1981 Old Malt Cask Brora 19 Years Review

I opened this 1981 Old Malt Cask Brora 19 Years earlier this year to celebrate my 40th birthday. Besides being my birth year, 1981 was an interesting year for Brora and you can find ones that were lightly peated, like this one, or heavily peated like some of the ’81 Signatory bottlings floating around. It was also one of the last big years for distillation as the distillery was shut down in 1983.

I’ve had Brora that blew my mind, I’ve had Brora that was undistinguishable from low-mediocre, current, Clynelish and I’ve had a slew of Brora in between. It’s not a magical, mythical distillery that only produced the best whisky ever made. If that were the case it would have never closed, it was just a distillery. A distillery that ended up producing a lot killer single casks, but a distillery nonetheless. Yet, that doesn’t stop me, or many other writers, from romanticizing it just a bit.

There is something alluring and tragically beautiful about dead distilleries. The fact that what you’re drinking is not able to made again, combined with the decades since it was produced, gives it an unavoidable air of reverence. And this of course drives up the price, because we all feel it to some extent when looking at a bottle of the departed. But like all whisky, it isn’t sacred. It’s meant to be opened, drank with friends, talked about, and, in my case, written about. So let’s get to drinkin’ and do just that.

1981 Old Malt Cask Brora 19 Years – Details and Tasting Notes

Whiskey Details

Region: Highlands, Scotland

Distiller: Brora
Bottler: Old Malt Cask (Douglas Laing)
Mash Bill: 100% Malted Barley
Cask: ex-Sherry
Age: 19 Years (Sept 1981 – May 2001)
ABV: 50%

Non-Chill Filtered | Natural Color

Vintage: 1981
Bottles: 192

Price: NA – Auction, Specialty Store or Private Seller

White background tasting shot with the 1981 Old Malt Cask Brora 19 Years bottle and a glass of whiskey next to it.

“Single Cask, Single Malts are noted for the intensity and diversity of flavors they possess. Old Malt Cask range offers the finest and rarest Malts ever to be made available to the enthusiast.” – Old Malt Cask

Tasting Notes

EYE
Light copper

NOSE
Dried strawberries, candied tropical fruit, dried orchard fruit, toasted malt, lemon peel, pecans and baking spice with a light bit of smoke and a thread of OBE pulling through it all.

That musty old bottle effect was super prominent when the 1981 Old Malt Cask Brora 19 Years was first opened, but within 3-4 days it settled down to a background hum.

PALATE
Dried strawberries, roasted malt, lemon drops, dried tropical and orchard fruit, candied pecans, baking spice, and a touch of melon and brown sugar with a bit of smoke and musty OBE.

If this was the only whisky I could drink, I wouldn’t be mad at my lot in life. This is a flavor profile to celebrate.

FINISH
Long -> Complex dried and candied fruits, malt and OBE drift out to a soft olde candy sweetness.

BALANCE, BODY and FEEL
Perfectly balanced, medium-full body and soft velvety feel.

1981 Old Malt Cask Brora 19 Years – Overall Thoughts and Score

This bottle is elegant and complex but kept that musty, dusty quality till the end. It didn’t sit at a distracting level, more of a steady beat letting you know it’s been waiting 20 years to be opened. And for good reason: once opened, it had a lot to say.

It wanted to let you know it came from the last bit of the distillery’s life and that distillery could pump out complex, fruity and slightly earthy, whisky like no one else. This 1981 Old Malt Cask Brora 19 Years is a whisky to be savored till the last drop… and it was.

SCORE: 4.5/5