Description
Cask 100.46 Strawberry pop tarts
The colour has to be seen to be believed. Aroma descriptors followed suit – strawberry pop tarts just out of the toaster, blackcurrant squash and, slightly more upmarket, a champagne, cranberry, and cognac and bitter orange liqueur cocktail. On the palate this was fairly tannic and astringent at first before it developed a chunky sweetness of prune juice, and sautéed apples with brown sugar and cinnamon. Water added an afternoon tea with scones, clotted cream and strawberry jam next to a pot of rosehip tea. On the palate, the still grippy tannins were now well balanced by a fruity sweetness. Following seven years in an ex-bourbon hogshead, we transferred this whisky into a first fill Australian shiraz barrique.
Batch 24 Underwater barbecue
This had a bountiful aroma at first, one chock full of smoke-laced flowers, liquorice, smouldering heather, sweeter sherry impressions and singed orange peel. We also found deeper tones of barbecue smoke, coconut shavings, suncream and silky trails of distant peat smoke. Water brought wet moss, sandalwood, shoreline freshness, wet seaweed and wood-smoked ham. The neat palate balanced sweetness and salinity very evenly, with rich umami broths, charred shellfish, dark chocolate-coated stem ginger, salted caramel and smoked butter. With reduction came seawater, soy sauce, peat embers, cloves, and fragrant wood smoke from a beach bonfire.
Cask 6.83 Chewy-textured meanderings
This started out as two bourbon hogsheads of single malt Scotch whisky. One was transferred at 12 years old to a first-fill Spanish oak oloroso hogshead, while the other was transferred at 13 years old to a first-fill American oak oloroso hogshead. The casks were then married together before bottling. The result gives a wonderful nose, combining geraniums and ginger, gooseberry and gorse, lemon curd and liquorice, poached pears, plum sauce and polished oak. The palate, with nice chewy textures, meanders from pineapple, pink grapefruit and gin-based fruit cup to brown sugar, blackcurrant jam and strawberry angel delight, with cinnamon, ginger, cayenne and pink antiseptic, fluoride-free toothpaste toothpaste to finish.
Cask 138.27 Fire up the chocolate barbecue
Constructed from chocolate cake fire bricks mortared with dark chocolate fondant, the barbecue was in full glow as it scorched pineapple rings and fresh coconut. Fuelling the flames with runny treacle and bourbon whisky, a burst of heat engulfed ripe mango slices and pain au raisin pastries. With a little water to control the heat we sat back to enjoy a rich mug of black coffee, served with delicious rum and raisin fudge. Sweet aromas joined the party from apricot jam on poached pears, before some lingering spicy notes, while cardamom pods stewed in a large pot of black chai tea, garnished with a few eucalyptus leaves for freshness.
Cask 8.44 Touched by a bear’s paw
The inviting nose conjured a melange of aromas – candied orange slices, cherries dipped in chocolate, walnut bread, ginger-infused jaffa cakes and, always in the background, a hot toddy with brandy. It was “very potent”, like a bone-dry martini where the glass gets rinsed with vermouth and then discarded. In the aftertaste we sipped a rich and highly caffeinated Turkish coffee spiced with cardamom. Following the liberal addition of water, we imagined chopping the firewood for that night’s stay in our log cabin. Resting, we sat on the pine cone-covered forest floor and enjoyed sourdough pumpernickel bread and bärentatzen: a soft, spicy chocolate cookie in the shape of a bear’s paw.
