53,2°
Distillery : Caol Ila - Islay
Oak Casks
Independent Bottling
By Elixir Distillers
Limited Edition
Single Malt
Bottled in 2022
Cask Strength
Peated around 35 ppm
Every year since 2017 Elixir Distillers launches a special bottling for
Black Friday, available only on their site The Whisky Exchange, which no
longer delivers to France unfortunately (sob). This year, it is written on
the back label that it is a 16 year old Caol Ila, and the number of
bottles is 2000. The Whisky Exchange blog informs us that it is a Cask
Strength distilled in 2006, but nothing on the origin of the casks (I suspect Bourbon),
nothing about cold filtration or dyes either. It is true that I have
never seen a whisky from Elixir Distillers cold filtered and coloured,
but I would have preferred more transparency.
Let's Taste It :
Nice ashy smoke, sticky, with coal and soot. Mineral chips, quartz,
granite and slate. In the background, fruits give mellowness to the
whole. Syrupy caramel, peach juice, clementine, green apple. Nice
refreshing iodine. Adding water brings out the liquorice. Creamy vanilla.
On the palate, peat and iodine with honey, and then spices, cumin, nutmeg, cloves. Damp wood, mustard, grilled meat. Long
and quite powerful finish, at the same time very peaty, mineral, a bit
metallic, bark, resin, charcoal, heather, rich soil. Roasted chestnuts.
In Short,
This is a very good Caol Ila, the distillate is hardly disturbed by the
influence of the cask, which gives a nice fruitiness. Both mellow and
well peated, it made me think of a Port Askaig, but older,
wiser. The release price was right, now that it's sold out it's
obviously more complicated.
Score : 89
To Be Listened While Sipping :
Om - State of No Return
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