Caol Ila 22 year old, Feis Ile 2019

Angus gave this a 92. Thijs said, 91 points. The Whiskybase community: 90.61 points. Mark Dermul, a 93. Anticipation! Expectation! Intoxication! Sherried CI is good, sherried CI with some age on it is usually better. So this thingy, a full-power 22 year old Caol Ila from sherry casks (er, sherry-treated American oak casks), probably earned those scores. MY TURN.

Distillery: Caol Ila

Owner: Diageo
Region: Islay
Maturation: sherry-treated American oak casks

Age: minimum 22 years
Release date: 2019
Outturn: 3,000 bottles
Alcohol by Volume: 58.4%

Chill-filtration? Probably not
Caramel coloring? Maybe

(from a bottle split)

NEAT
Reads like a dry sherry (fino?) on the nose. It has gentle ocean and ash notes that drift above. Nutmeg, cinnamon, shortbread and lemon custard below. The palate reads surprisingly hot and not very expressive. It's very salty and puckeringly tart. Some cherry shisha, ginger syrup, cocoa and a hint of tropical fruit punch. Some length to the finish, but it's most heat. Roasted almonds and subtle smoke. Tart citrus. A dried seaweed note comes around after a while.

Gonna dilute it...

DILUTED TO ~50%abv, or 1 tsp of water per 30mL whisky

More smoked meat, manure and chlorine in the nose. Then butterscotch and calvados. The palate gets simpler: limes, minerals, roses, vanilla bean and a soft sweetness. The finish has cooled off. Now it's all lime candy, menthol and wood smoke.

More water...

DILUTED TO ~46%abv, or 1⅔ tsp of water per 30mL whisky

Some classic oloroso notes show up, mixing well with the wood smoke and honey in the nose. The palate has become much more graceful. There's ginger, honey, limes, earth and leaves. The finish matches the palate and adds a pinch of good bitterness.

WORDS WORDS WORDS

Either I'm going to piss off Caol Ila fans this week or they're just laughing at me. Along with everyone else. This is a very good whisky, but falls short of the excitement I'd hoped for. I like it much better at 46% than at 58.4%, so  perhaps it improves further with more dilution. When neat, it's quite tight and not nearly as expressive as last week's CIs, especially the glorious G&M cask. I do appreciate how well the spirit and cask have integrated. It's likely going to be better than 88% of what most of us will drink this year, but weep not if you missed it.

Availability - Secondary market
Pricing - ???
Rating - 88 (diluted)

Caol Ila 9 year old 2009 TWE, The Magic of the Cask

I'm not entirely sure why I went in on a bottle split of this whisky, but what the hell, it's another Caol Ila week! This one is a single cask from the Elixir Distillers / The Whisky Exchange crew, released for last year's The Whisky Show. Though it was allegedly aged in an actual(!) bodega cask, it's another one of the scores of single digit indie Caol Ila casks that appear every month. It's just difficult to get excited about them. TWE/Elixir does tend to pick good stuff, so here I go...

Distillery: Caol Ila

Region: Islay

Independent Bottler: Elixir Distillers

Exclusive to: The Whisky Exchange

Age: 9 years old (2009 - 2019)

Maturation: refill Gonzáles Byass sherry cask
Cask #: 316103
Outturn: 308 bottles

Alcohol by Volume: 58.7%
(from a bottle split)

NEAT

A blast of classic, though generic, sherry cask hits first then quickly fades from the nose, being replaced by sneaker peat and tennis ball peat and pork chops. Then honey, cinnamon syrup, brine, carpet and lots of heat. The hot palate mixes cherry soda, mint and heavy industrial smoke. Then cotton candy, tart berries, pickled ginger and a hint of florals. Again, lots of heat in the finish, along with soot, salt, pickled ginger and cherry lollipops.

DILUTED TO ~46%abv, or 1⅔ tsp of water per 30mL whisky

The nose reads more like a solid piece now. Like Caol Ila 12 with the volume turned up and some sherry casktion added. Lots of ocean and beach notes, barbecue peat and a hint of figs. The palate's peat has become sweet and mellow. Burnt bacon, ginger candy, salt and figs. It finishes with salty bacon, ginger candy and figs.

