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Talisker 25yo
Island Single Malt Whisky bot. 2004
57.8%
abv £110
£180 (USD)
Readers of this blog will know I am not a peat freak but I do find Talisker to have the most sublime balance of sweetness and peatiness, so much so that I picked the 10yo and the 18yo as two of the best whiskies I ever tried here on the mission (The Tops So Far II). Yes, some find it too sweet, but that is the is part of the fun! If we all agreed, tasting and sharing impressions would be a pretty boring exercise. Perhaps, for some, it remains so.
I had a great email from a guy some time ago asking "what does Talisker mean?" cuz it was one of his names. The name Talisker comes from "Thallas Geir", meaning "sloping rock/land of stones". It is the only distillery on the Isle of Skye and it receives over 40,000 visitors per year. One visitor was Robert Louis Stevenson, who refered to it in A Scotsman's Return from Abroad(1880), writing, "....the King o' drinks, as I conceive it, Talisker, Islay, or Glenlivet." Worth noting, of course, that at the time "Islay" and "Glenlivet" would have referred to areas of production (the isle of Islay and the region of Speyside) and thus Talisker is the sole named distillery dubbed "the King o' drinks."
Had a more recent bottling of this expression back HERE. For more distillery info and for all Taliskers had on the mission, click HERE.
TASTING NOTES:
Initially bright, liquid sunshine, but dry. Then gets juicy with cream, cloves, and shortbread. Aromatic sweet and fruity smokiness like pipe smoke, some synthetic fruitiness like shampoo or green gummy bears. Smoke again and still.
Big and bourbony, but salty. Grows sweet and creamy with emerging spices (cloves again, white pepper?) and a lemony brininess. The smokiness is very earthy, like burnt celeriac or parsnips.
SUMMARY:
First impressions left me wanting more in the finish, a final denoument in the realm of sweet but all I get is oak and vegatal smokiness. So be it. A punchy and bright Talisker even at such a ripe old age. Currently 20% off at The Whisky Exchange.
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Talisker 1982, 25yo
Island Single Malt Whisky
58.1% abv
£120
During the late 1980s, DIAGEO introduced what would become the benchmark expressions of single malt whiskies from six single malt distilleries under the CLASSIC MALTS name. Without doubt, and giving credit where credit is due, this played a part in fostering the growing interest in malt whiskies during this period. One product of this surge of interest was the introduction of DIAGEO's RARE MALTS range, a series of rarer whiskies begun in 1995 but discontinued in 2005 as stocks declined, after all, RARE MALTS are by definition an exhaustible resource.
The interest in unusual, distinctive, older and unrepeatable cask strength bottling also saw a rise in the 21st century and to satisfy this demand and move some of the stocks from warehouses across Scotland, DIAGEO's SPECIAL RELEASES was born. The first of these was a 28yo Talisker in 2001, initially priced at £495 and now, if you can find the stuff, fetching at least 3 times that amount. Obviously, it was decided that these SPECIAL RELEASES were a good idea. A Port Ellen 22yo (now in it's 7th release and aged 28yo) and a Talisker 25 followed and both also sold out quickly. The demand was obviously present and the special releases have continued annually ever since. There are a total of 59 bottlings in this elite range to date. So demand is certainly present, the challenge has been to maintain supply, and the quality of that supply. By all accounts, Nick Morgan and DIAGEO have done brilliant job at this.
This 25yo Talisker is the ninth offering from the only distiller on the Isle of Skye in the Special Releases range and is one of 6,894 bottles. For more distillery info and for past expressions from Talisker had on the mission, click HERE.
Guest-tasted today by TF (cuz I wanted post on this baby and wasn't invited to the launch or get drops through the post. Oh well). Thanks, mate. With only a laugh and more clarity intended, I will translate of few of his 'local' descriptors.
TASTING NOTES:
Rich, sweet. Golden syrup, brown sugar, sticky home-made gingerbread, with sweet oak lurking in the background. Peat, white pepper. Clearly a few top-quality sherry casks in the mix.
All the flavours from the nose, but with an extra smack of coal and dry peat, rounded by a fabulously delicate honeysuckle. Full and rich, silky smooth but packing a great chewy, peppery punch. The spices are perfect. Finish is long, strong and somehow manages to be both brash and graceful at the same time, like a ballerina with a Mohican (British term for the hairstyle that some/most call a mowhawk). The spices and the sherry are perfectly complemented by the succulent peat.
SUMMARY:
Wow. Just stunning. Phwoarr!! (another Briticism, the kind of term you see printed across the bottom of a picture of a topless footballer/soccer player or actor from LOST, etc.). Gorgeous nose, even better on the palate! This is sumptuous stuff.
