Tobermory 15 Year Old

My wife bought me a whisky Advent calender from Master of Malt for Christmas. 24 different whiskies from all around the world, all different styles, all different ages, it's enough to make me giggle!

I'd started working my way through the calender, focusing on entry level single malts, blends and lower level abv whiskies, and now I'd slowly started working my way through some of the higher level whiskies, specifically one that had me intrigued.

Tobermory 15 year old.

An Island distillery from the Isle of Mull.

I've never tried Tobermory before, had only heard of it in passing, so I was quite keen to crack open the sample and get into it.

Bottled at 46.3% ABV and a dark golden color this whisky looks so inviting.

So let's start this bad boy up! I wound up sampling this whisky over the course of a day and a half over roughly 3 hours, over the course of which this whisky continued to evolve, stupidly so at times.

The sample was covered with a glencairn cover when I wasn't actually tasting it for the record.

The nose was stupidly complex, starting off oaky and then sweet and fruity, with figs, plums, raisins, all aspects of it's sherry influence, hints of cocoa appear and then it then slowly moves to a slight peaty influence, then spicy, but as time goes by a few wisps of smoked meat appears and then it goes to spicy oranges.

Very sexy. The nose alone makes me want to pick up a bottle of this!

Time for a taste!

Big strong sexy flavors of the fruits and oak are all over the palate, big enough that I'm taken aback just a little bit. Just a wee bit stronger then 46% and it's got so much flavor, it's so big that I'm blown away. The oak and sweet fruit slowly moves into hints of the cocoa that was on the nose, just a wee bit, at times it's almost like a memory of a memory of the cocoa, then the actual cocoa. The spices are present, at times cinnamon, hints of nutmeg, but it never moves into overpowering.

The finish is spicy, but now is the time when I'm actually saying to myself "I know I'm in the Islands" it goes a little salty with brine and just a hint of that peat rearing up it's little head again.

Holy crap this is an awesome whisky! And so far in all the whiskies out of this advent calender this is the clear winner. Blowing everything else out of the water.

However all this beauty comes at a price, at least in Australia it does. $140 Aussie dollars, but hey quality does cost. And I've had quite a few whiskies that were that expensive or even more so that weren't worth the price. This one is!

If you get a chance to try this whisky, do it!!

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