Bruichladdich 16 year old Single cask – Claxton’s

A few nights ago I was privileged to be involved with another live tasting on Twitter with Steve Rush and Claxton’s independent bottlers in order to showcase the winter releases..

Rather than write down the whole tasting I decided to do them individually as they all deserve the obligatory 15 minutes of fame as they say !!

So first up is this Bruichladdich 16 year old single cask, now those who are Bruichladdich fans will know they are very big into the whole Terroir thing and believe in full transparency for the whisky they release and I applaud them for this !!  Bruichladdich as we know is situated on Islay but the majority of the whisky falls into the unpeated category but it still amazes me to hear how many people pick up the peated notes in the whisky, maybe it’s the water ? Or just the power of suggestion, who knows, whatever the outcome it’s usually great whisky..

As for this bottling, this is released by independent bottlers Claxton’s, who as a proud family owned company hailing from Yorkshire they are dedicated to releasing the finest single casks possible at affordable prices which as anyone out there will know isn’t always the case with some of the companies in todays market..

This Bruichladdich 16 year old has spent its 16 years sleeping in a single Sherry Puncheon #1853 – 651,  Distilled on the 23-8-2002 and bottled in 2018 at a cask strength of 61.2%, this cask yielded 372 bottles.

Nose.. Dried fruits, plum and a little cinnamon lead into dark chocolate, Manuka honey, tobacco and old leather notes..

Palate.. A dusty start with dried fruits, plenty of spices and candied orange.. Hints of plum, chocolate, coffee and tobacco leaf with a lovely sweetness coming through in the form of toffee and maple syrup..

Finish.. Long and spicy.

Thoughts.. 61.2% abv and it just slides down like it’s a 40% weakling.. This is awesome stuff as are many single casks from Bruichladdich ! One thing I do notice from this and many other Bruichladdich sherry casks is how pronounced the chocolate notes become, give this a day or two to open and it is like drinking liquid chocolate with a few crushed nuts added..

Another damn fine release from Claxton’s..