Small Batch Series | 53.3% ABV

Score: 7/10

**Very Good Indeed.**
***TL;DR***
*Apples, apples, apples*

There Can Be Only One

In the yawning chasm of space that has appeared since my last rant, several noteworthy things have happened.

The first is the shocking injustice of Hollywood descending upon the Misty Isle, ruthlessly punting tourists from the island’s hotspots with nary a warning, all for the reboot of Highlander.

The prospect of sighting Henry Cavill’s abs has kept most locals awake at night, and as the Bride’s Veil Falls is converted to a behemoth stage worthy of Cavill’s period-correct booties, the visiting tourists are discovering with horror that their free overnight parking haunts are now closed for business.

It’s a tough situation for them, but catching a glimpse of the Tartan Superman is surely worth disgruntled rent-a-mob motorhomes having to pony up for campsites to pitch their self-sufficient torture boxes?

Well, I think so anyway - giving something back to the local economy instead of whizzing around snapping sunroof selfie-pole drive-by blurry iPhone shots so that the magic they missed in real life can be relived through a greasy cracked 6.2” OLED screen. Look, there behind the spiderweb of refracting lines - that’s the Old Man of Storr.

It’s really exciting for me, seeing first-hand the amount of work that goes on behind the scenes, by grips and engineers, to delicately, respectfully and temporarily convert the naturally shoogly Instahoot inspirational deathtraps into a safe stage upon which superstardom can stride to deliver a moving performance. The magnitude of planning involved to make sure no trace remains is genuinely awe-inspiring.

It makes me wonder how any actor can deliver convincing dialogue when they’re standing upon an astroturfed MDF platform suspended 30ft in the air beside a now positively geysering waterfall, on account of the sudden torrential downpour, as the upwards trending rain pelts their dreamy eyeballs. My mother-in-law, who unfortunately moved to the touristy side of the island, reported that they had two horses up there the other day. Horses!

Yesterday I bumped into one of my neighbours, who mentioned that the last time Hollywood rode into town he was drafted as gopher for the cast and crew, ferrying them to and from the Quiraing. The best part, he reminisced, was the unfettered access to the catering trucks. Every day he’d arrive back home, lucrative paycheck in pocket, with a belly full to the gunwales of lobster and shrimp. “Aye, it was a fine time.”

You know, Skye is a massive island. Surely there are places that are not on tourists’ radars that offer similar backdrops without all this upheaval? I suppose the tourist board wants fodder for drawing more punters to town, although with the state of Bosville Terrace in Portree right now, where even a fully kilted Cavill could comfortably lie down inside the potholes, it’s likely the Hollywood money will bypass the road crew currently resurfacing a perfectly surfaced A87 to Uig.

Locals chat. I love it. I absolutely beam when talking about stuff happening just around the corner from me with neighbours, here on the Island of the Mist. Mrs Crystal and I had a thrilling moment of wondering whether one of the A-listers might have booked our wee bothy under a pseudonym and there I’d be, eating my porridge in my pants, watching a hairy Henry preparing his morning quinoa-infused digest-o-shake from my living room at 8x magnification. Imagine that!?

One day in the future I’ll watch the Highlander reboot and remember the day I saw a crew member, folded in half by the ever-increasing weight of a sopping wet faux-field rug strapped to his back, shuffle up the stairs at Kilt Rock. I’ll look for his name in the credits - the Grass Man.

Review

Glasgow 1770, Small Batch Series, White Port Finish, Triple-distilled, 4y 7m in Bourbon, 1y 7m in French Oak White Port, 730 bottles, 53.3% ABV
£62

As all that has been going on, out of the blue a Glasgow Distillery shaped box arrived at my door via the Dramface Anonymous Deflection System. With an excitement second only to the thought of Cavill’s calves straining in his morning sunshine warmup, I ripped open the paper to find a bottle from their new spring outturn Small Batch range - in my case a White Port Cask Finish. I wonder if Henry has tried proper whisky yet? I’ll ask him.

White Port is a cask that I’ve had great enjoyment from, especially so deployed by Glen Garioch, matching beautifully up with the purple haze of yeasty, buttery distillate in a way that makes my ears glow. It’s not a cask often seen in whiskyville, but the use of weird casks for maturing whisky, and the celebration of the weirdness that they might bring, is surely one of Glasgow Distillery’s defining characteristics.

