Century Reserve 21 Years Old

Century Reserve Whiskies are distilled at the Highwood Distillery in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. The reviewed bottle has been open for 4 1/2 months.

Colour: very pale

Nose: delicate, floral, with grapes and other light fruit, strawberries, and honey. Pleasant and understated.

Taste: first, fruits: apple, apricot and nectarine, sour peach, and strawberries. There are strong sweet and strong sour flavours rather well balanced against one another. At 4 1/2 months the flavours are much much stronger and more interesting than when the bottle was first opened. What you don't taste, even after 21 years of aging, is any real wood flavours. The bottle label alludes to "...lingering malt and oak finish." I don't taste either oak or malt in the Century Reserve 21 yo. As is common with Canadian whiskies, the grain mashbill is undisclosed. Wheat and barley are apparently present, with wheat apparently the most prominent grain component. Upon first opening this bottle, the whisky was pleasant but very restrained and understated. At 4 1/2 months the flavours are now more apparent, but the grain contents and techniques of production are still somewhat obscure. This is pleasant enough whisky, but is not compelling in any sense.

Finish: a good finish, long, with the flavours holding up well together.

Balance: The sweetness is very well balanced against the sour citrus flavours. Balance in the sense of grain flavours balanced against wood flavours is lacking here, because there are no real wood flavours to be encountered in this whisky.