It’s weekend, so let’s take a break from writing about our Islay trip and post a picture that’s been lying on the shelf for a while now.
It’s the Craigellachie 8yo, finished on a red wine barrel, bottled by Douglas of Drumlanrig. We love Craigellachie and we love indie bottlers. Those two make a great combination. Be sure to also check out Sherwood’s 9yo Craigellachie bottling, which we’ll review soon.
This particular whisky is quite untamed. It has some nice rough edges and it doesn’t need to be polished. It’s what makes this a great dram.
Pinkish yellow
On the nose, its incredibly sweet, with a great smell of grapes, it reminds me of tawny port
The palate is sweet, sour and meaty at the same time, raw and complex, very punchy, fruity and woody, it has a nice taste of lightly salted cooked ham.
The finish is long and magnificently sweet, with fresh spicy oak, Christmas cake and red wine. It gets drier and drier until you’ll end up with raisins.
The flavours are bouncing around in your mouth, the unpolished character suits this whisky very well. But we have to be fair, it is a little difficult sometimes to taste everything that wel. Our scores for this whisky are fluctuating between 84 and 90. We discovered that it’s best when savored after a nice peated malt. Very interesting, what’s your ‘have-to-find-the-right-moment-whisky’?