Sure, we’ve seen Raasay deploy their fungus-amongus tri-state rippled dapple oak and wondered just why their distillery prices remain so high, and watched Billy Walker fire all manner of regional oaks at his sherried business, and enjoyed many a wine and sherry casked funker, but Glasgow are coming out with some real belters right now.

Where else can you enjoy a whisky finished in Passito di Caluso? Isn’t that what you use for bolognese? Or their Golden Beer, Tequila, Calvados, Pineau des Charentes, Constantia and Syrah finishes? I know they’re all types of wine or agave casks that others are offering too, but Glasgow is doing it better. Just do a Dramface search for “1770”, we’ve covered a fair few now across the team.

Maybe I’m just impressed with the big words or specificity of the cask - it’s not just red wine, it’s Syrah. It’s not just any old dessert wine, it’s Constantia from South Africa, a wine strain only re-introduced after a devastation of the grape from phylloxera. I’m sure Tyree would be better placed to tell you more, but still. Glasgow are picking some really interesting casks to mature their spirit in.

And what a spirit Glasgow has. On the one hand there’s the ultra-clean, glowingly bright triple-distilled whisky (of which today’s expression is an example), which sings like a delicate floral angel. On the other hand they have some of the mankiest, dirty drams around - the Passito di Caluso generous sample that arrived alongside the 70cl White Port bottle, is like sucking on Cavill’s freshly laid pothole. Yet remains moreish and sweet and decadent at the same time.

The White Port Cask Finish deploys Glasgow’s heavenly triple-distilled spirit for 4 years and 7 months in big bourbs barrels before being thrust into French oak White Port hogsheads for a further 1 year and 7 months, making this a 6 year old whisky. Because of that, I suspect some of the zingy youth will remain, and for that I’m especially excited. 730 bottles from this outturn, presented as always in Glasgow’s inimitable art-deco fluted bottle that just makes it into the acceptable height range. If it were a bawhair taller, I’d be livid.

No sign of Cavill yet, so I’ll have to go it alone, for now.

Nose

Tame. Clean, juicy. Orchards - apples mostly. Sweet, stewed, honeyed. Hint of match strike paper. Salted caramel Fuji. Maybe a truffle oil? Is that madness? Freshly tilled soil. Superglue.

Palate

Holy Christmas - apples, apples, apples. Clean as a whistle. Syrupy - apple sauce. Reduction of apples. Crisp apples. Zingy apples. Apple pie. Vanilla crusts. Clean. Apples. Lots of apples.

The Dregs

You know, in a world of bourbon this, and sherry that, where we, as whisky exciters, travel into each new amber-odyssey with expectations of dried fruits or tobacco or red berries, it’s nice to have no expectations.

I know what White Ported Geery tastes like and, with the final bottle from my stash opened and sampled at length, have very recent knowledge of just how fantastic it remains. But Glasgow in White Port? I’ve no idea.

Which is why the towering, ultra-glow of apple mania arriving in my facehole like a bare-chested Connor McLeod waving a claymore around his immortal head, took me by surprise. I suspected some viscosity and cleanliness, but such a wave of saturated apple pie, baked tarts, stewed reductions and crisp, citrus crunch was a delightful surprise. It’s fizzy apple sours and toffee coated Fujis. Wet. Juicy. Zingy.

The nose reveals little, taking persuasion and some pretty heavy nose-work to unpick the notes, but the palate is gargantuan, unfettered, and despite all this Malus magnificence, that defining ultra-clean Glasgow spirit slices through the lot, imparting an experience of having gorged on all the sweet apple treats without any of the sugary overdose or clag. Quite a thing.

Texture is just enough oiliness to make the finish long and lingering, but not cloying. There’s an astringency at the death which I like, much the same as sucking on a lime brings me joy. I bet Henry likes a lime to the facepipe too. I’ll ask him.

All in all, a delicious whisky that isn’t like other whiskies but still reports as Glasgow whisky. Great stuff! Thanks to Seb and the team at Glasgow for sending me such a beauty. It’s now forever linked to that time when Superman donned our traditional dress and said “take care of her, you overdressed haggis.”

Oh, and £62? Joyful.

Supplied with thanks by Glasgow Distillery via editor Wally

Score: 7/10

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

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