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Friday, March 20, 2020

Redbreast Small Batch D

If you're reading this now, you have made it to Friday. Congratulations! Time to weaken your immune system with whiskey.

No fails in the first three Redbreast Small Batches. And *SPOILER ALERT* this one passed muster as well. Kudos to everyone who nabbed one or more of these whiskies five months ago. Their secondary market prices are a primary bummer, but that is how it goes today.

Batch A - "Modern scotch-styled Irish pot still”, 85 points
Batch B - "Chocolate, fruit and flowers", 88 points.
Batch C - "The birdy gets dirty" (sorry not sorry), 89 points
Batch D - ......


Distillery: Midleton
Brand: Redbreast
Region: Cork, Ireland
Type: Single Pot Still
Age: at least 14 years
Maturation: bourbon casks and oloroso sherry casks
Batch: D
Bottled for: Oak + Violet, Bounty Hunter Wine & Spirits, Redstone Liquors and Julio's Liquors
Outturn: 252 bottles
Alcohol by Volume: 58.9%
Chillfiltered? ???
Color added? ???
(from a bottle split)

NOTES
Like Batch B, D has plenty of sherry cask action on its nose. Not raisiny or pruny, rather dried cherries and raspberries in dark chocolate. More honey than grape jam. Hints of mustard and steak emerge after 30 minutes. The palate ditches those last notes for a cleaner character, at first. Lots of nuts and dried fruit. Lime juice and a good bitterness. But it gets a little edgier with time, gaining small notes of earth and salted pork. It finishes with limes, dried blueberries, nuts, cayenne pepper and a minor metallic note.

WORDS WORDS WORDS
Batch D could be great on its own, but next to batches B and C it becomes merely very good. C is grittier, B is brighter. Both are probably more complex. Still, I like D's transition from light to dark, and though the nose is simple it is simply enjoyable. Obviously the scores of the four whiskies barely vary, so any one of these could top the others depending on the day and the drinking circumstances. The strong Redbreast quality is present in all four. Perhaps Pernod could do a few more small batches for, say, Ohio?

Final score card:

Batch A - "Modern scotch-styled Irish pot still”, 85 points
Batch B - "Chocolate, fruit and flowers", 88 points.
Batch C - "The birdy gets dirty" (sorry not sorry), 89 points
Batch D - "Simply enjoyable", 86 points.

Availability - US of A
Pricing - it was $100
Rating - 86

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