...where distraction is the main attraction.

Monday, March 7, 2022

Glen Ord 26 year old 1992 SMWS 77.51

Last week's Diageo distillery review trio belonged to Teaninich, a single malt that turned out to be better than I'd expected. This week, Glen Ord, a malt I tend to enjoy, fills the tasting table. Like Teaninich, Glen Ord is another massive production facility, cranking out ten million liters of alcohol per year, almost entirely for blends. Unlike Teaninich, Ord has its own maltings on site, and may even supply the Tean Machine with malted barley. Unlike its fellow Highland distillery, Ord does utilize mash tuns and is known to produce a lightly peated spirit.

There are no The Singleton of Glen Ords this week. All three whiskies are from independent bottlers, all from single refill casks. I'll start with the oldest, then go backwards again. First up, a 26 year old single cask from The No Homers Club SMWS....

Distillery: Glen Ord
Owner: Diageo
Region: Northern Highlands
Independent Bottler: Scotch Malt Whisky Society
Age: 26 years (19 Feb 1992 - 2018)
Maturation: second fill bourbon barrel
Cask#: 77.51
Cask "name": "Flower power shower"
Outturn: 160 bottles
Alcohol by Volume: 46.9%
(from a bottle split)

NOTES

This is the first time an SMWS nose matches the SMWS cutesy name. Like, in the history of humanity. Dandelions, daisies, earth, stones and sidewalks after the rain fill the nose for the first 30+ minutes. Then  cucumber peels, jalapeños, white nectarines, lychee and toffee arrive, one by one.

The palate starts off very grassy, with a hefty herbal bitterness, almost like wormwood. Hints of lychee, mango and guava are in the waaaaaaaay back. It takes a while, but the fruit rolls forward a little bit, and gains cassis and roses while holding onto some of the bitterness.

It finishes with wormwood and guava. Then gradually it switches to guava and wormwood. It gets a little bit sweeter with time as the cassis appears.

WORDS WORDS WORDS

First off, the name makes no sense. Everyone knows that we hippies don't wash. Secondly, The cask's low ABV had me anticipating issues that never came to be. Quite loud enough at this strength, the palate doesn't entirely come together yet isn't a mess. I like some herbal bitterness in my whisky but *whistles*. The nose is a complete delight though, reminding me of the chemistry/alchemy/magic/chemistry that goes on inside a whisky vessel over multiple decades. Thirdly, I have no idea how to grade this, so you should probably just ignore the score. 

Availability - Sold out
Pricing - ~€200 back in 2018/2019
Rating - 86?