Ardmore 2004 66.73 & 1998 66.82 Reviews

Hi everyone,

Picking back up where we left off, I was in Toronto and met up with the awesome people of the Toronto Whisky Society. They proceeded to ply me with a bunch of whiskies, particularly Ledaig.

I think u/Devoz had these two beasts. So, thank you sir.

Ardmore is awesome stuff and we just selected one for one of the r/scotch bottlings. But these two casks I have been very interested in because they are quite unusual. A white wine hogshead and a sherry Gorda. White wine casks are very rarely used for whisky and these SMWS bottlings have been some of the few. The sherry Gordas, on the other hand, have become a little legendary for their huge sulphury and strange flavours.

Ardmore 2004 66.73 SMWS 61.1%

Colour: Gold

Body: Full

Nose: Really cool. Kinda medicinal, bandages, sulphury fruit, white peach, oily machine parts,some dirty vanilla, more smoke coming out now. Great nose.

Taste: Sweet start, white grape, dry oak, really oily, clean medicinal notes, bandages and funk, some fun sulphur playing around.

Finish: Short/Medium length. Goes quite soft here, losing power but still great mouthfeel. Quite a dry finish.

10yo from a White Wine Hogshead. Very interesting, very delicious. A shame about the short finish, really wanted it to be longer and more powerful.

81/100

 

Ardmore 1998 66.82 SMWS 57.5%

Colour: Dark Amber

Body: Full

Nose: A real fruit bomb and not exactly what I was expecting, loads of stewed plum, very sulphurous smoke in a good way, fruit salad, more meaty as it opens up, sour cherry, black cherry. Nice contrast of light and dark.

Taste: Very soft arrival, building this great sweetness, dry oak backed perfectly by fruit salad and fruit pastilles, oily, very little smoke actually, great development of flavour to this.

Finish: Medium length. More sulphurous here, struck match, brimstone and hellfire.

17yo from a Sherry Gorda. So damn good, these Gordas have a sulphurous reputation but this was a bit lighter and fresher than I was expecting.

85/100

Thanks for reading!

Updated Distillery Rankings

Scotch Review #784-#785

Whisky Network Review #929-#930

Network Average: 75.1

Best Score: 94

Worst Score: 12

0-49 Terrible

50-59 Bad

60-64 Just About OK

65-69 Ok to Good

70-74 Good

75-79 Very Good

80-84 Excellent

85-89 Superb

90+ Magnificent

Full Disclosure Disclaimer: I currently work as a Brand Ambassador for Penderyn Distillery. The views expressed here are purely my own and do not reflect the views of Penderyn Distillery or The Welsh Whisky Company. I try to maintain as much objectivity as I can but feel free to take my reviews with as big a pinch of salt as you like. Furthermore, my rating scale is NOT based on a Parker type wine scoring scale or a school/college/university % or A-F grade score. You can find more on my scoring here. I apologise for any seemly low or 'bad' scores given with my system and I am sorry I can't say only nice things. Please keep in mind that I am ethically compromised and I am unable to produce 100% unbiased reviews.

Why is this here?

Benromach 2006 Single Cask & 1998 20th Anniversary Reviews

Hi everyone,

Ah, Benromach, the Springbank of the Highlands!

Gordon & MacPhail took the reins in 1998, unmothballing the distillery into its current form. They decided they wanted to produce a robust, traditional, slightly peated whisky that has real character and I think they’ve really succeeded in that.

For some reason I’m always slightly surprised when I taste Benromach and realise how good it is and how consistently good it is too. For me, its almost always scored in the 75-80 range.

Benromach 2006 Single Cask 59.1%

Colour: Light Gold

Body: Medium

Nose: Lemon and creamy vanilla at first. Then I am reminded more and more of a Springbank Local Barley. More smoke and mineral than I would expect, funky with banana and nice Terpenes-petrol and whiteboard markers. Roasted nuts too.

Taste: Nice soft arrival, great transition into a dry development, refill wood (despite it being 1st fill), banana, yellow apple, dry spice, ginger and some minerality.

Finish: Medium/Long length. More yellow apple and subtle minerality. More like an unpeated Caol Ila here.

Bottled 2018 for Germany. Not as good with water. Very surprised by the amount of smoke to this, I expected less.

79/100

 

Benromach 1998 20th Anniversary 56.2%

Colour: Light Amber

Body: Full

Nose: Intense red apple, old oak, ethereal and very old whisky-like, a few ashes, cherry lip sweets as it opens up. Very elegant and complex nose that speaks more of 40 years in a cask, not 20! More smoky as it opens up with a delicious creamy strawberry.

Taste: Salty arrival then juicy red fruit, intense, sour cherry, black pepper, intense oak and spice to back it, clove, some smoke into the finish. Red apple.

Finish: Medium/Long length. Dry here, more of the oak and spices, ginger and black pepper. A little very dark chocolate at the end.

Bottled 2018 at 19yo. Quite dry and oaky, really could be 40 years old. Love the nose, but the clove and oak feel a little overwhelming on the taste.

80/100

Thanks for reading!

