Aberfeldy 1993 Gordon & MacPhail Review

Hi everyone,

Do you remember that magical time, many years gone, when we could travel the world and go to whisky festivals and events? Do you remember the hubbub of many people filling a room with their whisky-fuelled banter? Do you remember the sound of lip-smacking-good whisky being consumed in great quantities by the multitude?

I do. I remember those times. And I look back on them with sick envy. I didn’t know how good I had it.

And now I sit alone with my hoard of whisky. And I drink it alone. In the dark. Bitterly contemplating the end time that crept up on us like a tiger out of the grass.

 

Anywho, this is a review from the end of 2018 at a German whisky festival.

 

Aberfeldy 1993 Gordon & MacPhail 58.8%

Colour: Amber

Body: Full

Nose: Dark, fruity and sweet. Blackberry, Cassis, black cherry, a touch of singed heather, ethereal spirit lightening everything nicely, black pepper and red apple.

Water: Opens up with more Sherry and oak, more sweetness.

Taste: So soft on the arrival, fruity and sweet, blackberry, beautiful brown sugar, then more oak and Sherry as it develops. Black cherry, amazing oily mouthfeel.

Water: Lovely. More oak, leather and orange.

Finish: Long length. Lovely. More Sherry here with raisin, chocolate, heather and some ginger spice.

Bottled 2018 from a 1st fill Sherry puncheon at 25yo. I'm sorry, did you say Glenfarlcas from a Port cask? Interesting style of Sherry. Always a pleasure to taste something from my birth year and this one was great, though if I remember right, the price was quite high.

84/100

 

Thanks for reading!

Updated Distillery Rankings

Scotch Review #869

Whisky Network Review #1044

Network Average: 75.2

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 the Global 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?

Aberfeldy 21 Review

Hi everyone,

Just a quick review of another whisky from Ian Buxton’s 101’s today. I’ve been trying to get my hands on this for a while but my motivation to actually buy a bottle was very low with this being such a low abv.

So I waited. Like a praying mantis or a tunnel spider. And when I saw it, I pounced like a Jaguar or a man wanting to try a new whisky.

 

Aberfeldy 21 40%

Colour: Gold

Body: Medium

Nose: Heather and lots of honey, biscuit, vanilla, oak and red apple. Nice nose but not nearly as complex as I would have hoped from 21 years.

Taste: Soft, honey, heather, spice, dry, oak, ginger, some soft black pepper, lacks power, golden raisin, red apple. Shame the abv is low, as I suspected, it died a little inside when being watered down.

Finish: Medium/Long length. Ginger spice, oak, heather, spicy red apple.

Well, a tiny bit better than what Glenfiddich are doing with their 21’s (ice wine casks included), but I know, KNOW, this could be so much better with a bit more abv behind it.

76/100

Thanks for reading!

Scotch Review #559

Whisky Network Review #662

Network Average: 74.7

Best Score: 93

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?

Gordon & MacPhail Shop Tasting: Elgin

Hey everyone,



Still in Scotland (June 2016) for an interview and decided to pop into Gordon & MacPhail, Elgin. Incredible selection. 1000 bottles, many of them really old and expensive.

Great selection to try too, basically anything bottled by them or open was fair game and they were very open about staying as long as I liked. Which I took full advantage of!

So 2 Clynelish's I started with. Clynelish is the younger brother of the deceased Brora distillery that many a money has been spent on. It's always got this lovely waxy thing going on...

Clynelish 1996 G&M Connoisseurs Choice 46%

Colour: Gold

Body: Medium

Nose: Amazing honey and wax combo, apple, some spice, aromatic highland style.

Taste: Spicy, pepper, oak, going creamy, apple, wax, some ash.

Finish: Long length. Spicy, ash.

Notes: Bottled 2014

76/100

Clynelish 2000 G&M Connoisseurs Choice 46%

Colour: Amber

Body: Medium

Nose: Fresh. Nutty sherry, almond, wax, honey, raisin.

Taste: Great arrival. Sweet, honey, wax, heather, raisin, fig, a little herbal, a little ash, oak. Good balance.

Finish: Medium length. Creamy oak.

Notes: Bottled 2015 from a Sherry butt and Sherry Hogshead.

76/100

Next up was a few Benromach's. The distillery is actually owned by Gordon & MacPhail and they really seem to know what they are doing.

Benromach Organic 2015 43%

Colour: Dark Gold

Body: Medium

Nose: Aromatic fruit, red apple, mango, lemon, banana, malt.

Taste: Very fruity, red apple, mango, banana, yeast, malt, oak.

Finish: Medium length. Creamy with some oak and ash.

Notes: Distilled 2008, bottled 2015. Taste lots older than that though.

74/100

Benromach Hermitage 45%

Colour: Dark

Body: Medium

Nose: Meaty red wine, red apple, ash, cherry, dark chocolate.

Taste: Intense, meaty, very fruity, cherry, blackberry, spicy ginger.

Finish: Medium/long length. Softens but keeps going with soft fruit and some oak.
Notes: A lovely wine-y whisky.

