That Boutique-y Whisky Company: Single Malt Irish 14 Year: Batch 4 (Irish Single Malt Whiskey: 14 Year: 47.6% ABV)
Visual: Light, clear browned gold. Fast, thick streaks come from the spirit.
Nose: Pencil shavings. Pear. Cereal grain. Lightly nutty. Water adds Shredded Wheat. Dried apricot. Dry sherry.
Body: Smooth. Toffee to caramel. Alcohol warmth. Very milky coffee. Pears. Quite thick. Sultanas if held in the mouth. Water adds apricot touch. Light apple. More water adds fruit cake notes.
Finish: Oatmeal. Alcohol air. Crushed walnuts. Water adds milky coffee notes. Slight sultanas. Slightly more alcohol presence. More water makes creamy. Dry sherry. More sultanas. Sherry trifle comes out over time.
Conclusion: This is a very robust Irish whiskey – giving a slightly thicker mouthfeel than normal, along with a bit of alcohol weight. In fact the alcohol never seems to completely go away, even with water, which is unusual for an Irish whiskey.
What water does do though, is give it a very interesting flavor progression. Well water and time, but mainly water. Initially the flavours seemed towards the lighter end of the spectrum with green fruit notes and sweet caramel, that are towards the more common and expected notes for Irish spirit, just with a thicker texture. It can be slightly overly oak touched in the aroma but generally nice.
Water brings out what feels like a lot of sherry aging influence – there is dry sherry, light nuttiness, more fruitcake and dark fruit notes. It feels like each drop of water darkens the fruit more until finally sherry trifle sweetness bursts out, bringing it to a sweet flip side of the original spirit.
The weight of the whisky feels like Highland Scotch whisky, but it is still smooth despite the weight and depth of character. It feels like a very Scotch whisky influenced Irish whisky, kind of like the older, more sherried Bushmills’ expressions, only with more alcohol weight to give it more to delve into.
A very rewarding, slightly dry whisky. Don’t grab it if you want a more traditional Irish easy drinking smooth thing, but if you want an Irish whiskey you can really dig into and dissect then this is a good one to go to.
Background: I’ve had a tad of free time finally recently so dropped over to the Hideout to take advantage of their awesome whisky selection again. They had just got in a bumper selection of new That Boutique-y Whisky Company expressions in, think it is about twenty five expressions. I am becoming a fan of that lot, they are reasonably priced, and put out some brilliant expressions in weird and wonderful colourful bottles that are so unlike the usual sombre and reserved bottles. This one is an Irish Single Malt from an unnamed distillery – I’ve been wanting to grab more Irish stuff for a while so this was a nice chance – If I had to guess I would say this was Bushmills, but my knowledge of Irish single malts is significantly less than the Scottish stuff, so take that with a pinch of salt.
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