WORDS WORDS WORDS

It quickly became apparent that this is good deal better than Monday's official bottling as I tasted them side by side. It's a bit bigger and crazier when neat, and water pulls it together; and I'm left split about which version I prefer. It's probably about as good as one can do with a 9 year old refill sherry cask, so there's no reason to delay opening an unopened bottle of this, unless it's 100ºF outside or you have 100+ whiskies open already.

Availability - Secondary market
Pricing - ???
Rating - 87

Caol Ila Distillery Exclusive 2017

Let's keep the Caol Ila reviews going. Last week I reviewed 28 and 29 year old Caol Ilas. This week I shall drink some younger stuff, including one on Friday that may challenge the 29's quality.

Though I respect the spirit produced by the modern Caol Ila distillery, it's the last facility on Islay that I'd choose to visit. But I am thankful to have gotten an opportunity to try one of their Distillery Exclusive bottlings. The exclusives from Diageo's Clynelish and Lagavulin were good but fell short of their distilleries' excellent standard expressions. Thus, The Optimism Level is set to "This is probably not terrible."

Distillery: Caol Ila

Region: Islay

Owner: Diageo

Age: ???

Maturation: ???

Release Year: 2017
Outturn: 3000 bottles

Alcohol by Volume: 58.8%
(from a bottle split)

NEAT

The nose begins with nuts, fresh cut grass and smoked meat. Then peanuts, oats and slivovitz. A fermenting fruit note appears with time, alongside some sour apple candy. Ashes and stones on the palate. Its sweetness grows with time, pushing down smaller notes of ham, wheatgrass and flowers. It finishes hot and peppery with plenty of mesquite smoke. Some apples chips and wheatgrass as well.

DILUTED TO ~46%abv, or 1⅔ tsp of water per 30mL whisky

Yeast, cashews, oats, smoked vanilla bean and burning leaves comprise the nose, while the palate is made up of ocean water, wood smoke, lemon juice and lots of sugar. The finish matches the palate, with some additional barley notes.

WORDS WORDS WORDS

I'm posting the whiskies youngest to oldest this week, and I'd assumed Wednesday's 9 year old would have been posted today, but then I drank this Distillery Exclusive and I'd be surprised if it spent as much as eight years in oak. As with the Clynelish and Lagavulin, Diageo doesn't seem to have painted over some ultra-young whisky with aggressive casks, so they get some brownie points there. But there has been A LOT of baby CI coming from the indie bottlers over the past three years, and this official release doesn't do anything to top most of the young single casks I've had. It also falls short of Caol Ila's standard releases. It's not bad whisky, in fact a bit of water brightens it up, but there's a wealth of better Caol Ila options out there.

Availability - Secondary market
Pricing - ???
Rating - 82

Mathilda and Papa Eat Kit Kats, Part Four

The fourth in a series of relevant tasting notes:

Caol Ila 29 year old 1990 Gordon & MacPhail, cask 19/139

While Whisky Nerds, the bottler of Monday's Caol Ila, has been in the game for about five years, today's Caol Ila comes from a company that's been releasing single malts for over a century. Like so many early whisky companies, Gordon & MacPhail, got their start in the wine and grocery business in the 19th century. John Urquhart and his family later brought the company into the whisky business and have since kept G&M at the top. The last I'd checked, they were the only, or one of the only, independent bottlers that still had filling contracts with distilleries. Thus G&M's single malts are in their possession, their warehouses, from the start.

Though I have more respect for G&M than nearly all other indie bottlers, nary a single one of their contemporary releases has WOWed me. I'm not talking about their '70s and '80s bottlings, because whisky production before 1980 was so different than today's that the results were almost a different fluid. Instead I'm referring to G&M releases from the past two decades. The pre-2018 Connoisseur's Choice range was always so-so to decent, while their single casks had few duds, yet no titans. That changed this weekend.