75/100

Then a Bruichladdich from the G&M Cask Strength collection. Some older Bruichladdich's always seem to get younger as they age. I know, I know, it doesn't really make sense.

Bruichladdich 1991 G&M Cask Strength 54.9%

Colour: Gold

Body: Medium

Nose: Lemon, older Bruichladdich that's noses young, zest, sherbet, malt.

Water: Creamy, vanilla, honey.

Taste: Intense, ash, malt, creamy, vanilla, oak

Water: Intense, sherbet, sharp sour lemon, some peach, barley sugar.

Finish: Long length. Creamy oak and peach.

Notes: Bottled 2012

71/100

Ah, the next one is a bit embarassing... I bought the Commitee Release Dark Cove because everyone was complaining about the website crashing on Facebook but I could get on fine. So I bought one. But then, I turned to the dark side. I thought, well it's probably going to be very similar to Uigadail, I'll sell this one and buy a SMWS Sherry Ardbeg. And the plan worked, I sold it for double the price and bought a 33.132. But I became something horrible at the same time: A Flipper. I flipped my Dark Cove and now it comes back to haunt me...

Ardbeg Dark Cove 46.5%

Colour: Dark Gold

Body: Medium/Full

Nose: Lovely Sherry and fresh zesty lime, lemon, musty wool, blood orange

Taste: Intense, creamy medicinal, cough sweets, lime juice, lime pith, lemon, creamy oak, orange. Great balance.

Finish: Long length. Creamy, medicinal, earthy peat.

Notes: It's Ardbeg, of course it's great. Maybe I should have kept my Commitee Release, I'll have to open my 33.132 before I decide if it was worth it.

80/100

After that I had an Ardmore. G&M do a great series based on old labels from those distilleries. In my opinion they look great too. Ardmore is a peated Highlander.

Ardmore 1996 Sherry G&M Distillery Labels 43%

Colour: Amber

Body: Medium/Full

Nose: Sherry, cherry, sweet syrup, honey, golden syrup, banana.

Taste: Intense, sherry strewed fruit, raisin and fig, then pepper and dry smoke kicks up.

Finish: Medium length. Creamy smoke and ash.

Notes: Bottled 2013.

76/100

And a last Aberfeldy to finish. Aberfeldy is an interesting distillery I think, there's always a tiny hint of smoke. I can't find a photo I can use of this one so I'll provide the link here.

Aberfeldy 1995 G&M Cask Strength 55.8%

Colour: Gold

Body: Medium/Full

Nose: Aromatic highlander, spicy and nutty, apple, subdued.

Water: More. Fresh, fruity, heather, honey.

Taste: Intense, juicy and spicy, red apple,

Water: Soft, beautiful fruit, lemon, building spice and sherry, stewed fruit, raisin, fig.

Finish: Long length. Fruit, red apple, oak, ash, complex.

Notes: Bottled 2014, 18yo refill sherry

78/100

Wow. After all that, I decided to buy the Benrinnes 23 1985, released in 2009, which wasn't too outrageously priced and is pretty legendary on r/Scotch, probably the highest rated bottle.

Also got a few miniatures I've been curious about, which are coing up next.

Reviews #148-155

Score Average: 74.5

Best Score: 91

Worst Score: 44

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

Aberfeldy 12 + 18 Reviews

Hello everyone,

Aberfeldy is a malt I'd heard of but never really tried. Mainly because I didn't want to fork out money on the low abv and it can be quite obscure.

I had a bottle bought for me for Christmas though, so let's see how it tastes.

Courtesy of Master of malt

Aberfeldy 12 40%

Colour: Gold

Body: Medium

Nose: Heather, honey, a little floral, some heathery smoke, wood smoke, green oak, some lemon, a little vanilla and toffee. More lemon after a bit.

Water: A drop (Not going full Ralfy-Mode) reveals more smoke, ashes, beeswax and orchard fruit.

Taste: Sweet arrival, toffee, going quite juicy with pear, then lemon, fizzy lemon sherbet, developing some harsh sappy oak. Soot and oak into the finish.

Water: More gentle arrival then more smoke with ashes.

Finish: Short/Medium length. Harsh oak and chocolate and a little lemon.

Notes: Batch 2905. Shame about the harsh oak, but still very quaffable. Not as good as the 18yo but more smoke.

68/100

Finished my bottle in a week, which is very unusual for me. Would normally take my a month.

I also tasted the 18yo in Heathrow, so here's my notes from that brief tasting:

Courtesy of Master of Malt

Aberfeldy 18 40%

Colour: Gold

Body: Medium

Nose: Heather, honey, rich sweet sherry, sweet fruit- Apple, vanilla, quite cakey.

Taste: Quite rich, heather, honey, some vanilla, fruity sherry, cherry, cherry chocolate.

Finish: Medium length. Cherry chocolate (the natural dark stuff) and a touch of smoke.

Notes: Less smoke than the 12yo but more complex. Pleasant, gentle, nice complexity and fullness for 40%.

74/100

Reviews #74-#75

Score Average: 77.9

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