Friday, December 5, 2014

Six Isles Blended Malt

An inexpensive blended malt this time.
I think this is a relatively recent addition to the Australian market (I could be wrong though), but is, I believe, fairly ubiquitous elsewhere. I picked it up on a whim at my local booze supermarket as I hadn't seen the label before and the idea appealed to me - they sure saw me coming.
The shtick here is that there is a malt from each whisky-producing Scottish island included in the blend.

The Six Isles 43%




Nose: Peat (of the Islay variety) dominates first up, wrapped up in light wafts of vanilla. This is soon followed by musty cupboards, old socks and sneaker rubber. Smells kinda dirty.


Palate: A fairly light mouthfeel, with a bit of a void mid-palate. There's plenty of that Islay peat, along with toasted grains and that sneaker rubber again. Sweetness builds in the background through sweet peat and some heather-y honey, but by and large it fails to displace that sense of dirtiness that pervaded the nose and has now re-emerged on the back palate.


Finish: Soot is at the forefront, becoming ashy as it fades, while the simple honeyed sweetness lingers long.

This is a pretty simple and largely inoffensive whisky which, I guess, delivers a quick and dirty peat hit for those in need at a relatively cheap price. The Islay malt (Caol Ila at a guess but I'm not certain) certainly dominates proceedings.

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