Whisky tasting last night

[albo]

I was the lucky recipient of an invite to a free preview tasting at SMWS and managed to wangle me a plus one for a friend at work, so we ventured up last night. The tasting was pushed back by half an hour so we whetted our appetites with a Scapa, light and fruity, like tinned peaches, a perfect aperitif!
The tasting was held in a poky room downstairs which swarmed with people, old and young, some with backpacks, some with dickie bows, a real mix. We started out with the lighter malts, went through the heavier sweet ones and finished with some Islays. We somehow managed to drink more than our advised quota of four thanks to some brazenness! My friend tried an old (29?) Linkwood, a Macallan (16?), a 27 year old Glenfarclas, a young (10?) Caol Ila and a Bowmore (16?), all bourbon casked. I tried a Glenrothes, a 14 year old Highland Park, a 28 year old Tormore, a 9 year old Port Charlotte and a youngish Laphroaig (10?). The Tormore and the Highland Park were sherried, the rest were bourbon casked. The highlights and lowlights were as follows:
The Glenrothes and the Bowmore were pleasant but unremarkable. The Macallan was a cut above for its age (16ish), extraordinarily smooth and unusually for Macallan, a bourbon cask. It would be good value for money and a rare purchase as SMWS doesn't get many casks from there.
The Linkwood and the Glenfarclas were both lovely but probably not worth the dosh for the age being around the £80 mark. Although the Glenfarclas is 27 years old, the commercially available 25 year old single malt has much more gravitas (probably due to some older casks in the vatting) and would certainly be worth forking out another £15.
There are two Highland Parks in the March release, 4.160 and 4.161. The one we sampled was 4.160 (sherried) and was ruined by sulphur, truly awful stuff. I was struggling to finish it.
The Laphraoig had the classic iodine note and the Coal Ila was quite medicinal too, Ardbeg-esque. Both are quite young and therefore good value at around £45 if memory serves.
As last month, the Port Charlotte is a star. It has the same provenance being 9 years old, bourbon casked and well over 60% abv. However, although seemingly impossible, this one is perhaps even peatier. We were coughing through wide grins as the smoke demolished all the flavours we had just sampled, including the other Islays. Wow!
The other star is the Tormore. The sherried sweetness was untainted by sulphur (at 28 years there is no chance that a sulphur candle would have been used to sterilise the cask) and the silky smoothness was wonderful. Butterscotch and Caramac if memory serves, and I left clutching a bottle!
As I was buying his Tormore at the bar, my friend asked about some 50cl bottles of Somerset cider brandy that I had never spotted before, which got us another free sample! This was about £37 a bottle (I don't think there was an age statement) and slipped down a treat, like a good calvados. Something different if one was so inclined.
All in all an enjoyable evening though my critical capacity was somewhat tainted towards the end of the night.

[Crane]

Sounds like it was a fantastic night. Sounds like in the case of the Highland Park you tried that the SMWS are still letting the odd dodgy sulphured sherry get past there selection process. I have always reckoned that there may be some on there selection panel that has a liking for sulpher tainted whisky.

I had an excellent SMWS Port Charlotte last year, cant remeber the number but PC really is a star when you get a good bottling of it.

[albo]

We actually asked the guy serving about the sulpher, not just in the HP but in a few other bottles recently, he was very non comittal about it all saying that sulpher isn't always detected by everyone and he for one doesn't find it offensive unless it's really over powering. He said that they do turn a number of casks away because of too much sulpher, but overall it came across to me that they were happy to have sulpherd casks in the Outturn's.

I actually picked up a bottle of the PC last month which was excellent, the one last night may have been even better, but I'd need to try them side by side and without the other 5 drams clouding the old judgement.

Fair play all in all to the SMWS for yesterday, they didn't charge for the event and all the whiskies from the March Outturn were available to try regardless of cost. I feel they should do more of these sorts of thing for the members.

[James T]

I let my membership lapse a while ago but I must say i never experienced any badly sulpured sherry cask bottlings in fact some of the best SMWS bottlings i had were sherried such as an outstanding young sherried Ardbeg which i cant remeber the number of but it was brilliant.

I would certainly take out membership again if i lived in the Edinburgh area but i may give it a go again in the future as i do like the unique varied selection they offer and mostly in my experience the bottles i had were very good.