Coming Soon - 2013 Lady of the Glen Orkney Single Cask #10001 11 Year Old Cask Strength Single Malt Scotch Whisky (700ml)

A Highland Park fully matured in a first-fill bourbon barrel. Prickling alcohol gives away the strength, settling to reveal some gorgeous poached pear, vanilla cream and drizzled honey notes. Immense on entry, more deep honeyed moments weave in and out of the faint minerally peat; orchard fruits, cough lozenges, pepper heat... As expected, completely mouthfilling, lip numbing, heavyweight material, only mildly tamed with water, becoming sweeter and rounder, the oils lending more scope to discreet phenols at the fade. Imagine the antithesis of the official 12 year old and this is close to perfection. 63.6% Alc./Vol. Non chill filtered. 203 bottles produced.

Other reviews... They say it’s cask strength, good to know, knowing that unless I’m wrong, HP fill at 63.5% vol., which means we’ve earned some extra-0.1% within eleven years! Colour: white wine. Nose: a fairly similar style, though leaning more towards yellow fruits and pollen, with fewer coastal and mineral elements, but instead we do find some virgin wool. A few touches of vanilla and coconut, almost certainly from the 1st fill bourbon cask. With water: orange peel, or rather mandarin zest. Mouth (neat): straight into acidic fruits, fresh rhubarb, lemon, not-very-ripe gooseberry, then a touch of liquorice and vanilla, though the coconut is nowhere to be found this time. In fact, we shall not complain. With water: veering back towards the classic profile, coastal and mineral. Excellent. Finish: long, with the arrival of green pepper, waxes and hints of indeterminate petroly derivatives. The White House might be able to enlighten us… Comments: performs extremely well following the quite superlative 18-year-old from Frankfurt. 88 points - whiskyfun.com

Notes from the bottlers... pear tart, lapsing tea and runny honey.