To ship is to embark on a voyage, and thus ''friendship'' is adequately termed. I'm not sure what everyone has been up to all day, but I know what we're doing now, and that's digging into Aberlour 12 Double Cask Matured.
A reminder for those reading through, this blog is by amateurs for amateurs, a more down to earth and relatable experience than the high flung expert tastings we commonly find online and on the back of bottles. Something you can rely on to make decisions about which scotch you want in your cabinet.
Trevor's pick here. To join him are Simon, Kyle, Sean, and Scott.
On the nose everyone can agree on the honey and fruits, perhaps apples. Simon thinks it smells like red wine. It's not very aromatic, all the odors are tamed on this one. For Sean it really comes down to the honey, both on the nose and the tongue.
Trevor and Kyle pick on some vanilla, both on the nose and the tongue.
Take this last part with a grain of malt, because until now everyone had settled on a rather plain, nice but not overly so, mix of fruit and honey sweetness with not much else to it. Simon goes off on a limb here and everyone comes around to it but it takes some convincing and even then the agreement is reluctant and subtle. We've tried a few scotches aged in sherry casks (HP 12, Glendronach 12), but for Simon, this is the first one where you can really taste it. That molasses, nutty bouquet that you get from dry fortified wines comes through for Simon in a way it hasn't in other sherry aged bottles.
The Scotch & Ponder Crew, unlike last week, really synced up on their ratings here. Sean and Scott both started off at 60 but the whisky grew on them, and Simon got them seeing into things, and so they landed on 70. Trevor and Kyle both enjoyed it, also rating it a 70, and Simon tried this before, originally gave it a mid-70s but isn't quite finding as strong flavors as he remembers, and brings it down to a 66. We average out to 69.2. Our total average rating is 72.
At $66C this is a well valued bottle. It's a good scotch with autumn flavors. We wouldn't recommend it right away, but if you're some ways into your scotch journey and you want to try a new bottle on a budget by all means, no wasted money here.
Cheers!
The S&P Crew
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