Benromach 30 Year Old

It's Christmas time and that means all the morons come out to play if you work in retail. Bosses scream that a million things need to be done last week, even if the problem has just arisen, customers have crazy expectations because it's Christmas time and by golly what they want goes.

Personally Christmas can take a long walk off a short cliff as far as I'm concerned, but hell I'm Ebenezer Scrooge as far as most people are concerned.

A long crappy day and I knew I needed something special to cheer me up, and I figured what could do that better then a 30 year old Speyside whisky.

A sample from one of my whisky friends, I've been saving this for a special occasion and I figured this kind of day fit the bill, a whisky to put everything into perspective.

So first thing I do when I get home is crack open the sample bottle and pour it into one of my brand new glencairns.

The whisky is a Benromach 30 year old, which recently scored a 95.5 in Jim Murray's 2014 Whisky Bible.

This whisky comes from before Gordon & MacPhail purchased the Benromach distillery, there's no peat (which makes you blink a little bit if you're used to the current Benromach range)

This whisky has been aged in first and refill sherry casks and you can tell. It's quite a bit darker then your standard Benromach, although not as dark as I first thought it would be. There's been no caramel coloring added.

I hand the glencairn off to my wife first thing and the first thing she says after nosing the whisky is "apricots"

And she's correct. This is definitely a fruity whisky, with apricots, sultanas, peaches, nectarines, mild spices, very mild, cinnamon, soft vanilla, very soft smoke, a cigar humidor, charred oak, honey, this nose is completely about subtlety, nothing is huge, nothing is massive, this is a whisky that sits there and tells you to shut up and pay attention to it, the hell with the football game.

The nose invites you in, quietly, begging you to take a taste and see if the body will be as subtle as the nose, if it'll be as quiet and complex.

Oh jesus that's delicious.

A small sip, screams for more, honey, sweetness, vanilla, drying, spices, cloves, nutmeg, cinnamon, oranges, want more, must take another sip, so very good, bitter dark chocolate, liquorice, apricots, the palate screams subtlety, it screams more, give me more.

The finish is long, so very long, with lingering spices, oak, some dark fruits, figs, and is so very dry.

Oh god where has this whisky been my entire life?! This is smashing! As my wife said those just getting into whisky would describe it as "smooth" a word that I personally hate when it comes to describing whisky, but it is indeed smooth. It's inoffensive, you could give it to anyone and they'd love it. The alcohol burn is so mild as to be a "who cares" thought, and it makes you want another sip, another drink.

This is dangerously drinkable, dangerously, which is a pity because at $400 to $500 AUS it would be so very easy to go through a bottle of this with friends. If you ever get a chance to try this whisky, do so. Simple as that. A huge thank you to Ian for the sample, you really made my day with this one!

By the way if anyone wants to buy me an awesome Christmas present, yeah I'd totally be happy with a bottle of this!

Find where to buy Benromach whisky