Edradour 10 Year Old

My wife got me one of the coolest Christmas presents ever! A whisky advent calender. A calender made up of 24 different whiskies, from all different countries, all different whisky regions, all different ages and strengths. Including a 50 year old Speyside!

Each calender is different, with different samples in each calender, and I immediately loved this calender enough that I requested 2 more calenders.

Lots of different distilleries, Talisker, Glenfarclas, Tobermory, Aberlour, Caol Ila, Bowmore, Four Roses, Wild Turkey!

So many different whiskies, so little time.

So I'm finishing working my way through the entry level whiskies and the last one on the list.

Edradour 10 year old.

Edradour, the smallest distillery in Scotlands, a Highlands distillery.

I've seen the bottles before, they have a tendency to draw one's eye, but I've never got a chance to try it.

Until now.

So this evening when I got home I cracked the sample bottle open and poured the contents into a glencairn, it pours a copperish color, with not very many legs.

Nosing the glencairn the first thing that hits me is it's spice. Lots of spice, cinnamon, nutmeg, then it moves sweet with honey and then goes floral with apple blossoms, fruity with citrus and some vanilla at the end.

A fairly complex nose, especially for a 10 year old, I really enjoy the brief burst of apple blossoms personally.

Time for a taste though!

Mmmm really not sure how much I care for this!

Flavors are oaky, then it shifts into a dry floral apple and cinnamon sequence. Very dry.

The oak at least initially overpowers all the other flavors and makes it mildly unpleasant at times. The whisky does improve, but that initial burst of oak is quite dry and bitter.

The finish moves to a sweet apple pie suggestion with apples, cinnamon, and vanilla. A little sweet and quite pleasant.

Now I've never seen Edradour before in Australia, however I'd guess that if you could find it over here you'd be looking at an $80 or so bottle, which at that price I'd much rather pick up a Highland Park, Ardbeg, Glenfarclas, Talisker, you get the point. The nose on this whisky is quite nice and interesting, but that initial oak bitterness sort of kills the whisky pleasure for me. Maybe if you were to oxidize the bottle a bit it might lessen that bitterness, but at this stage I'd pass on picking up a bottle of this.

Find where to buy Edradour whisky