Caol Ila 11 YO (The Maltman)

ABV: 54.4 %
Origin: Islay
Type: Single Malt
Bottles in collection: 0
Emptied bottles: 0
Impression: 4/5

Tasting notes
Nose: This is sweet and peaty. At first there’s an ashy peat with notes of hay and wet dirt. There’s a big sweetness with vanilla, honey and mixed red berries. They are somewhat subdued at first but gets a bit more bold as time goes by. A black liquorice note is found somewhere in the back. The oak is detectable as a top note. The ashy note is in charge but the whole feels balanced and there’s no sharp edges. This is a nice nose with a lot of the house style shining through.

Mouth: It starts out with a generic sweetness and then a mild spicyness spreads out evenly throughout the palate. There’s a bitter tang in the back and it’s a dark chocolate bitterness. A lot of hay and earthy notes is found within the center part. The berries are now much darker and hides along the edges and mixes with the dark chocolate note in the back. The oakiness is still in there and gives it a nice extra dimension. The sweetness eventually switches to a butterscotch note in the center. It’s doesn’t feel as balanced as on the nose.

Finish: The spicyness increases slowly and gives it a nice power-up at the beginning of the transition. The oakiness comes early and fills an outside layer together with the hay and the ashy note, which now has returned. The dark chocolate note is still sitting in the back. After a while the ashy note once again takes over and spreads out over the palate. The fruitiness gets lost in everything else and almost disappears throughout the finish. This is a good whisky with a nice mix of grown-up flavours. It’s got a quite demanding flavour profile but that’s not a bad thing.

Additional information
This whisky was aged in a sherry butt between 2009-2021. This is cask no. 322973 and it’s limited to 493 bottles.

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