Roseisle: Special Edition 2023: The Origami Kite – 12 Year (Scottish Speyside Single Malt Whisky: 12 Year: 56.5% ABV)
Visual: Quite dark gold body with fast thick streaks from the spirit.
Nose: Honey. Toffee. Cheesecake. Redcurrants. Smooth. Soft lime. Wood shavings. Water adds red grapes and shortbread.
Body: Alcohol comes in strong but not fiery up front. Fudge. Drying. Strawberry and redcurrant. Slightly bitter red wine. Lime sorbet. Honey comb. Fig rolls. Water makes smoother but still strong. Apple pie. Raisins. Fatty butter.
Finish: Fudge. Numbing feel. Oak. Dry toffee. Malt chocolate. Black pepper. Water adds sour dough. Fatty butter and chives. Raisins. Cheesecake.
Conclusion: When I had this before, at a whisky tasting, I was disappointed in this one. However I was also something like six cask strength drams deep into the tasting, with generous measures, soooo not at my best, so I figured I should give it another chance. Then, at this second attempt I was surprised to find out it is, in fact, very good.
Initially it has very numbing alcohol – impressively not in a fiery way, just numbing due to the higher abv, which at over 55% abv, yeah I probably shouldn’t be surprised it had some weight, so I took some time to acclimatise to it.
Then, as I got used to it, it had a lovely mix of toffee and fudge (which, ok is not unexpected) and more surprising burst of red fruit. From a quick google this is all aged in first fill ex bourbon cask, so I am guessing that the red fruit did not come from the barrel, so must be some of the base spirit character. It is interesting and tasty. Another interesting note is that the sweetness also gets quite honey like in the aroma, and stickier honeycomb like in the body, so sweet but in a way a tad different to the standard way I tend to see bourbon barrel aging come out.
It even has a kind of cheesecake, weightier sweet note at times, which works very well with the fruit notes for very dessert notes. Water helps soothe the alcohol but also makes it feel a tad more savoury overall. A nice feel, thick, kind of fatty butter like, and with the reduced alcohol is easier to drink, but I will admit I prefer the flavours neat. I think it is worth getting used to the big alcohol if you can so to be able to enjoy the bigger flavours – while initially kind of numbing it does handle the very high alcohol incredibly well overall.
Despite that it has not 100% got the alcohol managed, but you know what, still very impressed.
Lovely mix of flavours that give a strong indicator of a house character, well, one of the house characters (See the background for more on that).
I will have to try this again when it is less stupidly expensive a bottle, but I am impressed with it so far.
Background: A new distillery, and from what I hear and odd one. Apparently it is set up to be modifiable so to be able to turn out many different type of spirit depending on what is needed at the time. An interesting idea, though I’m guessing it will make trying to work out what the house character is very difficult. Done well it is a gateway to experimentation, done badly it could be a way to try and replace other distilleries with a cheaper alternative. Note, this is not a claim of what Diagio is trying to do with it, just me watching things for costs and benefits, as I generally find it best not to trust companies too much when profits are on the line. Hopefully will be used for innovation, not cutting costs, we can but see. Anyway I tried this first at The Hideout at a Diagio tasting of their special editions, an excellent value tasting. However as mentioned in the main notes, by the time I got to it I was a bit worse for wear, so did not really appreciate, so I grabbed a smaller bottle from malts.com to give it a proper try. A bit pricey for 20cl, but better than dropping on a full bottle since I was unsure if I would enjoy. Anyway, returned to this with Polyphia: New Levels, New Devils as music to get me in the drinking and tasting mindset.
