SMWS July Outturn Tasting

I was lucky enough to attend a tasting of the July outturn for SMWS last night, with most of the new outturn available and a bunch of either rare, sold out or non-UK bottles also available to taste and for sale.
I often produce these notes for my bottle share friends but at Joe's request I'm putting them on the blog for wider consumption!  They're micro-tasting notes though, just a brief impression, an initial grading and an indication if I think the whisky is a consideration to buy.  Hopefully this will be of use if you want to work out where to focus your attention in July.

Cheers!

July outturn micro tasting notes.

Code	Distillery	Name	Age	Price	N	B	F	Comments	Score
123.8	Glengoyne	In the Spanish mountains	12	50.70	Wax, sour, beautiful, challenging	Fiery, spiced, woody	Long, balanced	Refill ex-port pipe Quite challenging, bitter wood.  The delivery didn’t live up to the lovely port nose.	A+
2.87	Glenlivet	Satisfying as a butcher’s blade	21	89	Lovely, balanced wood, orange zest	Caramel, chocolate orange, fizzing	Refreshers, balanced, clean/sweet	Fruity, delicious, balanced, lots of structure. Buy.	A⊕
7.101	Longmorn	Playing with colours	10	48.40	Rich wood, burnt toffee, hint of petrol	Stunning wood and sweet integrn	Medium, balanced, toffee	Robust and intensely sweet, rather good. Buy.	A⊕
117.3	Cooley	Hubba-bubba, mango and Monstera	25	335	Sexy, ice pops, blue raspberry ice lolly, tropical, mango, creamy fruit	Bubblegum, oak and meat	Long, meaty, musky and hammy	Intense and dirty, spectacular nose. Good but not £335 good.	A⊕
35.114	Glen Moray	A Southern gentleman	19	65.60	Dark Stagg tones, but a little more restrained.  Very good.	Dark fruit and intense sappy wood	Fabulous, long sap and depth	Toasted oak hogshead Very smooth and intense, quite exciting but very bourbon like.  Great value for this mini Stagg, with a similar feel but a bit more restrained (and good for it)	A⊕
1.181	Glenfarclas	Vintage car in a rose-garden	11	45	Bright, sappy, cherry sweet tobacco	Spicy wood, very sharp	Intense sweet and bitterness, darkly toffee	Very interesting but quite strange. Buy	A
39.100	Linkwood	Exotic contradictions	23	87.20	Bright cherry, waxed wood and rosemary.  Perfumed and fried courgettes.	Ripe wood, banana, stewed apples	Long toffee, balanced but intensely sweet	Deep intensity of wood and boiled sugar. Buy	A⊕
73.60	Aultmore	Tarts in a tea house	24	92.40	Floral, sweet, toast and honey	Lightly peated, clean and balanced.  Good, bright wood.	Medium, astringent, bitterness at end.	Very interesting, loses it in the finish	A+
36.77	Benrinnes	Wee secrets of flavour	17	56.70	Forest fruit and yoghurt, pine needles and cigar tobacco.  Cross channel ferry and crayon.	Rich oak and grapefruit, fizzy.	Quite long, sweet and varnished oak.  Good tropical back notes.	Very interesting but quite challenging with the fizzing fresh wood Buy	A+
76.116	Mortlach	Tangier market	26	117.70	Ripe red fruit, banana and plum wine	Instant hit of toffee penny.  Great structure, wax and marzipan.	Meaty, rich and numbing.  Waxed.	Interesting, balanced, rich, darkly wooded.  Lovely. Buy	A⊕+
9.86	Glen Grant	Sangria on the terrace	16	Offers	Elegant rich and ripe plum.  Well balanced wood, furniture polish.	Spicy and licked joss sticks	Long, complex, astringent.	Fabulous wood intensity and well integrated, good candle wax on the nose. Interesting bitter peat complexity, long wood sour.  Very good.	A⊕+
3.226	Bowmore	Cigar smoke and Newhaven fish boxes	16	59.40	Fresh and rich smoked fish, meaty.	Sweet peat, rich and beautiful, raisins and smoked mackerel	Sharp and astringent, bitterness at the end.	More great peat, sweet richness.  Not as good as 3.221 or 3.219 (recent refill sherry Bowmore hits)	A⊕
53.206	Caol Ila	Ooh Matron!	18	71.70	Austere but mad max.  Masculine.	Perfectly rich, ashen, peat and sweet intensity.	Darkly ashen and ripe.	Hard to fault – some bitterness at the end but otherwise wonderful stuff. Buy
Old, rare specials
66.47	Ardmore	Campfire character	11	45	Vinegar sour and cigar, charred wood and leather	Herbal, cigars	Toffee		A⊕
21.27	Glenglassaugh	Enticement of sweet oak	39	439	Sweet soft toffee, tobacco and wagon wheels	Long, deep perfection of leather, oak and chocolate caramel	Long tobacco and herbs		A⊕⊕
59.43	Teaninich	Caramel swirl ice cream	29	137.20	Beautiful rich, complex nose.  Bright, herbal, astringent, lightly wooded, toffee	Sweet, structured	Long, beautiful	Buy	A⊕+
72.30	Miltonduff	Fruit, fruit, fruit!	29	117.80	Acrylic paint, citrus fruit, thinners	Sweet and balanced, lightly fruited, great wood balance		Buy	A⊕+
10.76	Bunnahabhain	Duelling banjos dram	8	52.20				Buy	A⊕

34

a little over 100

Buy

A⊕