Blind Bottle Review & Reveal | 48.5% ABV

Score: 6/10

**Good stuff.**
***TL;DR***
*Surprising, great whisky, poor taster*

A Fabulous Lack of Transparency!

When it comes to whisky I’m a fervent believer in transparency. Same for wine, beer, or anything really. I have no care for what the marketing departments of the corporations have to say; I’m interested in hard cold facts.

Age, distillery name, fermentation time, exact cask type… you know the drill. I don’t think I’m alone in this and I believe the modern whisky drinker is on average much more educated than, say, twenty years ago. To coincide, we’ve never had such a plethora of available whisky, be it from indies or direct from the distillers themselves.

With this proverbial whisky loch of choice in front of us, the punters, deciding which whisky to buy is, at least in my case, a very Cartesian task. I’ve got no time for the fancy sales blurb. I’m simply asking: is the whisky any good?

Almost equally importantly, is it presented in the way that I like? I often don’t get the chance to taste whisky before buying it, so if none of my whisky pals have tried the bottle I’m eyeing at any given moment, I will decide to buy it or not purely based on those transparency specs: cask type, distillery, and absence of chill filtration and colouring as well as where it’s from.

Some whisky producers cater to similarly-minded drammers pretty well: the vast majority of the indie bottlers first and foremost, as these are companies run by passionate whisky drinkers like us. But also, pretty much all the ‘new wave’ distillers like Glasgow, Lochlea, Daftmill or Torabhaig, to name but a few. Ardnamurchan has even implemented blockchain transparency, accessed through a QR code on the back of the bottle leading you to webpages and pdf files filled to the brim with technical data. Whisky geek’s paradise.

Let’s contrast that with what’s actually mandatory to put on a Scotch whisky label:

The category of the product: Blended or single, malt or grain
‘Product of Scotland’
ABV
Volume of the liquid
Address of the bottler/parent company
And a few official logos and required legal information: recycling, pregnancy, etc.

No mention of region, peat level, maturation… If a hypothetic bottler stuck to these obligatory mentions exclusively we’d be left in the dark. Almost like… blind tasting.

Wouldn’t that be fun?

Review

Thompson Brothers Mystery Malt, Series 3, 48.5% ABV
£65 now sold out

A few weeks ago I went to a whisky club night. I’ve mentioned my Parisian whisky club in these pages several times. We’re a bunch of around a dozen whisky nerds, from all types of backgrounds, and we gather far too less often than what we ought to. Here’s the setup: one of the persons not coming to the club night will be designated as in charge of the line-up. All those coming send him a wee private message with the bottle (or bottles) they intend to bring - no restriction here; it doesn’t even need to be whisky - and said line-up manager links each bottle with a number, and decides on a tasting order.

On the night, we gather around a nice table in a restaurant or wine bar, and we have a three-course meal over the course of which we try the whiskies blind, each trying to guess what has been brought by the others completely blind. Some even go far to ensure bottle anonymity. Once, as an example, an Octomore wielding friend of mine had decanted it into a 20cl bottle just so that the bottle shape in the sock wouldn’t give it away. In the end, very few guesses are correct, though we do get close quite often, but it’s always been a blast. We’re serious about having fun.

Last time, there were only four of us, due to various agenda complications. We decided to each bring two bottles, so that we could have a little variety. Some stunning drams were offered - two 20yo+ Highland Parks, a great Moine bottled by Hidden spirits, 2002 vintage PX and a mature Indiana bourbon. I myself brought two quite different malts: a recently acquired (and reviewed) 20yo Auchentoshan, and a demijohn peated and blended malt by Cadenhead’s.

You could expect any of those drams to be voted best at the end of the night, but it was the two drams brought by my pal Tom that were the most interesting: two 43%, chill-filtered, and, for one of them, coloured whiskies. One was Nikka’s 21yo Taketsuru blended malt. When trying it blind, I remember feeling like I would happily pay around 60€ for it, and that it was a bit young and jaggy, but enjoyable. Good whisky for sure, but when it was revealed to be a 400+€ collectible from Japan our jaws dropped in disappointment. I would advise you to stay clear of this, unless you can find it for fifty quid.

What I would advise you to do though, is to try the other whisky he brought. We tried it first, as the opener for the flight. Immediately, those like me who were not in the know whispered and muttered; ‘what an exceptional sherry cask’, ‘it smells divine’, ‘surely European oak, maybe a real bodega cask’, ‘more than 30yo for sure’, ‘delicate and refined’, ‘9/10 material’. The whole table was in agreement. What was this stunning whisky then, dear reader? Well, it was the one we all like to complain about. The one distillery very few of us actually bought a bottle from in recent years, mainly due to premiumisation.

