Scotch Review #72: Aberlour Casg Annamh (Batch 1)

Distillery: Aberlour

Region: Speyside

ABV: 48%

Age: NAS

Price: $6 for a sample from FineDrams

Color: 1.3, Russet/Muscat. Non-Chill Filtered.

---

Nose (according to the wife): Nice and sweet. There’s lots of sherry along with some extremely overripe, to the point where the fruit would be bursting apart, plums and pears as well.

Palate: It’s a lot thinner than I would like. There are some lovely notes of mixed nuts, a plum reduction, and loads of Christmas fruit cake in here. However, all of them get dominated though by an incredibly dry, dry wood—almost sawdust dry. No sherry is present, which is a real disappointment as well.

Finish: Medium to short. There’s some ginger and some more Christmas fruit cake, both of which are really lovely. But then there is that dry, dry wood at the end and it’s really off-putting.

Conclusion: Sherried Speyside whiskies really are my poison of choice and Aberlour is an absolute favorite of mine. This particular one is, on the whole, a disappointment. While the nose really teases that this will be an excellent dram, the palate and finish are dominated by this dry wood note that just isn’t pleasant. Perhaps the sample I got was bad or perhaps it is Aberlour again failing a bit with their batch control (like they’ve had some problems with the A’Bundah series). There are some really nice and promising notes in here though. The sherry and overripe fruit in the nose are really lovely along with the Christmas fruit cake in the palate and finish. It’s a real shame since this could’ve been great but falls a bit short. Perhaps Batch 2 will be better. Would I buy a bottle? No.

Final Score: 78.

Scotch whisky review #72, Speyside review #33, Whisky Network Review #95

---

Scoring Legend:

• 96-100: The perfect dram, nectar of the gods.
• 90-95: Near perfect, there is something truly special about this whisky.
• 85-89: Amazing, will always try to keep a bottle of this in my collection (if feasible).
• 80-84: Very Good, maybe only one minor nitpick about the whisky keeping it here.
• 75-79: Good, quite enjoyable to drink.
• 70-74: Solid, wouldn’t go out of my way to get it.
• 60-69: Meh, still drinkable.
• Below 59: If you have a bottle of this, start cooking with it instead.