Ending our outturn review with a very 'Britishly' named Glen Scotia. Not sure what to expect – root vegetables, idiocy or just plain madness.
Nose: Pickled radish, vinegar, shellfish stew, polystyrene cement and medicinal gauzes. Pretty wild. In time – French white loaf, cress, lovage and damp leaves together with air-dried ham. Dilution adds a chiselled character – granite – together with further ‘greenness’ from smoked pear, leafy greens and mulch.
Taste: Continuing the theme – Pickled Onion Monster Munch leads to tarred felt roofing and floor cleaner. Kiwi and melon join alluvialness from slate and gravel before ginger spice and pangs of salinity sit with mentholated oak. Water offers a broader base of damp wool, barn yard manure, medicinal wipes, smoked meats and char.
Finish: Long with wet vegetal smoke, white chocolate and pickling juice mixed with menthol.
Madness it is. Wonderfully perverse stuff here – and easily the pick of the month for drinkers looking for psychotic whisky. Reminds me a lot of Ardnagherkin – and indeed, I like it just as much for the same left-field reasons. Joyfully, unashamedly odd. Not everyone will get this - indeed some will run a mile. But I’ll happily recommended it for those who share my predilections.