April 2024 Tasting Pack
Distillery: Glen Garioch.
Region: Oldmeldrum, Inverurie, Scotland, UK.
ABV: 54.9%.
Age: 12 Years.
Cask type: White Port Finish (since August 2020).
Price: £55 (~£5 for 2cl in the sample pack).
Color: 1.1 Burnished. Natural Color. No chill filtration.
Tasting Notes
Tasted neat in a Glencairn with 15+ minutes of rest. These tasting notes are only my first impressions leading to my purchasing decisions.
Nose: A green and floral nose with honeysuckle, morning dew, and clean white linens. Tart fruits of green strawberries, orange zest, and cranberries. It’s like a cranberry-orange cobbler with those rough bits of pie dough sprinkled on top. Lambic funkiness almost like a shrub or drinking vinegar. Lastly, some whisps of tropical sea air and overripe bananas.
Palate: An odd mix of lactic sweetness and metallic, industrial-leaning flavors. Toasted marshmallows, white table grapes, and lemon poppyseed muffins washed down with a glass of skim milk. My subsequent sip was anything but this wonderful mix of milk sugars and pastry treats. Pinewood shavings, machine oil, tin, and silver.
Finish: Green apple and acidic white wine. The dram starts to move into the savory side of things with white pepper and mushroom risotto. It’s woodsy and floral with herbal tea and aromatic cedar notes. Lastly, the metals come back at the sides of your palate like drinking from a stainless steel flask.
Overall
I can firmly put this whisky in the weirdly good, “need to try more” category. It’s an oddball mix of flavors and I loved every second of this small sample. A whiskey that deserves more time to explore and develop in the glass.
Pass or Buy?: Buy.
