the flavours and tastes you can only find in higher priced drams. The biggest thing about the nose is the predominance of peat. We're read about a scent of salty sea side air and maybe that's what that is, might not have picked that out without help, but now that it's been said, we can agree. There is also a hint of maple sweetness.

The palate has hints of coffee bean, with more more peat mixing with a subtle sweetness.

The finish is hot and the peat gives way to a taste of oak.

Overall a good way to mix up your scotch experience without spending too much money.

Singleton of Dufftown 12 Year Old

A darker more golden coloured 12 year old singe malt.  Not too strong with a 40% alcohol. The first impression of the nose was of apples, with a mixture of fruits and possibly pear. There was something else there, we were thinking vanilla, but it was pretty subtle and we couldn't pin it down. Carmel, toffee or brown sugar? A little sweetness anyway. Then there's a touch of oak that then comes alive in the palate, as a dry oak taste. Touches of general warm scotch spices. We don't like using terms so vague as spice, but maybe warm winter spices might be as close as we'll willing to go (like things you'll put in mulled wine, a subtle in-the-background ginger, cinnamon, allspice, anise, etc.).
The finish is nice and long, with the previous flavours of the palate and a tiny tinge of orange zest and pear.

Tomatin's Stillmen's Choice gift pack

This is a nice little teaser. Three Tomatin single malt's, a 12, 15 and 18 year old that come as three 50 ml airplane bottles.

First comes the Tomatin 12 year old. This one is a nice sweet scotch, with a nose of fruits. Not getting the fruit smell? Then add some more water and it really brings it out. They say there's a malty smell and maybe it is, maybe it's more like oak. I kind of feel Malt is a stronger Oak smell. The palette continues with the fruity tastes and perhaps some caramel. The package speaks of stewed apples and nuttiness. We found it more sweet fruits and caramel. Impressive and delicious. Hadn't tasted Tomatin before but I think the future will see more than just a sample in the mix. I'll need to directly compare this to Glenlivet. They are similar and I think Tomatin may win out as a superior scotch. But we'll have to wait and see.

The 15 year old is similar in taste, but with a few key differences. Gone is the malt/oak of the nose. I find the fruitiness stronger with a hint of the Vanilla they speak of.  The package speaks of fruit cake, which I guess I just view as more fruit, rather than any cakeness. The malty oak taste comes in on the palate with a gentle sweetness. The finish is nice and long. A very smooth experience. Probably better than the 12 year old, and since the two only differ in price (for a full bottle) about $20, maybe quite worth it, when you want to spend an extra $20 to get a better scotch.

The 18 year old is good. The fruit is stronger in the nose and more delicious, a slight hint of vanilla and the taste of a maple syrup in smell (which is weird because it smells like maple syrup would taste, not how maple syrup smells). Dry oak and a bit of sweet in the palette, but a nice building wave in the finish with the first gulp, the dry oak intensifies as the gentle hint of sweet settles in. Delicious for sure,

Glenfarclas 105 Cask Strength 60% Vol.

So I'm going to start off this blog with an unusual scotch: The Glenfarclas 105 Cask Strength. This was my first experience with Glenfarclas and I had high hopes. I had read a few reviews of other Glenfarclas scotches and I think I had a misconception of this one. At 60% alcohol this is very strong drink. It's overpowering, to be honest, and reviews I've read that have said it has a alcohol  nose, pallet and finish are true, if you don't mix enough water into it. I found with 1 shot to 1.5 shots of water allows all the flavour to come out. At this level you can really taste and smell the subtleties; the pear and apple nose, with a toffee undertone. Some oak and sweetness. The palate has a building smokiness. It's actually pretty impressive in its smoothness for such a high alcohol content.

At first I tried this scotch with not enough water and found it too intense. Once you mix it down, then you can experience all the underlying flavours while at the same time feeling the gradual overwhelming experience of the alcohol content.