Bunnahabhain’s core spirit is great, and I like peat, so a Staoisha bottle will likely appeal to me. My first experience with this bottler, though. Looks almost as young as new make, I felt I needed to include the white background so you could really see how light it is. Really, it looks like you poured vodka into an empty glass that used to have whisky in it but didn’t rinse.
Minutia: Distilled on October 16, 2013 and matured in a Bourbon hogshead numbered #10537 until bottling of 342 bottles on March 15, 2019. Reviewed blind, neat in a glencairn.
Color: White wine, 0.1.
Nose: Dirty smoke, salty smoke, medicinal earthy smoke.
Taste: Much of the same from the nose.
Finish: Dry, then smoky. Takes on a musty quality while you inhale. Just shy of being properly ‘long’.
Guess: An Ardbeg, though Caol Ila wouldn’t surprise me.
I’ll have to check my notes on the other Staoisha I had to see if it was this salty. Wasn’t expecting Bunnahabhain at all. I think overall this could be a few points better than the score, but it was too salty to get there for me. I general appreciate that maritime element, but with a more meaty smoke, and thicker feel. Or at least where the salinity doesn’t push everything to the back seat. Drinks a bit under it’s proof, though. Maybe the high proof comes in on the sharpness of that salinity.
Score: 80
Musical Evocation: Alestorm – “Keelhauled”
Here are links to the other posts from this calendar:
