Old Ballantruan

The Old Ballantruan is a peated malt produced by the Tomintoul distillery and owes its name to the waters of the Ballantruan Spring, nestling in the Cromdale Hills close to Tomintoul. The NAS version has been around for quite some time, while the new 10 year old has just been released in the UK at The Whisky Exchange show down in London, and now available also on the TWE site. The launch of this new one is the reason we convened for the twitter tasting in the first place. Always cool to be one of the first to try a new malt. What caught my eye immediately was the fact that it’s bottled at 50% ABV, very nice.

Nose: Soap, Mezcal , campfire on a sandy beach, sugar icing, Banana peal,smoke, and a lot of youngish sweet malty sort of stuff.grilled fish too. lovely stuff. Sturdy and manly.

Palate: Dry smoke, earthy and peaty but not medicinal at all. crushed black pepper, with a lot of sweet cereal goodness and Barley sugars popping in.getting earthier and bitter towards the end.A very different palate than Islays, but very nice

Finish : The finish is bitter, with bitter wood, earth, and pepper. some espresso! double espresso, that is.

A very rustic ,earthy dram, manly and rough but in a nice way