Category: 8 years

2009 Old Particular Talisker 8 Years Review

Indie Taliskers aren’t exactly rare, but they aren’t exactly plentiful either, so when this 2009 Old Particular Talisker 8 Years popped up at K&L I jumped on it immediately. Then I did what all obsessive whisky nerds do and hoarded it “just in case” I needed it for something. That something came in the form […]

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Indie Taliskers aren’t exactly rare, but they aren’t exactly plentiful either, so when this 2009 Old Particular Talisker 8 Years popped up at K&L I jumped on it immediately. Then I did what all obsessive whisky nerds do and hoarded it “just in case” I needed it for something. That something came in the form of a Pandemic which brought about an opportunity to try the OB Talisker 8 via a sample swap.

2009 Old Particular Talisker 8 Years Review

In a head-to-head I’m going to tell you right now… I liked this more. Not by a monumental amount, but enough to feel a wee bit smug about having picked this up for about $60 ($66 after tax) vs the $120+ the OB, 2020 Limited Edition 8 yo, was going for.

I know this is sold out at K&L long ago, but think of this as a gentle reminder that just because it’s young, doesn’t automatically mean it’s bad, just different. So keep an eye out for future IB releases that fall in line with the specs on this Old Particular Talisker 8 Years.

Now. Let’s get to drinkin’ and see what this little Tali is all about.

2009 Old Particular Talisker 8 Years – Details and Tasting Notes

 

Whiskey Details

Cask Strength | Non-Chill Filtered | Natural Color

Style: Single Malt (Scotch)
Region: Islands, Scotland
Distiller: Talisker
Bottler: Douglas Laing
Bottled For: K&L

Mash Bill: 100% Malted Barley
Cask: Refill Hoggie
Age: 8 years (09-18)
ABV: 59.5%

Barrel: DL12719
Bottles: 295

2009 Old Particular Talisker 8 Years Price: $60

Related Whiskey

Talisker 10
Talisker Select Reserve Game Of Thrones House Greyjoy
Talisker Distiller’s Edition 2015
1979 Cadenhead’s Talisker 18 Years
Talisker 35 Years

White background tasting shot with the 2009 Old Particular Talisker 8 Years bottle and a glass of whiskey next to it.
“Anyone familiar with Talisker understands its role in the pantheon of Scotland’s greatest distilleries. Located on the Isle of Skye, a rugged and remote locate battered by the wind and sea, the malt produced at Talisker has always captured the imagination of whisky drinkers with its maritime flavors of salt, smoke, oil, and peat.” – K&L

 

2009 Old Particular Talisker 8 Years Tasting Notes

EYE
Golden straw

NOSE
Smoked pastries, peat, vanilla, minerality, dried apples and some maritime notes.

Elegant, crisp, delicate yet not spineless. This has a solid aroma that delivers with each sniff.

PALATE
Smoked spices, peat, fresh pastries, vanilla, minerality, dried apples and some iodine heavy maritime notes.

A bit spicer her and carries a bit more maritime notes but, painting with broad strokes, it’s similar and that’s a good thing in this case.

FINISH
Long -> Peat, malty sweet, dried apples and a spirity note that kicks up more as it fades.

BALANCE, BODY & FEEL
Great balance, full-bodied, oily feel.

2009 Old Particular Talisker 8 Years – Overall Thoughts and Score

It’s a solid, tasty, and completely enjoyable malt. Whiskies like this are exactly why , if I had the money and space, I’d buy at least 3 of everything. I’d love to have another bottle or two of this in reserve to share with friends, make cocktails with or just enjoy on a summer night. It’s not incredibly deep, but it is a nice sipping whisky.

Adding some water to the 2009 Old Particular Talisker 8 Years brings out a bit more maritime and vanilla frosting notes on the nose and the palate gets more minerally and more silken making this a tad more interesting. It’s not an “impressive” whisky, but it is a fun whisky, a good whisky, a drinking whisky, a mixing whisky, a whisky whisky. And that’s never a bad bottle to have around.

