Last week saw Piping [...]
Islay Whisky Fest 2009-Ardbeg Day
By Ian
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As you can see from the attached pictures we had the best ever weather during this festival, sunny with a light wind, and not a midge in sight.We began the day with a quick look and purchase at the Islay brewery before setting off for Ardbeg.Dropped into Laphroaig for a dram of the new 12 year old Cairdeas, gaelic for friendship, very nice, very friendly….The sign as you go into the distillery states they only use first fill casks for their maturations, impressive and given the great flavour you get from their 10 year old I believe them.They also have their own peatfields which produces a specific type of peat that is very much part of the Laphroaig flavour.
Stopped in at Lagavulin for a quick photograph given the blue skys, an unusual phenomenon for Islay.
Met up with a few friends at Ardbeg who coincidentally had samples of the lagavulin festival whisky, a sixteen year old wholly matured in oloroso casks, the sherry was very prominent and gave the lagavulin the complexity that it has long lacked. They also had the caol Illa 12 created for the festival, it tasted a wee bit spirity with hints of sherry.
Tried the bruichladdich Octomore, quadrupled peated at 131ppm phenols and 63.5 abv, very spirity still as it’s only five years old. Price £80
Ardbeg
The Ardbeg tasting we signed up for was run by Mike Heads, the Distillery Manager.
They produced a total of fourteen different Ardbeg bottlings from which the audience chose six for the session.
The whiskies were;
The Lord of the Isles, a 25 year old, pretty straightforward, well matured, peaty flavours cutting in after the typical Ardbeg spicyness, my least favourite (but still very good) of the six.
The second sample was a 16 year old single cask No 772 @ 55.7%. , fragrant and a spicy sweetness, my number three choice.
The third sample was a Single cask matured in new American Oak which was toasted, the cask No. was 1189. This worked really well with the new oak imparting maximum spicyness and vanilla, if we had tried this on the mainland with an unpeated the new oak would have overwhelmed the whisky, I think.
I placed this one in fifth place.
Our next two samples were both filled into European oak in 1975 and matured alongside each other for their entire maturation, despite that they were hugely different the first, cask no 1375 had strong vanilla and slight hints of sherry, and bottled at 54.2, the second, cask no 1378 was much better with a christmas cake flavour, a great balance beteen the sherry and the peatiness, bottled at 53.7 . This was my number one choice with the sister cask my number two.
The final sample was a 14 year old called the warehousemans choice. Bottled at 53.0 matured in first fill bourbon, sweet, spicy and well balanced versus the peat.
Beyond the sampling we tried Airigh nam Beist also known as big Beastie, bottled at 46, nice dram, well balanced and typical for Ardbeg.
Casks 1189 and 1190, both 1998 fillings were sold out within the first couple of hours of the festival as was their Supernova, a nine year old bottling @ 58.9 abv and 101 ppm phenols.
The first two sold at £130 and the Supernova at £90.
We had a fabulous day at Ardbeg, the people, the Distillery crew led by Mickey and the sunshine, all blended together to bring to an end a marvellous four days on Islay.
A stunning suny afternoon at Ardbeg
The Islay Crew at Ardbeg
A typical peat field on Islay
8 Apr 10