Glenlivet 12 Year Old

Nose, Taste, Finish and Balance are graded out of 2.5 each:

Nose: There's a feel we've just entered a university laundromat, there's that unique dry-cleaning smell, mixed with fabric softener and soap. Once we enter the laundromat however and allow for our senses to get used to the ambient aroma, we can find banana and custard notes milling around, backed up by a slightly lost layer of aniseed and malt. 1.5

Taste: The palate does its best to make up for the nose's failings, and delivers a welcome dish of shortbread covered in marmalade and gooseberry, on a bed of very soft spice. Delivering a solid tried-and-tested Speyside repertoire is a surefire way to win back some favour from the crowd. 2.0

Finish: A slightly bitter note of pencil-lead and wooden spice lets down the palate's hard work, leaving us with a very short finale of wooden jalapeno spice and a very stingy serving of vanilla cream. 1.5

Balance: Certainly a bottle I could live without. Were I to be served it as a guest, I would still be able to find some redeeming qualities within it, however it would be a bit of an effort. The palate is admirably faithful to the Speyside tradition, even if not trying to do anything different. It's the nose and the finish though that really let the side down, giving the whisky an air of having been sloppily and hastily put together. Surely this can't have been worth a 12 year wait? 1.5

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