House Of Commons: 12 Year (Scottish Blended Whisky: 12 year: 40% ABV)
Visual: Burnished gold.
Viscosity: Thin fast streaks.
Nose: Cinnamon and cinder toffee. Chalk dust. Oak. Water adds honey and a slight eggy sulfur note.
Body: Smooth. Toffee. Black liquorice. Dry rice. Slightly rough edged. Quite oaken. Cinnamon. Water adds more toffee and cinder toffee.
Finish: Malt chocolate. Steamed rice. Dry. Slight oak. Water adds cinnamon and cinder toffee. Treacle. Stir fry.
Conclusion: I had a measure of this on the night it was given to me, and it was a tad rough and seemed poor quality. However, over the years I have found that a bottle of whisky may take a few days of breathing after breaking a bottle open to settle. So, now, I take another measure for doing notes on.
So, still a tad rough edged. That fiery like note that I associate with cheaper blends is there, but generally the whisky seems to have settled down somewhat. It is basally a sweet toffee and cinnamon whisky. Not bad on the base, especially with the nice cinder toffee notes but still with a few off rough edges. A lot of the rough off notes are familiar to whisky veterans – dry rice, stir fry – not notes that are automatically bad, Nearly everything has a place somewhere, but generally not a good sign. Here? Not a good element.
It actually is a whisky that does better without water – the alcohol touch is stronger, but the sweetness is stronger too so the off notes are less evident.
It is not the worst whisky I have had, but it does show the cut corners quite obviously. There is a decent base, but with too much rough character for me to recommend.
Let us say it is a sub-optimal whisky.
Background: So, many thanks to Paul from work for this. He won it back in the mid 80s in a raffle, but he isn’t a whisky fan, so kept hold of it until now, when he gave to to me for doing notes on. Not much info on this from google – looks like it is discontinued these days, but according to the label is whisky bottled, shocking, for the house of commons – probably for sale as a gift shop style thing I would guess, but who knows maybe everyone in the house of commons in the 80s drank this. Would explain a lot of the shit that went on in the 80s. Anyway, put my music on random, poured a dram and saw how it went.
