Origin: Speyside (Scotland)
Type: Single Malt Scotch Whisky
Strength: 40%ABV
Ageing casks: Ex-Bourbon and Ex-Port
Chillfiltered: Yes
Added coloring: Yes
Owner: William Grant & Sons
Average price: € 300.00
Official website: www.thebalvenie.com
First released in 1996, it has undergone several restylings over the years until 2015, when it received its current label.
Initially matured in ex-bourbon casks, followed by an unspecified (but probably brief) aging in ex-port pipes, in the past it came in different versions depending on the market in terms of alcohol content, between 47.6% (which I tried here) and 43%ABV, while the one I’m tasting is the version with the minimum alcohol content currently on the market.
Tasting Notes
And it is immediately crème fraîche on the nose, a tart creaminess that caresses and titillates the nostrils, anticipating a series of pastries (fruit tart, Chantilly cream, butter cookies), fresh and candied fruit (peach, apricot, pineapple, orange), acacia honey, white chocolate. Bounty bar idea. Intense and soft, with an acid touch that tempers its sweetness. On the lenght, a mineral and sulphurous note emerges from the background. Full bodied.
On the palate, it doesn’t find the same dimension promised by the nose, falling completely into the trap of reduced strength, which dilutes the substance of the distillate and extinguishes its fervor. The spices (black pepper, cinnamon, aniseed) are in the foreground, along with the wood tannins, the aromas shift to nuts (walnuts, almonds, pine nuts), with little room for fruit (peach and apricot with green apple, pineapple and a hint of white currant) and plenty for balsamic and mineral notes. Isolated notes of brioche bread, green tea, wood.
Quite long, tannic finish of nuts, vegetable and mineral notes, apple, propolis, butter cookies.
Another victim on the altar of minimum alcohol content, with the expectations created by a stellar nose gone crashing down on a flat and inconsistent drink, far from the greatness of which the distillery is capable. And when I reread my impressions of the higher-strength version, I feel like crying…
Vote: 81/100