The ‘middle’ offering of the Founder’s Collection gives us a whack of sherry in the form of a 12 year old Glenrothes which has spent its life in 1st fill butt #6147. 670 bottles have been produced - which is rather a lot (469L) from a single butt assuming a standard size of 500 litres. The ABV of this one has been kept higher – 57% and you can purchase a bottle directly from the Baron’s website for a cool £100.
Nose: Apple crumble drizzled with toffee and Dulce de leche sauce – packed full of well stewed fruit and rich with crumbled biscuit and demerara. A scattering of ripe berries sits on the side and is joined by rum-soaked raisins, orange and apple peels and a generous twist of cinnamon spicing. Reduction adds a sense of creaminess with brulee, as well as directly expressing the oloroso influence – chopped walnuts and crumbled chocolate.
Taste: The arrival is all on bakery – gingerbread men, apple pies and cinnamon rolls. Alongside, there plenty of biscuit crumbs, raisins and sultanas before cask spicing rolls in – pepper, nutmeg, ginger and cinnamon – aromatic and quite intense. The back-palate is more overtly sugar-based with burnt toffee, rolled pastry and hedgerow berries. Water reduces the spicing, leading to tinned orchard (apple and pear) fruits, oats and increased nuttiness from walnut and cashew.
Finish: Quite long, spice-forward and with plenty of lively drying oak.
On the one hand, the sherry influence in this Glenrothes is quite restrained – there’s not an overabundance of sugar and sweetness and a sledgehammer of thick oloroso to the face. On the other, the cask influence in terms of the wood is palpable – particularly on the palate which has taken some of the precursor liquid’s fruit-character, but all of its spice influence. As such, I find this both an interesting and tasty 1st fill – which is largely sympathetic to the underlying Glenrothes spirit. It’s therefore a shame that the price is out of whack.