Whisky Newsletter 26 - September 2007

Dear Whisky Customers

I shall be brief as there are only two items of interest for you. The first was that I was asked by the whisky magazine to be a judge in their ?Independent Bottlers? Competition?, which was an honour. So I was given the task of tasting and scoring 58 samples from both Speyside and the Mainlands. As you would expect it was a mixed bag of the good, the bad and the down right nasty! Anyway I will go into more depth on this in my next newsletter.

The second item of interest is that Bruichladdich have released the Port Charlotte PC6. As you are probably aware it has been released with six different labels, with pictures of the guys who make this fantastic spirit. Now I must say I have mixed feelings about this. Looking at it one way you could say that this is a tribute to the hard working men at Bruichladdich that do all the behind the scenes jobs and are not generally in the lime light, and without their work and love of the spirit there would be no plaudits for the distillery itself. On the other hand, the cynical side of me wonders whether this ?overt marketing strategy aimed fairly and squarely at the collectors market? was really necessary!

Now unfortunately I have not as yet had the opportunity to taste it, but having tasted the Port Charlotte spirit many times as you will recall from earlier newsletters, I think I can safely say that it is going to be damn good. So take it away Jim:

Bruichladdich Port Charlotte PC6 61.6% ?62.95

Sorrel chestnut/polished hazel in colour. The ultimate islay six-pack. It?s a war of the elements: gaelic skills, Atlantic tempests, ancient oak, smouldering peat all detonate from the

Glass in a thunderstorm of Hebridean spirit unrestrained by age. [Nose] Opens beautifully, balanced on malt, peat and young spirit. The youth and strength of the spirit infusing the aromas of green apple, mild mint, clove, bayleaf and forest greenwood. Given a dash of water and time little notes of meadowsweet, iris and honeysuckle put their head above the parapet but don?t linger too long as the next wave of bracken and smoke with a slipstream of vanilla is about to overload the olfactory senses. The madeira cask influence lies deep in the glass and brings the rich notes of syrupy dates and raisins which hold up well to the onslaught.

[Palate] Absolute rock ?n? roll Islay. The heat of 61.6% plus 40ppm peat ? and it?s still only six years old ? together develop into a unique palate experience. If you love peated malt this kid has the ?wow? factor. It?s got an effervescence of spindrift and smoke, sweet citrus ? the texture of the spirit is awesome due to trickle distillation. It?s the integration of all the characters of this island ? particularly the guys who made it ? that Gives this spirit a 100% Islay DNA. This is a spirit that challenges, it exhilarates and it delivers ? big time.

[Finish] Albert einstein said: ?everything that is great and inspiring is created of Individuals who labour in freedom?. I believe this spirit meets his vision.

As I have a limited allocation, I probably will not be able to let you have all six bottles, but I will do my best to make sure every body that ones some will get some. I would suggest that you email or call me on 0115 911 0555 with your wishes, because like the PC5 it isn?t going to around for long!

Until next time

Regards

Chris Goodrum

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