Review 144
2/23/13
Edradour 10 Yr: 43% abv
Background: Edradour makes their mark by calling themselves the smallest distillery in Scotland. That sounds like a silly little marketing thing until you hear the facts. Currently two people work at the distillery, and three people founded it. They produce 95K liters a year, and if they were any smaller they would be considered a portable distillery with implicit capacity for illegal distillation. If that isn’t enough for you, they produce only 12 casks a week. This makes Edradour quite a tiny little operation. Edradour is placed in Perthshire, and is a Highland distillery. I bet you’re curious about how this one turns out.
Nose: New make spirit, mellow spice, honey, caramel, barley, agave, slightly harsh
A/W: Not much different
Arrival: Sweet, honey and caramel, candied almonds, slight bitterness, big vanilla
A/W: Big almond, nutty
Body: dark, rich, sweet, almonds, honey, vanilla, sugar
A/W: Almond, sweet caramel
Finish: Nutty, dry, slight sherry, powdered sugar, honey, grain, barley, rye, dry spice, hot cinnamon, maple
A/W: Powdered sugar, more almond, sherry backs off
Final Comments: So you might have guessed, but this is pretty much like mixing Amaretto and Highland Scotch together. Is that a good or bad thing? It is up to you, but there is a certain lack of balance and the huge nutty quality to the Scotch seems to steal some of the complexity from the spirit. After adding water, we noticed that there was a huge jump in the presence of the almond character, and suggest staying away from the addition of water. This still has some interesting characteristics to it, but it certainly isn’t the highlight of the Scotch world.
Why you’d buy it: You like Amaretto and you like Scotch
Why you wouldn’t: You’re afraid of having an allergic reaction to almonds
Score: 8.25/10
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