Updated Distillery Rankings

Scotch Reviews #743-#744

Whisky Network Reviews #881-#882

Network Average: 75.1

Best Score: 94

Worst Score: 12

0-49 Terrible

50-59 Bad

60-64 Just About OK

65-69 Ok to Good

70-74 Good

75-79 Very Good

80-84 Excellent

85-89 Superb

90+ Magnificent

Full Disclosure Disclaimer: I currently work as a Brand Ambassador for Penderyn Distillery. The views expressed here are purely my own and do not reflect the views of Penderyn Distillery or The Welsh Whisky Company. I try to maintain as much objectivity as I can but feel free to take my reviews with as big a pinch of salt as you like. Furthermore, my rating scale is NOT based on a Parker type wine scoring scale or a school/college/university % or A-F grade score. You can find more on my scoring here. I apologise for any seemly low or 'bad' scores given with my system and I am sorry I can't say only nice things. Please keep in mind that I am ethically compromised and I am unable to produce 100% unbiased reviews.

Why is this here?

Springbank 1998 Cooper's Choice Sherry Cask Review

Hi everyone,

Ah, Sherried Springbank. That’s the dream right? You don’t need much of the 12yo cask strength or 15 to realise that Springbank is quite a different beast in Sherry casks.

Then there’s the indies, which often take things to a new level.

Independently bottled Springbank isn’t often seen, and when it is, it’s usually very expensive but they are about.

I had the great pleasure of chatting with Andrew, the MD of Cooper’s Choice, after the festival we were at in The Haig and we were chatting about whisky and sourcing casks, etc. Lovely guy, Cooper’s Choice is very small and family owned, and we normally see quality coming from that.

Springbank 1998 Cooper's Choice 46%

Colour: Amber

Body: Full

Nose: A funky Springer. Dirty Sherry, dark plum and fig, dark chocolate, espresso, slightly meaty and sooty. There's some unripe mango which feels a little out of place.

Taste: Intense! God knows what kind of monster this would have been at cask strength! Mineral and sooty, then very fruity, plum, fig and date, dark chocolate, ginger. Quite a peaty one to start and then gets softer and softer.

Finish: Medium length. Very soft, easy, plum and some spice. Lacking a little complexity here.

Refill Sherry cask. Bottled at 18yo. This is mega expensive too if you can find it. Like £300 expensive. Great whisky but a tad out of place in places.

82/100

Thanks for reading!

Scotch Review #537

Whisky Network Review #632

Network Average: 74.5

Best Score: 92

Worst Score: 22

0-49 Terrible

50-59 Bad

60-64 Just About OK

65-69 Ok to Good

70-74 Good

75-79 Very Good

80-84 Excellent

85-89 Superb

90+ Magnificent

Full Disclosure Disclaimer: I currently work as a Brand Ambassador for Penderyn Distillery. The views expressed here are purely my own and do not reflect the views of Penderyn Distillery or The Welsh Whisky Company. I try to maintain as much objectivity as I can but feel free to take my reviews with as big a pinch of salt as you like. Furthermore, my rating scale is NOT based on a Parker type wine scoring scale or a school/college/university % or A-F grade score. You can find more on my scoring here. I apologise for any seemly low or 'bad' scores given with my system and am sorry I can't say only nice things. Please keep in mind that I am ethically compromised and am unable to produce 100% unbiased reviews.

Why is this here?

Lp8 (Madeira Finish) Review [From Paris with Love]

Hi everyone,

Daves Whisky Reviews is 1 year old! Yay! It's the blog's anniversary today. Does that mean anything special? Not particularly. Business as usual: More reviews.

Do you remember that Cairdeas Laphhy from 2016 that was finished in Madeira casks? Well, if you were a fan of that (I haven’t tried it yet), you might be interested in this.

It’s a “Mystery malt” (huuuhhggggglaphhhuuuurooaighuuuuuhhg) Excuse me. A so called mystery malt from a very obvious Islay distillery. Distilled in 1998, it was then finished in Madeira casks.

Madeira is a funny fortified wine, in that to make it they essentially abuse the wine as much as possible, because they noticed that when the wine was stored on ships, it tasted better after a rough sea voyage round the world. Now, they heat it and slosh it about as much as they can in Madeira to try and replicate that.

Madeira isn’t hugely popular at the moment, but it’s seeing more use as whisky barrels recently as people become more experimental about finishings.

Lp⁸ 53.5%

Colour: Dark Gold

Body: Full

Nose: Medicinal and fruity, blood orange, a little peppermint, opens up with lovely coastal sea air and seaweed.

Taste: Soft, orange then intense smoke and mineral and coastal waves, gritty stones, seaweed, some sweetness, spicy ginger.

Finish: Long length. Sweeter, fruitier and more coastal, orange and salt. Best bit.

This is a lovely style of Laphroaig (Whoops) The Madeira hasn’t overwhelmed the style at all, and there’s some great minerality and coastal flavours in here too.

82/100

Thanks for reading!

Scotch Review #468

Whisky Network Review #535

Network Average: 74.3

Best Score: 92

Worst Score: 22

0-49 Terrible

50-59 Bad

60-64 Just About OK

65-69 Ok to Good

70-74 Good

75-79 Very Good

80-84 Excellent

85-89 Superb

90+ Magnificent

Full Disclosure Disclaimer: I currently work as a Brand Ambassador for Penderyn Distillery. The views expressed here are purely my own and do not reflect the views of Penderyn Distillery or The Welsh Whisky Company. I try to maintain as much objectivity as I can but feel free to take my reviews with as big a pinch of salt as you like. Furthermore, my rating scale is NOT based on a Parker type wine scoring scale or a school/college/university % or A-F grade score. You can find more on my scoring here. I apologise for any seemly low or 'bad' scores given with my system and am sorry I can't say only nice things. Please keep in mind that I am ethically compromised and am unable to produce 100% unbiased reviews.

Why is this here?