Waterford Ballykilcavan 1.1

While getting a bottle of every harvest/vintage they released is too impractical, I did manage to get a number of samples of Waterford, including this from their inaugural set of releases. I’m very interested in how each farm changes over time, but also how the farms differ with the same process. Not a proper side by side, but I will be mentally comparing this to Bannow Island 1.1.

Waterford Ballykilcavan, Ireland Single Malt, 50% ABV

Minutia: Distilled on February 9, 2016 from Taberna barley from Ballykilcavan farm - sown on March 19, 2015 and harvested August 17, 2015 - fermented with Mauri distiller’s yeast for 150.5 hours and matured in American oak, French oak, and Vin Doux Naturel casks for 3 years, 11 months, and 18 days before bottling in June 2020 producing 8,640 bottles. Enjoyed neat in a glencairn.

Color: Old gold, 0.6.

Nose: Butter cookie, fried dough, fruit tries to sneak in.

Taste: Malty. Green fruit, honey. Off note under it all.

Finish: Off malt, grass, honey.

I’ve read that some of their wine casks early on had issues with sulphur, and I wonder if that is that off note I got. It diminished/I got acclimated before the end of the dram, and toward the end that note in the finish almost became pleasant, but it was still prevalent enough to knock it down a peg for me. Without that it would have been quite enjoyable, though young. Nose-wise it was pretty similar to the Bannow Island 1.1, with a bit of difference, but this also had a different cask makeup as virgin oak wasn’t available at the time this went into casks. That off note (by the way, totally not present in the nose) did stop me from being able to do any real comparisons on the palate. I still think this will be a great distillery once the spirit has had time to age more. I’m also pleased that the nose was really very similar, so even though they’re doing a lot with terroir and trying to demonstrate the differences between the barley type, farms, harvests, etc., there does seem to be a “house style” so I’m expecting a fair amount of consistency going forward without every single expression being drastically unique. In short, if you find you do or don’t like one Waterford release, you can probably expect the same on others (though that could change if more aging brings it around, or they do something wildly different with one batch, such as peating the barley).

Score: 74

Musical Evocation: Haggard – “Awaking the Centuries”