Edradour 10 yo The Distillery Edition vs Edradour Ballechin 4 The Discovery Series
This distillery comes with the fearsome reputation being one whose whisky actually improved this side of 2000. It might be an understatement to say the fact of accomplishing this is no mean feat.
It’s pretty though.
(photo:whisky.com)
And has funny little stills:
Edradour 10 yo The Distillery Edition 40%
This comes from a mini and the tin tells me there are only THE THREE MEN OF EDRADOUR, as opposed to the sixteen men of Tain maybe, and the same three men make just 12 casks a week, from what was then Scotland’s smallest stills, contained in Scotland’s smallest distillery. That’s not the case anymore these days.
Very much sherry led, but a juicy and well balanced one so far. Red jam, caramel, leather and oaky tannins. Dusting of cocoa and an assortment of the plumpest moistest sultanas, dates and figs. The same tale is told on the tongue, where oaky spices mull about with jammy elements and a mildly malty spirit, though the woody tannins leans towards heaviness now. A fair drinking whisky, one could do far worse with some recently released ‘sherry matured’ ‘special edition’ whiskies.
Edradour Ballechin 4 The Discovery Series 46%
Ballechin is the heavily peated make from Edradour. Find here a thickly earthy and oily peat. As if someone mixed black earth and linseed oil in equal parts, add pulled up roots and some dried eucalyptus leaves. Hints of sweetness come through but it’s overcome by the tobacco ash and black smoke. Quite pleasant really. On the palate however, things start to go south with an immense acrid ashiness, and a boatload of stinging tannins tell a tale of over-oakiness. Somewhere in there there’s some earth, some richness, but its way unbalanced, and completely flattened into one dimension.
Whiskyrific RSS
- Millburn 36 yo 1969 / 2005 Douglas Laing #DL2152 50% vs Glenburgie 40 yo 1963 / 2003 Signatory #4751 56.4%
- Ben Nevis 23 yo 1996 / 2019 Single Malts of Scotland for the Nectar #536 51.3% vs A Speyside Distillery 32 yo 1989 / 2022 Thompson Bros 51.4%
- Brora 22 yo 1972 / 1995 Rare Malts 61.1% vs Brora 22 yo 1972 / 1995 Rare Malts 58.7%
- Talimburg 19 yo 1986 / 2005 The Whisky Fair #1485 45.9% vs Talisker 20 yo 1981 / 2002 62%
- Caol Ila 12 yo Bulloch Lade for Zenith 43% vs Caol Ila 30 yo 1979 / 2010 Berry Bros #4604/5 55.6%
- Clynelish 29 yo 1965 Whyte & Whyte 52.1%
- Brora 21 yo 1982 / 2003 Signatory #416 58.4% vs Clynelish 27 yo 1982 / 2009 Synch Eli Daily Dram 46%
- Dornoch 5 yo 2017 / 2023 #46 ‘Jasper Broers’ 57.9% vs Shizuoka ‘private cask’ 2017 / 2022 #2017-108 61%
- Clynelish 26 yo 1993 / 2020 Carn Mor #11215 52.7% vs Bowmore 17 yo 2004 /2021 SMWS 3.327 ‘Siren’s Song’ 57.1%
- Talisker 25 yo ‘Bottle TA25 3987’ 45.8% ~ bottle code L0296CM004 bottled 2020 vs Ledaig 11 yo 2008 / 2019 The Swan Song & 1BRD #700104 58.7%
whiskyrific 