Ardnamurchan AD 10.21:06
Delicate, Juicy, Oak, Vanilla2023-04-30
Smell
A sweet and sour bouquet stings the nose intensely and is a little overwhelming. Once you have got used to these aromas, you will find a real variety of flavours underneath. A salty orange meets spicy oak, which is lightly interwoven with an iodised peat note. In between, a red baked apple in vanilla sauce flashes up.
Taste
The light peat smoke from the nose becomes more definite on the tongue, followed by a peppery (alcoholic) spiciness. The watery, voluminous mouthfeel opens sour and bitter (lemon balm, artichokes) and transitions into an herbaceous taste (baked potato spice mix). The journey ends with a fruity-sweet region and is again strongly reminiscent of red apple in vanilla sauce.
Finish
The dry, medium-long finish is slightly peaty-berry, has a bit of dark chocolate in it and is still youthfully bitter.
Thoughts
The bottling from the Ardnamurchan distillery, matured for about 6 years, is tasty and exciting, but not outstanding and partly unround. We also see the potential of the distillery, because there are obviously experienced professionals at work. The same applies to the still young Lochlea distillery, by the way. With around 6 years, we nevertheless find some issues that show us that the future bottlings will probably be even better. Extra points for transparency, because each bottle has a QR code that takes you to a website that provides all the relevant information about the bottle.
Rating: 79/100 - Very Good (Marcel: 81 | Sascha: 77)
Value for Money: 4/5 - Good
Further Information
- Bottle 1408/21000- bottled by Jess Hamilton
- bottled on 28.10.2021