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Talisker 18yo
Island Single Malt Whisky
45.8% abv
£38
$94.50(CAD)
$75(USD)
Tasted blind by a bunch of whisky folk, this was awarded Best Whisky in the World at The World Whisky Awards 2007. The 30 friends who got together while I was in Toronto to have a tasting a few weeks ago thought it was pretty darn tasty, too. This week we have been reliving that tasting one dram at a time.
Talisker is currently the only distillery on the Isle of Skye and is bottled at the unusual strength of 45.8% by its owners. It has been a part of Diageo's Classic Malts Selection since 1987. When the still house was burnt down in 1960, the distillery fell silent for 2 years. The phenolic content of the malt (peat level) is 25-30 ppm(parts per million). To make relative sense of that, Charlie Maclean has a formulation: 1ppm in a 700ml bottle of whisky is like 10 minutes in 20 years. So what makes more of an impact, 5 hours of the past 20 years of your life or the peat in that dram of Talisker you're drinking right now?
Notes in quotes are from folks at the tasting. All Talisker we've had on the mission can be read HERE.
TASTING NOTES:
"Bitter dark chocolate" cinnamon tea, dark rum, vanilla. A little orange zest, creamy bourbon element. Some folks got salt from coastal aromas, others got salt from licorice. "Can I say smoke and cherries? cuz they seem to go together. Sweet smoke." Time brought out more peat and bonfire on the beach-type of aromas.
Gorgeous creaminess, but with an oaky bite up front, green bitternes, raw celery. "Its definitely got that book mustiness"
"Ooo, very sweet. Saccrin and cherry. Once you swallow you get that bitterness. Blunt smoke. Two tones."
Immensely drinkable and full of tasty oak influence. Honey cured ham and toffee. Pepper late in the game.
SUMMARY:
Delicious, but a bit too sweet for some. For me, the pepper and bitter rootiness helped rein-in the luscious vanilla and bourbon sweetness creating a dangerously drinkable treat. Well-rounded, beautifully crafted stuff. Very fair price, too!
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Talisker 10
Single Malt Scotch Whisky
45.8% abv
£28
$66.70(CAD)
$57(USD)
The distillery is still the only one on Skye and was built in 1830. It changed hands and was renovated a few times before 1915 when a consortium including John Dewar & Sons and John Walker & Sons took it over. Until 1928, Talisker triple distilled their spirit. The distillery was badly damaged by a fire in 1960 and 5 replacement stills, exact replicas, had to be made. Five is a strange number, and Talisker is one of only two distilleries (the other being Macduff/Glen Deveron) that uses two wash and three spirit stills.
Talisker has been a big part of Johnnie Walker blends for over 80 years and the JW 'striding man' logo was on the Talisker label until the 1980s. Talisker sticks to its alcohol level of 45.8%. This is 80 proof in the Sikes hydrometer system. Originally, distilled spirits were “proved” by dissolving gunpowder in the spirit and trying to ignite it. If it burned evenly and steadily, the spirit was "proven." By Sike's hydrometer, proven spirits were at least 57.1% alcohol by volume. The British proof system is built on this number. “Proof” spirits, or 100-proof spirits, are 57.1% alcohol by volume. Basically, to find out British proof, multiply the %abv by 1.75 and you will get a rough idea of its proof. So Talisker 45.8%abv is 80 proof, Glenfarclas 105 is 60%abv, etc.
Talisker 10yo has won the trophy for best single malt under 12 SIX times at the International Wine & Spirit Competition, more than any other malt. It also is the whisky that convinced Kristin back in 2003 that she could like whisky.
TASTING NOTES:
Deep, warm sweetness of baked pears and sweet potatoes. Really incredible. Some creamy sherry with a sort of sourness that is sometimes in Chinese food. Sweet and spicy like red peppers and vinegar, tabasco. A smoky element throughout that is throughly exciting, never outpowering any of the other scents, just complimenting them like smoke from a peat fire on the beach wafting downshore.
Much more smoke on the palate. It almost billows in your mouth. Wow. Multi-dimensional. Raw almonds, vanilla and dough. Woody and peppery. Long finish of smoke, dried legumes(beans and stuff), raw green peppers.
SUMMARY:
I often forget how great this whisky is. It really impressed me today. It is big and satisfying and rich and dense and very well constructed in that it sits in great balance in the mouth, without any flavours ever being out of place or too overpowering. Also, in my experience hosting tastings, it is an amazingly approachable whisky for the new whisky drinker (once you exlplain them that smoke is only an element in some whiskies and not to hold it against the spirit at large) before trying an Ardbeg or something.The only distillery on the isle of Skye and the only one that combines the kinds of flavours that it does. Great value, too, especially for the 18yo. Second helpings, please?
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