Remaining in Speyside for a Glen Spey that was filled into a 1st fill ex-bourbon barrel in 2012. It’s the lynchpin of this outturn's triptych of offers.
Nose: Deep and inviting with notes of blackberries and plums alongside tart cases, aerated pink chocolate and leather car seats. Diverse notes follow with earthy mushrooms joined by well-chewed mint chewing gum, pumice stone, cold steel and old cloth sacking. Dilution reveals a distillate-forward freshness with salt, ginger and menthol, played off against increasingly earthy notes of leaf mulch, clay and moist soils.
Taste: The arrival offers fruitiness front and centre – pineapple juice and balled melons served with jam sandwiches. The development returns to contradiction – metal dust, sliced ham and a scattering of chilli flakes into mentholated oakiness, chocolate milk and oaty breakfast cereals. Water adds a creamy nose – gooseberries with Chantilly as well as presenting reed and flax.
Finish: Medium with menthol cough sweets, golden cereals and a scattering of pine needles.
A fascinatingly broad selection of aroma and flavours styles are offered by this challenging, but still hospitable Glen Spey. Sweet, savoury, vegetal and earthy have no real right to work together this well. Recommended (I hope the 66 – included with this 80 in the ‘Still of Sparkling Pair’ offer is similarly impressive. *Post tasting note* - it is indeed.)