Whisky: Bowmore 16 Year (1994) SMWS 3.169 “Pagoda reek drifting over Loch Indaal”

Country/Region: Scotland/Islay

ABV: 56.6%

Cask: Refill Sherry Butt

Age: 16 Years (Distilled April 1994, Bottled 2010)

Nose: Coastal, grill smoke, caramelized sugars, sea shells, citrus, sea breeze, dried grass, driftwood, bonfires.

Palate: Medium-bodied, fruit, smoke salt, bonfire, molasses, black sugar buns, meaty-fatty, roast duck skin.

Finish: Lingering herbal notes of barbecue and sea.

Score: 8

Mental Image: Bonfires and BBQ Candy

Narrative & Notes: Seaside grilling came to mind as a thick blanket of smoke poured out of the glass— was the aroma of caramelized balsamic vinegar with grilled maritime meaty scallops and oyster shells or an apiarist lulling my nose to a state of relaxation? Charred lemons and driftwood bonfires arrived between gusts of a soft and sweet sea breeze that cut through grassy coastal dunes. Medium-bodied, the first note on the palate was an acrid green wood smoke that faded to a salty tropical fruit punch— margaritas at a driftwood bonfire. Smoke and molasses coalesced as maritime notes of black sugar buns and charred candies joined in the gray. Meatier toward the end with sweet barbecued char siu and roasted duck skin. The finish was long with barbecue and maritime delights.

Our local whisky group poured this beautifully coastal Bowmore for an anniversary tasting in 2022. The final of four drams during the evening— a nod to the peat lovers in the group— the Bowmore proved popular and pipped a 20-Year Lochside for second best of the evening. It took me half a year to get around to retasting the whisky and finishing up a review (and then another couple of months before I got around to actually posting it). It was so good that I kept searching for the proper night to sit back and enjoy it all over again. When I finally did, I was not disappointed in the slightest, and it was just as good as I remembered.

Overall, when Bowmore is good, it can be the best thing out of Islay. When it is bad, you sometimes wonder how the distillery is still around. It is a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde distillery in a way that few others can match.

Weekly Theme: Bowmore

I decided to try something new in 2023 with my whisky reviews: theme weeks. Rather than my normal hodgepodge of just reviewing whatever whisky I fancy and posting the reviews in a generally, but not consistently, chronological order, I will attempt to organize my tasting and posting around themes. I am neither certain the themes will always be coherent nor confident that I will relentlessly stick to this. It is an experiment and perhaps a chance to compare more malts side by side.

The theme this week is Bowmore! Bowmore is one of Beam-Suntory’s Islay outposts and the oldest distillery on the island. The malt Bowmore distills is peated to 25-30 ppm, producing a wide variety of flavors depending on fermentation, distillation, and maturation. Bowmore is one of the few Islay distilleries still producing some of its floor maltings. According to the 2022 Malt Whisky Yearbook, just under 1/3 of the malt used at Bowmore comes from its floor maltings, with the rest sourced from Simpsons Malt.

The recent history of Bowmore is full of ups and downs. Whiskies from the 1960s and 70s are frequently regarded as legendary, while Bowmore produced in the 1980s is famous, or infamous, for its lavender and floral notes.  Notes which some whisky commentators equate to soap or cheap perfume. The 1990s were kinder to the distillery; Jim McEwan took the helm as distillery manager in 1986 and global ambassador with the resources of Suntory behind him after 1989. Suntory took complete control of the distillery in 1994 and, over the next decade, remade the distillery’s core lineup and branding.