Blind tasting – hmm… Which whisky is this? – Speyburn Hopkins Reserve

I got a sample on Cinderella Whisky Fair 2018 and was asked to taste it without knowing what it is. So, here we go:

Malty on the nose. Banana. Cinnamon roll dough. Yeast. Quite fresh after a while, actually. I get eucalyptus and lemon juice. Something reminds me of beer, maybe a Saison. Rough and spicy on the palate. Watery. I get a lot of oak influence and not much more. The spices are black and white pepper and cardamom. It is quite dry. The finish is warm and dry. Nutty, without the oil. It does not last for long.

Hmmm… What can this be? It seems quite young on the nose, and the oaky taste can indicate a young whisky as well. Or is it a well used cask? What about the lack of vanilla on the nose and palate? Does it mean this is a young whisky or is it a tired cask?

My score: nose 19 / taste 19 / finish 17 / balance 18 = 73

Well, Mark, now I am curious! What is this?

Mark says: Speyburn Hopkins Reserve, a cask sample. He says the cask sample for Cinderella was not quite representative of the final product, and he finds the final bottling to be better. The whisky has been bottled now:

Dedicated to John Hopkins, the man who created our unique distillery deep in the heart of Speyside. This lightly smoky single malt is a tribute to our founder.

Image from Frankfurt Airport.

I have previously shared my tasting notes on Speyburn 10 YO, read here.

– Tone

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