| #369 Speyburn Bradan Orach NAS Single Malt Scotch (Speyside) | |||||||||||||||||||||
| This cost is what I found the likely shelf price for a 750ml bottle to be, based on an average of costs throughout the USA. Your price may differ significantly. This is not an advertisement of sale, this bottle is likely empty by now anyway Cost | $2500 |  | |||||||||||||||||||
| Bottler | Official Bottling | ||||||||||||||||||||
| 56 | ||||||||||||||||||||
| The whisky's score as weighed against the cost of a bottle. Adj. Score | 54 | ||||||||||||||||||||
| ABV | 40% | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Misc: | Says "Highland" but Speyburn is in Speyside. | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Awards |  | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Tasting # 401: Tis a shiny, shiny tin of B.O. from Speyburn (21-OCT-2009) | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Notes | So one of the  cheapest Single Malts has a... well, a sibling of some sort. With an odd name. Pricewise Bradan Orach NAS (just look for the goldfoil tube) comes in maybe 4 bucks over the standard 10YO, but my rounding system puts them both at roughly 25 clams. The 10 still seems to be appearing on shelves, so this doesn't look like a replacement. And if you don't feel like reading a bunch today: it's probably worth the extra five or so. Mostly. Oh, and Bradan Orach is some geographic area within Speyside. | ||||||||||||||||||||
| 1st Impression | That is one -shiny- tin. And bottle. And, well, I'm not really a fan. You know: all that glitters, gilding the lilly, gilded cages, wolf in sheep's clothing, book + cover. All the standard wise sayings seem to apply here. | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Smell | Honeyed, but it has a feinty, green olive scent that has me scratching my head. The citrus runs toward lemon grass and it ends with poppy seeds. | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Taste | Flawed, to be honest, and I'm going to start with a bit of a summation to ease the upcoming litany of complaints: it's lots of tiny cracks in an otherwise modest Speysider. It isn't horrible, in other words, it just has a lot of minor imperfections. That said, on with the show.
Opens sharp (in bite) and flat (in flavor): bread crust and a slightly bitter barley that goes quite quickly into a flat oak and dusty top. The barley base is ok, but it always seems slightly off-key. The fade has an oily feel and there's a sharp and quick finish to it all where the wood lingers on and then gives up. So. 50s somewhere, but again despite all the flaws this is drinkable enough and has a few redeeming moments in there somewhere. It's certainly more interesting than it's sibling, and given the choice I'd toss in the extra 4 or 5 bucks for the shiny one. | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Tasting Score | 56 | ||||||||||||||||||||
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