Whisky : Glenallachie 7 Year SMWS 107.17 “Kissing a rainbow”

Country/Region : Speyside

ABV : 62.3%

Cask : 2nd Fill Ex-Bourbon Barrel

Age : 7 Years (Distilled 26 July 2011)

Nose : Opens with a baby burp of spoiled milk and stomach acid.  Beyond the spoiled milk are sweet candies: faintly waxy cinnamon red vines and licorice ropes.  If there is any rainbow here it is the aroma of melted skittles.

Palate : Sugar rush!  White sugar and artificially fruity candy lead the charge: skittles, starbursts, and the marshmallows in Lucky Charms cereal.  The flavor profile is very one dimensional with different variations on artificial fruit flavors and sugar coming through : cherry flavored cough syrup anyone?  There are occasionally more pleasant notes, sweet tobacco leaf or tempura, but the palate is very simple.

Finish : Bit of heat along with skittles and red vines.  The finish does not develop much or thankfully linger.

Score : 3

Mental Image : Sautéed Skittles.

Something Better : Westland Garryana 2019 Ed. 4.1 (real candied fruits, more complex/pastries, longer finish)

Something Similar : Suntory Ao (similar candy, more floral notes, weaker body)

Something Similar : Yellow Spot Single Pot Still (similar candied sweetness, more fruit notes)

Notes : Wow, this was not pleasant.  My experience with Glenallachie has been one of extremes— when its good, it can be really really good, when its bad, it is barely palatable.  This was just way too sweet for my taste with no deep complexity to draw me back into the glass wanting more.  This is also one of the few drams I have liked even less the second and third time I tasted it.  Plenty of high octane cask strength drams get better as they oxidize, as they breath, but this was definitely an exception.  Neither air, nor water brought out enough different flavor notes to bring me around.

If you love sweeter scotch— if you love skittles— or you just need something for a premium highball— then this dram might be for you.  I am sure there are people out there who found this to be pretty good, I am just not one of those people.