North Port 15 yo 1974 / 1989 Sestante ‘Very Rare’ 66.1% vs North Port 14 yo 1974 / 1988 Intertrade 66.2%
North Port, or Brechin, distillery was one of those hit by the whisky downturn of the 80s and closed for good in 1983. Not particularly missed or lamented, one still finds old bottles on the secondary market at a comparable discount to other closed distilleries of the period. Neither have I met anyone who has had particularly positive things to say about North Port, not a surprise to me based on the couple of other North Ports I have tried elsewhere.
(photo – skanemalt.se)
North Port 15 yo 1974 / 1989 Sestante ‘Very Rare’ 66.1%
Not a great start but not terrible either: Porridge and boiled vegetables, frying oil, paraffin and flinty hot sand. Lots of tree sap and rubbed bark. Clear resinoid compounds. Withered grass and a touch of dunnage funk. Undoubtedly characterful if somewhat brusque and ungainly to behold. Beware – a raging torment on the tongue, don’t try without water. Ugh! Even with water its just purely alkaline, hot salty oil, some sort of biofuel and loaded with a masochistic amount of grapefuit pith. Certainly a character.
North Port 14 yo 1974 / 1988 Intertrade 66.2%
Remarkably similar, save that this one shows off a sunnier disposition with a caramel, apple sauce, empty jam tart box sweetness. Sherry casks it says but I only find echoes here. Instead it returns to hydrocarbons and paraffin, reused fry oil and sooty flecks. Vegetables and hot sand. Resin compounds and thick white sap again. A careful glace of grass and motor oil, yes very fine. The trepidation of tasting is justly deserved, though the disappointment is allayed by finding some syrup where expecting salt. Otherwise bitter pith, metallic oil, plasticky candy. A most cantankerous duo these twins make.
Whiskyrific RSS
- Bruichladdich 25 yo 1958 Cadenhead, Macallan 15 yo 1946 Securo, Macallan 1962, Springbank 1965 Moon Import The Birds #367, Glenfiddich 29 yo 1956 Intertrade, Clynelish 1974 Modern Masters, Caol Ila 21 yo 1968 for Intertrade, Glen moray 25 yo 1959 Samaroli, Glen Grant 21 yo 1972 Whyte & Whyte, Talisker 1979 Whyte & Whyte
- Laphroaig 40 yo 1960 / 2001 42.4% vs Laphroaig 28 yo 44.4% (2018)
- West Indies Dark Rum 1948 Samaroli 49% vs Lapalun Rhum Petit-Bourg Vieux Rhum dela Martinique 1952 / 1972 50%
- Dornoch New Make August 2019 60% vs Dornoch New Make 63.5% ~ circa April 2018
- Tobermory 32 yo 1972 / 2005 49.5% vs Tormore 16 yo 1966 / 1982 Samaroli 57%
- Macallan 17 yo 1965 43% ~ bottled 1983 vs Macallan 29 yo 1965 / 1994 Signatory #1058 49%
- St. Magdalene 26 yo Cadenhead 1982 / 2008 52.7% vs St. Magdalene 32 yo Cadenhead 1982 / 2015 58.1%
- Aultmore 2005 / 2018 Gordon & Macphail #15601007 for Whiskywarehouse Exclusive 54.1% vs Aultmore 25 yo 46% ~ 2014 bottling
- Longrow 16 yo 1974 46% ~ mini, J & A Mitchell & Co Ltdvs Longrow 21 yo 1974 #1550 46%
- Lochside 21 yo 1979 / 2001 Silver Seal 50% vs Lochside 37 yo 1981 / 2018 The Whisky Agency 48.6%
