Of malt whisky, cider and other drinkables. Carpe aqua vitae.
Nose: Lemongrass, malt and oak. With quite a lot of water it turns towards citrus and grass.
Palate: Overoaked, oaky bitterness. With a lot of water: Much better. Malt, candy floss, hazel nuts, still quite a lot of oak.
Comments: Undrinkable at full strength. Better with water, but it never quite redeems itself in my eyes.
Tasted at Trondheim Whiskyfestival 2016.
Nose: Citrus, bonfire, a lot of alchohol. With quite a bit of water I get more fruits; melon and sweet pears.
Palate: Cold smoke, lemon drops wrapped in waxed paper, oak. With water a warm spicyness develops, rather a lot of oaky bitterness and yeasty dough.
Comments: This has been left as a dreg for too long, unless my memory of what it used to be like betrays me. It needs quite a lot of water before it’s drinkable, and I guess it’s been matured in fairly inactive casks since the alchohol is still so obvious after 20 years. It has a lot going for it, but the bitterness on the palate is too overwhelming. I can’t remmeber it from before, so I suspect we must take this bottle as a sign that we really should have a spring clean (ok, a summer clean) in our whisky cabinet to make sure any dregs we want to keep are rebottled into sample bottles to minimise oxidation.
20 years old, distilled October 1981, bottled January 2002, sherry butt, DL ref. 533.
Nose: Surprisingly fresh fruitiness, but also raisins, tobacco and oak.
Palate: Heavily sherried, dry oak. The more water I add, the more it tastes of dust (however contradictory that may seem). My thouhts go to old dunnage warehouses full of casks, to the corner where a small window lets in the sunlight, drying out the nearest cask and heating the dust up.
Comments: Somewhat too oaky, but otherwise one of the more interesting DUfftowns I’ve had (though that’s not necessarily saying much).