As summer approaches in Scotland in 2019 and all the major festivals have been and gone. It seems a great time to bring out the festival bottling not from Islay but from Campbeltown and eh not from 2019 but from 2018.

Foresight and planning #winning

Glen Scotia is a distillery which while I haven’t visited yet is for sure on the list. I have reviewed and enjoyed a lot of Glen Scotia’s here so far and remember wanting this bottle for a number of reasons

• Glen Scotia
• Port Cask
• Cask Strength
• Cheap
• Peatedis b

The Dram

Released in the April or May of 2018 this was the first festival bottling from Glen Scotia. For the very acceptable price of £55 and widely available in most shops. Two aspects which is lacking in the Islay offering just now this was a good way for the company to get in on the limited edition market and get some decent market exposure.

With a natural colour and natural cask strength of 27.8% ABV this is a heavy hitter of a 10 year old whisky. For that decade the whisky has spent the majority of its time in a bourbon barrel with a finishing period in Port. The last interesting aspect to this bottle is that its lightly peated spirit in the bottle.

If you want a bottle there is still ones available in the retail channels so you don’t even have to venture onto the secondary market. An appealing proposition for a lot of buyers I am sure.

Tasting Notes

Colour – straw yellow

Nose – subtle nose of tart red fruits and cherries. A touch of salt for me as well.

Palate – Quite a lot of heat and chilli without water. Really needs a lot of water to open it up which brings out a mineral metallic note. The port casks influence though is lost.

Finish – more of the funky metals and brine notes in the finish

Final Thoughts

If you go looking around the internet you will struggle to find a bad review of this whisky. I have spent a decent amount of time with it trying different amounts of water and leaving it to air for different amounts of time. Really trying to understand and get under the hood of what makes this whisky unique and interesting.

I just can’t seem to click with it and get the enjoyment which others clearly do. That is ok for them to get more out of it than me and it doesn’t make me wrong to be wanting more and not being satisfied with the end result.