SCORE: 3/5   (above average, worth checking out  ~  B- | 80-82)
2009 Old Particular Talisker 8 Years Review $60
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2009 Old Particular Talisker 8 Years Label

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Islay Mist 8 Years Review

The tale of Islay Mist 8 years, well just Islay Mist, holds that it was the original “Islay blend” created in the 20’s to celebrate a Lord’s son’s 21st birthday. I don’t know why 21 was a big deal in the 20’s, “legal drinking age” wasn’t much of a thing back then and in the […]

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The tale of Islay Mist 8 years, well just Islay Mist, holds that it was the original “Islay blend” created in the 20’s to celebrate a Lord’s son’s 21st birthday. I don’t know why 21 was a big deal in the 20’s, “legal drinking age” wasn’t much of a thing back then and in the UK it was 18. And like everything in life, it wouldn’t apply to aristocrats anyway. I guess they just like the number 21 in that family.

Islay Mist 8 Years Review

Though it is kind of interesting that the 1920s is when the UK actually got a legal drinking age. Before then it truly wasn’t a thing and for many years after it wasn’t a heavily enforced thing. Also, for a while, the UK had a split drinking age of 18 and 16: 18 for liquor and 16 for beer, cider, wine, etc. Though that beer had to accompany a meal for that 16-or-17-year-old.

In the USA, the 20s were the dark period of prohibition so “drinking age” still wasn’t a thing for us and after prohibition states chose their own legal age. It was nationally lowered to 18 for a while but kids were driving drunk so in 1984 Reagan signed a bill making the legal age 21. I was 3 when that happened and 37 years later that I’m writing this post about the Islay Mist 8.

Now, let’s get to drinkin’ and dive nose first into this blended Scotch review.

Islay Mist 8 Years – Details and Tasting Notes

 

Whiskey Details

Style: Blend (Scotch)
Region: Scotland
Blender: MacDuff International

Blend: Single malt (Laphroaig + Highland and Speyside malts) + Single Grain whisky
Cask: ex-Bourbon, ex-Sherry
Age: 8 Years
ABV: 40%

Islay Mist 8 Years Price: $25*

Related Whiskey

Faultline Blended Scotch Whisky
Isle of Skye 8
Isle of Skye 12 year
The Black Grouse
Laphroaig 10 Years

White background tasting shot with the Islay Mist 8 Years bottle and a glass of whiskey next to it.
“Initially blended for the 21st birthday celebration of the son and heir of the then Lord Sargadale, this gold-medal winning whisky still carries the seal of the Lord of the Isles.” – MacDuff International

 

Islay Mist 8 Years Tasting Notes

EYE
Light caramel

NOSE
Caramel, dried orchard fruit, honey, smoke and some malty sweet and coastal notes.

Easy, lightly peated, aroma with a definite grain profile and a shiny bit of malt.

PALATE
Charry smoke, dried orchard fruit, malty sweetness, roasted nuts, caramel and a bit of menthol.

There’s a dirtiness to it that reminds me, a bit, of Ledaig. I kinda dig it.

FINISH
Med-long -> Smoke, earth, caramel, malty sweet and menthol.

BALANCE, BODY and FEEL
Decent balance, medium-light body and a light polished feel.

Islay Mist 8 Years – Overall Thoughts and Score

I honestly didn’t expect to like this as much as I do. My good friend Bozzy and I were chatting recently about some of the blends we enjoy and now that I’ve had this, I’m going to have to add it to my list. This is nice.

Islay Mist 8 Years is an easily enjoyable whisky. It isn’t a complex beast, it isn’t going to blow you away, but it will deliver a straightforward, moderately malt-driven, medium-peated, character. And that character is warm enough and full enough to be sipped on its own or mixed into something like a Blood and Sand or Penicillin, which is how I’ll be using it.

SCORE: 3/5 (above average, worth checking out ~ B- | 80-82)

Islay Mist 8 Years Labels

Islay Mist 8 Years Review $25

Summary

My brain doesn’t want to like it, but my senses enjoy it. I don’t have anything negative to say about it.

