Douglas Laing: Longmorn: Old Particular: 15 Year (Scottish Speyside Single Malt Whisky: 15 Year: 48.4% ABV)
Visual: Pale greened clear spirit. Very thin puckering comes from the spirit.
Nose: Clean. Sage. Alcohol tingle. Water adds cereal grains, strawberry and honey.
Body: Vibrant alcohol. Lime. Vanilla toffee. Water adds strawberry crème. Alcohol jelly. Honey. More water adds sweet apricot.
Finish: Slightly meaty. Touch of smoke. Lime. Alcohol jelly. Water adds strawberry crème. Honey. More water adds cake sponge and lychee.
Conclusion: Ok, neat this one really lost me. It has a lot of alcohol character, not harsh but very present. It results in a whisky that is kind of closed, with just very basic lime and vanilla notes that are obvious, with hints of something else around that which are hard to pin down. So I gave it some time, took a few more sips, but I just couldn’t get a feel for anything deeper from it.
Water, well water starts breaking through the shell around this whisky and changes it completely. It is very sweet, almost sickly levels of honey comes out along with gentle strawberry crème. It is still not complex, and still alcohol touched but now radically different from both itself neat and most other whiskies I have encountered.
More water lightens the sweetness, losing some of the interesting and unique notes, but it does balance things out a bit better in response.
So, in my experience this varied between closed with too much alcohol, and stupidly sweet. The thing is, there are such unusual elements here, and it is a fair chunk stronger than the base 40% abv, that I figure it is likely there is something worthwhile hidden in there, it just needs more experimentation to find the perfect water level to unlock that.
From my experience then I cannot recommend it. However I can acknowledge that there may be more to be found that my quick dalliance with it may have revealed.
Make of that what you will.
Background: : So, fourth time around – Mini whisky samples! Woo woo! These were donated to me by Independent Spirit for me to do notes on – much appreciated! Being a sample this is a smaller measure than normal, so may be slightly shorter notes that usual, not that I’m complaining. Only had a few encounters with Longmorn before and I don’t feel I quite have a handle on what to expect from this distillery yet so thought this would be an interesting one. Googled for more info on this bottling and can’t find anyone selling this particular expression yet at time of writing, so may not have hit the shelves yet. If anyone knows more please let me know. Went with The Kominas – Wild Nights In Guantánamo Bay for music while drinking. One of those albums I still love but wish the world would change so it wasn’t still so bloody relevant.
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