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Friday, September 24, 2021

Glenrothes 1972-2005

I began this week essentially nominating Glenrothes for the The Great Meh Distillery title. Since then, I've had three very good Glenrothee. But surely a 30-something year old single malt distilled in 1972 will be bog water. Right?

Distillery: Glenrothes
Ownership: The Edrington Group
Region: Speyside (Rothes!)
Age: 32-33 years (1972 - 2005)
Maturation: ???
Outturn: ???
Alcohol by Volume: 43%

NOTES

The nose begins almost like an old Calvados, with baked apples and pears. Then there's the honey cake we had at kiddush in the synagogue when I was a kid. My notes then say "macrons"; did I mean macarons? Or does the whisky smell like France's first family? You decide. After that: hints of maple sugar, iodine and seaweed. Finally, again quoting my notes, "Sticky Icky in the BG". I can't imagine what that's supposed to mean.

Musty oak, sandalwood incense and a hint of cigarettes start off the palate. Tiny notes of dried herbs, dried apricots and dried leaves. But it's mostly a series of old oak tones, though not as far down the path as liquid furniture (see Pappy 23).

A little bit of sherry cask appears in the finish, along side cracked peppercorns, dried leaves and the palate's bitterness.

WORDS WORDS WORDS

This is unlike any Glenrothes I've had before. But then again, I don't think I'd tried too many older than 20yo. Having completed three decades in a cask, and starting a fourth, the whisky has gradually taken on plenty of oak; the key word being "gradually." The result is a remarkably expressive nose. Though I liked the palate's aged tobacco-like style, the oak's dominance didn't leave room for much else. Again I wonder what this was like at cask strength, and what was lost in the dilution.

Availability - ???
Pricing - ???
Rating - 86