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Valinch and Mallet South Shore Islay Malt 8 Years Review

Young Islays can be hit-or-miss depending on how active the cask is, so with a slight bit of trepidation that I dug into this Valinch and Mallet South Shore Islay Malt 8 Years. Emphasis on slight because I’ve had some good Islays as young as 5 years. I’ve also had a pretty good experience with […]

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Young Islays can be hit-or-miss depending on how active the cask is, so with a slight bit of trepidation that I dug into this Valinch and Mallet South Shore Islay Malt 8 Years. Emphasis on slight because I’ve had some good Islays as young as 5 years. I’ve also had a pretty good experience with Valinch & Mallet so far. On the surface, I was set up for success.

Valinch and Mallet South Shore Islay Malt 8 Years Review

Being a “South Shore Islay” narrows it down to the three “Kildalton distilleries”: Ardbeg, Laphroaig and Lagavulin. Which one it is, V&M are not saying, but doing a little bit of thinking, and drinking, we can narrow this down a bit more. We can eliminate Ardbeg right away because single casks of them are few and far between, always cause a stir and no major stir was made.

Indie Laphroaig releases almost always carry the name but Lagavulin indie releases never do and will sometimes carry the title of being from the south shore. The mental gymnastics of this info and experience leaves me 90% sure this is a Lagavulin, but to be 100% sure we need to get to drinkin’ and see what the senses say.

 

Valinch and Mallet South Shore Islay Malt 8 Years – Details and Tasting Notes

 

Whisky Details

Style: Single Malt
Region: Islay, Scotland

Distiller: Lagavulin (best guess)
Bottler: Valinch and Mallet
Mash Bill: 100% Malted Barley
Cask: ex-Bourbon
Age: 8 Years
ABV: 48.8%

Price: $140

Non-Chill Filtered | Natural Color

White background tasting shot with the Valinch and Mallet South Shore Islay Malt 8 Years bottle and a glass of whiskey next to it.
“Collection: The Dumpy Series Type: Single Malt Scotch Whisky Distillery: Undisclosed Region: Islay – South Shore Distilled in: 2008 Bottled in: 2016 Cask type: Bourbon Hogshead Outturn: Variable” – Valinch and Mallet

Valinch and Mallet South Shore Islay Malt 8 Years Tasting Notes

EYE
Pale gold

NOSE
Ripe apples, smoke, spirity minerality, vanilla taffy, marzipan and some light maritime notes.

Not super complex, but pleasant. There is a sweetness here I attribute more to Lagavulin than any other Islay distillery.

PALATE
Salted butter, dried orchard fruit, vanilla taffy, spirity minerality, toffee, iodine and a bit of candy sweetness towards the end.

The palate is better than the aroma with a more pronounced sweetness kicking through this South Shore Islay Malt.

FINISH
Long -> Dried apples and graham fade to and ashy minerality.

BALANCE, BODY and FEEL
Decent balance, medium body and a warm soft feel.

Valinch and Mallet South Shore Islay Malt 8 Years – Overall Thoughts and Score

Before we talk about anything else, because I have some opinions here, let’s talk about how much fun this whisky is. It’s soft, it’s sweet, it’s warm and it’s brimming with Islay character. The aroma and palate are great and make this whisky so dang interesting. The finish is a bit meh, but doesn’t distract. I ended up enjoying this one and was pretty sure it was Lagavulin by the end of the tasting… like 98% sure.

Once I had written everything above I finally Googled this whisky and was both validated and shocked. Validated because everything else I saw said Lagavulin (awesome), but that’s when I saw the price… $140. The Lagavulin Distiller’s edition, which is about 2x this age, is $130. The Offerman Edition is 11 years and $70, the regular 16 is around $100 and Lagavulin’s own cask strength 8-year-old is about $70. I don’t often comment on price, but damn.

Obviously I didn’t buy this one, the remainder pictured was gifted to me by a friend for this review, and all I can say is “Thank You” and “WTF”. Whisky prices are just insane these days, I don’t know why I’m still so shocked by them. I guess it’s because 7-8 years doesn’t feel that long ago and back then you could buy a 1979 Lagavulin for $170 and now… this. At least it tastes good though, so there’s that.

SCORE: 3.5/5

Valinch and Mallet South Shore Islay Malt 8 Years Review Label

Valinch and Mallet South Shore Islay Malt 8 Years Review $140

Summary

A fun, lively, and engaging Lagavulin that keeps you coming back for more. This is a tasty little dram.

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