I’ll wait until the end of the review to share what this marvel was, so that I’m not the only one who could try and hazard a guess today.

For now, let’s just say that this was a massive surprise for me and the others around the table, and that it was proof, as if we needed one, that blind tasting is the best way to assess a spirit.

And so, what better to celebrate blind tasting than to open a bottle from the Mystery Malt introduced by the Thompson Brothers this year? Wally very kindly offered it to me back in Glasgow, and I luckily managed to find a spot for it in the suitcase. No dirty undies were harmed in the process.

It’s been sufficiently long so that I don’t clearly remember exactly what whiskies were part of release #3. I only recall that there were a few Clynelishes (Clynelishs, Clynelishii?), a previously reviewed old Speyside, a 33yo Secret Islay - wouldn’t that be glorious - and maybe a Torabhaig and a Raasay. Though those could have been part of an earlier batch. See, I don’t remember. And that’s fun!

I will try it blind, hazard a guess, then I’ll look at what it could be, decide to change my guess or not, and make the reveal only after. It’s all about personal suspense today.

Nose

First of all, colour-wise, it looks deep golden. That really doesn’t help, other than it is probably neither a fourth fill hogshead nor a wet first fill PX. Could be anything. No cheat code here!

Then, is it peaty? It doesn’t seem so at first pass. It does smell like it’s got a bit of age as well. A good balance between spirit character and a delicate cask influence. Maybe refill Oloroso? I’m getting ahead of myself though.

Hints of various spice, along with sultanas, dried dates and candied citrus. Old bruised apples and pears. It noses really well. Pear syrup infused with Ceylon cinnamon. I definitely think there’s sherry in there, but it’s subtle. Set caramel. Herbal honey. Ice cream on a still warm tarte tatin. A hint of clove.

With water: A bit more sweetness now. Fudge, brownies. Sticky toffee pudding. Maybe a bit of wax, but is it me trying to find a Clynelish?

Palate

Echoing the nose. Soft but enveloping, cider apples, dusty cellar, and damp leaves. It does indeed smell like a mature malt (God I hope it’s not some 3yo Holyrood in a wine cask). I’d say around 20 years or more in refill sherry, unpeated. There’s a kind of an old wood bitterness on the finish. In spite of its delicate profile, it does have a bit of a spice/alcohol tingle on arrival.

With water: A bit fresher and brighter, but the bitterness becomes slightly distracting now. I prefer it neat.

The Dregs

Regardless of what it is, it’s a great whisky I definitely wouldn’t have minded paying 65 quid for. An easy 6/10, and only the bitterness on the palate prevents it climbing up to a 7. I would guess a mature Highlander or Speysider in refill sherry, but pinpointing a distillery is hard. Brackla? Braeval? Allt-a-Bhainne? Let’s look at the possibilities:

Judging by the whiskies on offer, I think it could be:

Bruichladdich 21yo: I’ve encountered that woody side before in old Bruichladdies (what a day for distillery plurals)
Speyside 27yo
Tobermory 24yo
Glenrothes 27yo

The fact that they just mentioned ‘hogshead’ for quite a few of these makes for a lot of possible candidates. If I had to guess one, I’d say Bruichladdich.

Now for the reveal…

WHAT?!

Well, at least that’s proof I didn’t cheat! That’s literally one of the last ones I would have guessed. This distillery is a first for me, but I might try and hunt some Annandales from now on… I’m a bit disappointed I didn’t get an old gem, but in the end I got a 7yo that kinda tastes like one. A testimony to the brothers’ ability in selecting casks.

After such an embarrassing ending, let’s also reveal what the bottle was during my club night tasting: none other than Macallan’s double oaked 18yo at 43%. Way too expensive I agree, but a stellar whisky. Do try it at a bar if you get the chance.

This time, we’re gonna listen to the aptly named song Slow learner by Swedish band Viagra Boys. 3:36 is just the time I need to flee in shame and hide somewhere anyways. God what an embarrassment.

As if to rub a little pleasant salt into the wounds, that lovely bottle I was sipping with friends? A Macallan 18yo Official Release. I know.

Score: 6/10

Tried this? Share your thoughts in the comments below. AF

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