Origin: Isle of Islay (Scotland)
Type: Single Cask Single Malt Scotch Whisky
Gradation: 52.4%ABV
Ageing cask: Ex-bourbon Hogshead
Chillfiltered: No
Additional coloring: No
Owner: Valinch & Mallet Ltd.
Average price: € 79.00
Official website: www.valinchandmallet.com
Vote: 85/100
I finish my “race” along the latest releases of Valinch & Mallet with a bottling part of the Private Cask Selection series, a young Caol Ila distilled in 2009 and bottled in 2020 in 306 bottles.
As always when it concernsthe two Italian bottlers, their bottles represent excellence, a guarantee of passion and quality in every single barrel chosen, so much so that they deserve a blind purchase, regardless of the impressions you can read on this or other blogs around the net.
Take a bottle until you can find it around, and you won’t regret it.
Tasting notes
Straw yellow in the glass.
Acrid and marine peat that emerges on the nose, blunted by fruity shades (apple, pineapple, pineapple, green melon), orange zest, pecans, honey, lemon drop. Wood spices and toasted malt. Overall it’s a gentle nose, with balsamic veins that lighten its reach.
Sparkling and fresh on the palate, with a rich lash of pepper on sea waves with accentuated notes of citrus (orange and cedar), yellow fruit, honey, rhubarb and a bottom of lit embers. Spices and balsamic impressions dot the drinking, especially in length.
Medium long and ashy finish of citrus fruits, spices, salt, malt.
A calm, solid and structured whisky that plays on the tones of a peat that is not aggressive but very evident, in a mix of marine and balsamic aspects very intriguing.