Etikettarkiv: Arran malt review

Arran, Arran Malt, Islands

Arran Port Cask Finish

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ABV: 50 %
Origin: Islands
Type: Single malt
Bottles in collection: 0
Emptied bottles: 2
Impression: 5/5

Tasting notes
Nose: This is sweet and fruity. At first there are assorted dark red berries and vanilla along with a thin cooling mint layer on top. Underneath lies a subtle but nice earthy layer of dry soil and herbs. There are also a honey and liquorice sweetness somewhere in between. Both increase in intensity over time and it ends up quite sweet. This is a fantastic nose which feels like it’s gentle but extremely volyminous when it’s allowed to open up in the glass.

Mouth: It starts out with a heavy impact of dark fruits and berries together with honey sweetness. A peppery spicyness accompanies it as well as a quite gritty and roudy background with a mix of very dark and ripe fruits, anise and a hint of sulfur, oil and soil. There’s also a hint of dust and dried fruits floating around. A light and floral note is in the as well. It feels very rich and has a nice texture. The flavour impact is impressive.

Finish: It starts out peppery with an even mix of sweetness, dark fruits and the earthy and dirty notes. The impact is immediate. It’s not as sweet as before but there’s now room for additional dried fruits like raisins and nectarines. A hint of lemon peeks through as well. Everything seem intertwined with the dark ripe berries to create a very nice whole. The oak makes a nice entrance from back to front and it’s a very potent oakiness with walnuts, mild coffee and even a sort of savory note on the tail end. This is just a fantastic whisky.

Additional information
This is part of the Arran’s range of wine finishes. It’s aged in refill casks for 8 years then finished in ex-port pipes. It’s unchillfiltered and has natural colour.

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Arran Malt, Islands

Arran Sherry Cask – The Bodega

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ABV: 55,8 %
Origin: Islands
Type: Single malt
Bottles in collection: 0
Emptied bottles: 1
Impression: 5/5

Tasting notes
Nose: This is dark and sweet. At first there’s a thick layer of dark, ripe fruits. There are raisins, overripe plums and dried apricots. It’s very aromatic and there are bakning spices as well as a mild menthol sitting on top of the main flavours. There’s a sweet side to it with brown sugar and vanilla, but the sweetness is mostly coming from the fruits. The background brings a brighter, tropical fruitiness and some apple juice. There’s also a hint of sulfur in the back. This is a sherry bomb and it’s quite fantastic on the nose.

Mouth: It starts out very sweet and dark. Immediatly there’s a black coffee bitterness with the dark fruits close behind. It’s high ABV spicy and it’s quite rich and oily. After a few seconds a dark chocolate note builds up. The tropical fruitiness is not present at this point, but the powerful sherry notes are surpressing most of the other flavours. It’s somewhat astringent and the oakiness is peeking through every once in a while.

Finish: The dark fruits, dark chocolate and black coffee notes start to move towards the edges as soon as the finish starts. This leaves room for vanilla, oak and dried assorted tropical fruits to appear in the center. The sweetness is still sugary with a hint of vanilla. The menthol cloud returns and stays all the way through the finish. The oakiness gains momentum after a few seconds and it’s a dry, slightly nutty oak. This is a fantastic whisky within the sherry bomb category and it’s really well made. Even though it lacks an age statement it doesn’t present itself as young and undermatured.

Additional information
This is part of The Arran Malt’s core range. It’s aged in ex-sherry hogsheads and is presented in natural cask strength. It’s unchillfiltered and has natural colour.

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Arran, Arran Malt, Islands

The Arran Malt Finished in a Rum Cask

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ABV: 57.6 %
Origin: Islands
Type: Single Malt
Bottles in collection: 0
Emptied bottles: 0
Impression: 4/5

Tasting notes
Nose: This is sweet and spicy. At first there’s a layer of vanilla, coconut and sweet fruits underneath a cloud of nail polish remover. When it settles it becomes sweeter and fruitier as well as a bit more acidic. It feels young and vibrant. It takes a while in the glass before it reaches its full potential and when it does, there’s a nice complexity in the back and a nice balance between sweet and sour in the center. At this point the sherry fruitiness, with liqueuer-soaked red berries as its main feature, is creating a thin outside layer towards the edges of the glass. This is a great nose when given time to open up.

Mouth: It starts out with a mix of sweet and dusty vanilla, coconut and a nice powerful, yet pleasant, spicyness. It’s acidic overall and has a lemon sourness which contrasts the sweet flavours. The sherry notes are somewhat subdued and resides in the background together with the sour notes and an elusive cinnamon note. There’s also a small bitterness floating around. It’s not the most interesting development and it feels like the different components compete for attention instead of adding to the whole.

Finish: The transition is very logical. The sweetness increase in intensity as well as the spicyness. It’s not spikes, it’s more of a slow increase. The fruitiness then arrives around the edges and it’s a general fruitiness without any specific recognizable sorts. It still feels more like a fight between components than a cohesive character. The bitterness is still in there and it slowly turns into walnuts. The late finish is a very nutty and frankly amazing oakiness and becomes the best part of the journey. This is a very good whisky, but it feels a bit over-engineered.

Additional information
This is a single cask release. It was aged in an ex-sherry cask and then finished in a rum cask and bottled in 2004. The bottle reviewed has no. 96/260. It’s unchillfiltered and has natural colour.

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Arran, Arran Malt, Islands

The Arran Malt

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ABV: 43 %
Origin: Islands
Type: Single Malt
Bottles in collection: 0
Emptied bottles: 0
Impression: 3/5

Tasting notes
Nose: This is sweet and sour. At first there’s a thin sweet layer of honey and vanilla. Underneath there’s a lemon sitting side by side to a savory note. It feels young and lively without being ethanol driven and metallic. Over time the sweet and sour notes seem to merge but the lemon sourness is dominating. The savory note stays in the background. A liquorice note slowly arrives around the edges and an oakiness creates a thin top note. This is a nice and straight forward nose. It’s a bit too mild it feels a bit unbalanced.

Mouth: It starts out very mild and sweet and first out is a rather flat vanilla note. After a second or two the sour note arrives but it stays in the back. There’s a lot of the distillate coming through. There’s a spicyness, yet extremely mild, coming from a the oakiness, which sits in the center together with a now more rich vanilla and a slight dustiness. It feels a bit uninteresting at this point.

Finish: The oak steps forward early in the transition and the sour lemon note steps forward from the start. It’s dusty and sweet with the honey and vanilla. It’s still mild and it never really takes off. The oak spices are still in there though. When the oakiness takes over it reveals a fresh woodshop oakiness. It’s slightly astringent but mostly it comes through as a generic oak note. This is a good whisky but it is a bit too mild and unbalanced to be really interesting.

Additional information
There is not much information to be found about this whisky. It’s an older NAS release from the distillery. It has natural colour.