Distillery: Caol Ila

Region: Islay

Independent Bottler: Gordon & MacPhail

Age: 29 years old (1990 to 9 Sept 2019)

Maturation: refill American hogshead
Cask #: 13/139
Outturn: 148 bottles

Alcohol by Volume: 48.8%
(from a bottle split)

NOTES

The nose starts with a heavy, almost-Laphroaig, peat that gradually recedes into the rest of notes. Lots of fruits, think peach skins, lemon zest and plum juice. Iodine and shellfish. Dark chocolate and a crisp sauvignon blanc. I got lost in the palate for a bit, and I'm pretty sure I wrote some of these notes with my eyes closed. Roasted cashews and pumpkin seeds. Savory smoke, black walnuts, blue cheese and sea salt. Bonfire smoke, stones, lime juice, salty shellfish and hint of fresh stone fruit sweetness. The finish mirrors the palate, focusing on the savory notes, adding in some charred beef. A mix of minerals and peaches. And that morning-after-a-beach-bonfire note I've found in my favorite '90s Ardmores.

WORDS WORDS WORDS

The devil on my shoulder told me not to post this review until I secured a bottle, but it's $400 and there are only 147 bottles other than the one which I'd already split with folks. So screw him. This is a brilliant whisky from a stellar, well-managed cask. It pulls the best elements of Allied Lyons-era distillery mates Laphroaig and Ardmore into a savory, coastal, grown-up Caol Ila affair that is difficult to surpass in 2020 or any other year. This is a big win for the indie grandpa.

Availability - It's out there
Pricing - €350-€400
Rating - 92

Caol Ila 28 year old 1990 Whisky Nerds, cask 13129

The Whisky Nerds bottling outfit seems to be well loved in European anorak circles. Maybe it's because the company is run by former geeks, maybe it's the romanticism of "Nerd" status, or maybe they pick good casks. I'm not sure if any that really explains why this release is $500-$600 per bottle. That's halfway to Port Ellen territory. Folks really took all those "Forget Port Ellen, we have Caol Ila!" blog articles to heart. Unlike the rest of the Nerds bottlings, this bottle has not sold out, in fact I've seen it on sale, so perhaps a (temporary) price ceiling has been found?

Normally I save my pricing complaints for a review's conclusion, but I couldn't come up with a different introduction in time.

Distillery: Caol Ila

Region: Islay

Independent Bottler: Whisky Nerds

Age: 28 years old (30 Nov 1990 - 11 Feb 2019)

Maturation: refill Oloroso sherry hogshead
Cask #: 13129
Outturn: 192 bottles

Alcohol by Volume: 48%
(from a bottle split)

NOTES

It's not a subtle cask, but the spirit's will is strong. The nose leads with roasted nuts, cinnamon syrup, manure and smoked salmon. A mix of candy canes and coal smoke in the background. Meanwhile, the palate registers more complexity than the nose. Milk chocolate, lemons and tangy oranges. Jalapeños, wood smoke, aged Parmesan and black walnuts. It gets sweeter with time but also holds onto those peppery and savory notes. It finishes sweet and peppery with some savory dried herbs, then almond extract, wood smoke and pickles.

WORDS WORDS WORDS
This Caol Ila was bottled right in my preferred ABV range (46-50) so I didn't add water, sorry. I enjoyed the savory notes, but also wished the nose's smoked salmon and manure notes showed up as well. The cask refused to hush up with all the nuts, chocolate and sweetness though luckily it never took over. I'm nitpicking here, really. This is a very good, fully satisfying whisky which would not disappoint anyone who didn't see the price tag, but it got knocked on its ass by the Caol Ila I'm reviewing on Wednesday...

Availability - A flock of specialty retailers in continental Europe
Pricing - €450-€550
Rating - 88

Killing Whisky History, Episode 32: Jameson Irish Whiskey, 1980s versus 2020

John Jameson was not an Irishman, he was a Scot who married into whisk(e)y money but then wound up creating the most powerful Irish whiskey brand on the planet. In Episode 32, I compare a 1980s bottling with a 2020 bottling of Jameson blended whiskey.

But first, shots.