Mosstowie 37 Year (1979), Signatory Vintage
Whisky: Mosstowie 37 Year (1979), Signatory Vintage
Country/Region: Scotland/Speyside
ABV: 42.4%
Cask: Bourbon Barrel
Age: 37 Year (Distilled 5 June 1979, Bottled 31 Jan. 2017)
Nose: Orange, floral, mangos, salted sunflower seeds, chocolate-covered oranges, apple, cinnamon, mellow citrus, hints of zinc, and copper batteries.
Palate: Medium-bodied, semi-sweet with banana, guava, pineapple, and hints of coconut; honey and nuts on the mid-palate, salt, rattan furniture, and guava at the end.
Finish: Lingering dry tropical fruits with a hint of salty minerality.
Score: 7
Mental Image: Beach Day Snack Bag
Narrative & Notes: The aroma was fruity and mild with loads of oranges; freshly peeled and chocolate-covered, mangos, and apples. A lovely spice rose behind the fruit with salted sunflower seeds and the fixings of a good apple pie; cinnamon, citrus, and pastry crust. A mineral undercurrent ascended with more time, somewhere between copper batteries and zinc-based sunscreen. Medium-bodied with a restrained soft sweetness that built toward the finish. A semi-sweet grab bag of dried tropical fruits: banana chips, coconut, mango, pineapple slices. Honey and a nutty almond quality peaked on the mid-palate as hints of salt elevated the sweetness with guava and rattan antiques. A few drops of water gave the mouthfeel a creamier aspect, while notes of citrus and bamboo became more prominent. The finish was long with a mellow woody astringency, hints of tropical fruit, and a kiss of salt.
I saved this dram for a very long time. I was waiting for the ideal special occasion— which is rather the problem with buying special bottles or pours— it is easy to overdo it, end up with a few too many, and consequently never find time to open or pour them. This only increases over time, each time you pass over a bottle, your expectations for it or demands on it grow. It was not special enough for Christmas… so how about New Year’s? It did not make the cut for an anniversary tasting… so how about a birthday? Each time you pass it over, you know that you will eventually, and inevitably, compare it to the things you drank instead. Sometimes having fewer choices prevents this paralysis.
Mosstowie is not a distillery label one encounters very often; it was produced at Miltonduff using Lomond stills. Those stills only operated between 1964 and 1981 when they were decommissioned and replaced by more typical pot stills. So Mosstowie might best be understood as a “silent still” rather than a “ghost distillery.”
Overall, I enjoyed the subtle topicality that ran throughout the dram. The restrained sweetness of the palate— almost dry at times— built up beautifully before fading again on the finish. I prefer my tropical fruit notes a bit juicier, but this had the sort of complexity you want from a dram that spent nearly four decades in the cask.
Image Credit: The Whisky Exchange.
