Royal Lochnagar 1986 / 2009, The Carn Mor Vintage Collection
It’s *ahem* Royal Lohnagar and not plain Lochnagar like it was before 1848, because Queen Victoria visited Lochnagar distillery (located on a mountain named Lochnagar) near her Balmoral estate and was suitably impressed to bestow a Royal Warrant allowing the addition of the prefix ‘Royal’. This makes Royal Lochnagar one of three distilleries allowed to use ‘Royal’in its prefix or suffix. It is reported that the long lived Queen relied on a favourite cocktail which consisted of red wine (bordeaux? or known generically as claret) and a drop or two of Royal Lochnagar.
The family owners of Royal Lochnagar sold their interests in the distillery to John Dewar & Sons in 1916, which itself came part of DCL in 1925, and through the decades it chugged till 1963 when it was renovated. By 1969, Royal Lochnagar had been fully modernized with steam coils and condensers plus new distillation regime.
This is one of the smallest producing distilleries. Royal Lochnagar only makes 450,000L a year. Most of which goes into Johnnie Black and Blue, why is it still open? Diageo uses this distillery as a training centre for all new distillery staff. Also it’s rather picturesque!
Note the fat onion shaped stills with downward slanting lyne arms – suggests an equally fat spirit.
Royal Lochnagar 1986 / 2009, The Carn Mor Vintage Collection, Cask 1109, Hogshead, 46%
Right I read that fully bourboned Royal Lochnagars are actually rather rare? Lets see…
Nose: Right, fresh and clean. Frangipani and lime zest, oat biscuits and porridge jump out of the copita. Actually very inviting almost playful. With time, it’s malty, with linseed oil undertones, citrus gummies and talc. Also a bit ‘dusty’ like old books. Bit of cumin in the mix. Interesting nose, very ‘focused’, at the cost of expansiveness. But in a nice way.
Palette: Again, fresh, bright spice with pepper. Green apples and cholophyll. Malty clean but I wouldn’t call it sweet. Some zest, some effervescence like sparkling water. Becomes a minerally dry white wine after a few moments. Some stale old bread notes – it’s not the glass, I checked.Interesting development.
Finish: Dry, some oregano, turns bitter.
I have to say quite pleasing, bit of a non conformer with some rough edges, but quite easy and drinkable. This malt tells me Royal Lochnagar is worth a second or third revisit and maybe even more.
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