Balblair 40 Year old (Speciality Drinks Ltd)

Nose:  Nutty, Oaky.  Malt and oak are well integrated.  Sherry in the back.  Strong coffee.

Palate:  Rich with lots of caraway and curry (not revealed by the nose!).  Warm feel.

Finish:  Dry oaky and spicy.

Comments:  Quite a warming fellow.  A real character.  For winter...or a rotten summer!

Score: 8.25 / 10

[These tasting notes are reproduced from Whisky Magazine Issue 65]

Nose:  Mature and deep with a superb layering effect: ripe fleshy autumn fruits.  Then fudge, citrus and a leather / bung cloth note.

Palate:  Deep with good grip.  Real power and a figgy depth, but then it lifts once more into cherry stone / maraschino.  One to sip slowly.

Finish:  Long, silky.

Comments:  Yet another superb Balblair which chimes perfectly with the official bottlings.

Score:  8.75 /10

[These tasting notes are reproduced from Whisky Magazine Issue 65]

Nose:  Wood spice, vanilla, polished wood, varnish, natural caramel, old soft leather - almost like a rancio.  Some sweet orange notes developing, with toffee , brown rock sugar, spice (clove) and a lovely raisin / fruitcake aroma.

Palate:  Big varnished oak hit, then the sweet orange and a big surge of spice & pepper.  The rest of the flavours from the nose appear in walk-on roles.  Eventually the gentlest of silky barley malt notes arrives to caress the tastebuds. 

Finish:  Fine-grained oak tannins with the spice persisting for a long while.    Great depth and balance.

Comment:  A complex, serious, masculine whisky with some glorious depths and texture.

TF 30/07/07

Balblair 40yo 1965/2007 (47.7%, Speciality Drinks Ltd - The Whisky Exchange)

A brand new bottling by our friends in London, with a different packaging.

Colour: amber.

Nose: really a carpenter’s workshop! Lots of cellulose varnish, freshly sawn oak but also old furniture, antiques… Also lots of vanilla, cloves, nutmeg, roasted nuts. The oakiness is very heavy but also extremely pleasant. This one could be mistaken for a very old and very good rum when nosed blind I think. Keeps developing on crystallised oranges and heather honey, then ripe melon and peaches as well as bananas flambéed. Gets more and more ‘old-Balblairish’ with time. Quite superb I must say.

Mouth: we’re closer to the famous 38yo OB now, with the fruitiness striking right from the start and holding out on the heavy woodiness. Very ripe melons again, bananas, apricots… Orange zests, pecan pie, coffee beans… Very good even if maybe a little less complex than on the nose. Still very nervous at such old age, in any case.

Finish: long, quite hot and almost young, with the wood, the spices and the fruits mingling quite beautifully. A rather rougher version of the famous 38yo OB I’d say, still a beautiful old whisky. 90 points.

[These tasting notes are reproduced from Serge's site]