2025-03-27

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2025-03-27 10:46 pm

Ben Nevis 2019/2024 tasting notes

Ben Nevis 5YO Signatory Vintage 70cl 61.6% ABV
The Un-Chillfiltered Collection
Heavily Peated
Distilled January 22, 2019; bottled June 20, 2024
Cask type: Oloroso Sherry Butt
Cask no: 64

706 bottles

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Color: golden.
Nose: peat, smoke, dill, sprats in oil, shoe polish, chalk, celery stalk, nuts, red currants, fresh champignons, rosin, raisins, tea, apricots, limes, grilled pineapple, croissants, wet newspaper, tobacco, mint chewing gum, fruit yogurt, and camphor oil. With water: resin, apples, burnt paper, pears, candies, and engine oil. Really complex aroma.
Taste: smoky and oily, peat, cocoa, dark chocolate, licorice, apricots, oranges, apples, red currants, noticeable pepper, and bitterness. Hot. With water: Lugol's solution, candies, limes, lingonberries, cinnamon, and more pepper. Still quite hot.
Finish: smoke, peat, chocolate, pepper, rowan berries, cocoa, licorice, limes, coffee, and tooth powder.
Score: 8 ½. Good. +2+1+1.

Conclusion: in a blind tasting, guessing the distillery would be nearly impossible. A young malt, which is quite evident in the taste and finish, though the nose is almost mesmerizing. Water reveals some amusing nuances, but doesn't improve the overall experience. According to Ingvar Ronde, peated Ben Nevises have 40ppm in the barley. My only second such malt, with the first one tasted way back, at the end of 2011. 86/100.