Quietly celebrating its 125th birthday this year, Glentauchers distillery passed in and out of James Buchanan & Co's hands until it wound up at DCL-SMD-UD for 74 years. It then went to Allied for 16 years before being added to Pernod Ricard's portfolio. It survived seven years in mothballs during scotch's dark days in the '80s, coming out on the other side as one of the main malts in Ballantine's blended whisky.
Now it's time to chase today's history lesson with some scotch.
Distillery: Glentauchers
Owner: Pernod Ricard
Region: Speyside (Moray)
Independent Bottler: Scotch Malt Whisky Society
Age: 8 years (22 Sep 2010 - 2019)
Maturation: first-fill bourbon barrel
Cask#: 63.58, "Dental damage"
Outturn: 258 bottles
Alcohol by Volume: 56.1%
Alcohol by Volume: 56.1%
(from a bottle split)
NEAT
Juicy Fruit gum, yeast and mint extract arrive first in the nose, followed by oatmeal topped with brown sugar and bananas. Bits of grapefruit and pine linger. The Juicy Fruit morphs into Big League Chew. The malty, sweet palate leans heavily on lemon candy and orange candy, with some yeasty wort in the background. Lots of oranges and a little bit of barley in the very sweet finish.
DILUTED to ~46%abv, or 1¼ tsp of water per 30mL whisky
Limoncello and bitter lemon soda meet malt and confectioner's sugar in the nose. Some herbal bitterness now appears in the palate but sugar rules the day. Plenty of malt can be found from start to finish, along with confectioner's sugar.
WORDS WORDS WORDS
"Dental damage" may be the most accurate cask name SMWS has ever issued. This is one of the sweetest whiskies I've ever tried, yet it remains appealing, like a piece of hard candy when a mouth needs a quick sugar hit. Drinkers with bigger sweet teeth may like this Glentauchers even more, but I do think it's an appealing take on partially-baked whisky.