ALL SIGNS POINT TO GREAT SCOTCH!

September’s seven spectacular single malts await your discovery, so follow the signs – you won’t be misled! Bottle notes are below; for full tasting notes and to purchase please visit http://www.smws.ca/

Also, remember to sign up for the October First Friday tasting! Join Colin and Rick at The Strath Ale, Wine & Spirit Merchants on Friday, Oct. 3rd at 6:30pm for another fun night of good scotch and good company. Contact The Strath now to register ($35 members/$45 non-members): 250-370-9463.

Cask No. 36.62 The Italian job
21 years old; 2nd fill hogshead; 51.3%
A fresh, chalky and slightly sweet nose neat with a fizzy mouth feel turning juicier with time. Adding water almost flinty like an austere Lombardian wine and the taste has an intriguing balance of sour cream chips and honey yogurt ice cream.

Cask No. 17.35 Very fruity, very tasty
11 years old; refill barrel; 56.1%
The nose – plentiful fruit (tinned pineapple, three-fruit marmalade), toffee, honey, vanilla and Battenberg cake; also tarragon, straw and stationery cupboards. The palate – very tasty, very fruity; gummy bears, ‘soor plumes’ candies, Moffat toffees and coke with lime, traces of salt and ginger.

Cask No. 94.4 Ode to autumn
24 years old; refill hogshead; 52.3%
Warm and dusty, like a hayfield at harvest time on a sunny afternoon. The taste has the sweet richness of Italian biscotti with hazelnuts and dark cherries. With water – roasted red peppers and salty/sweet flavours of a quality olive oil and balsamic bread dip.

Cask No. 7.97 Cedar, sandalwood and cinnamon
20 years old; refill hogshead; 53.9%
The nose balances deep wood, dark honey, chocolate, coconut, menthol and leather against tropical fruits and gardens of flowers and herbs. The palate tingles with leather, orange zest, aniseed and ginger, before finding sexy traces of floral perfumes and sweet tobacco.

Cask No. 4.181 A muscle man from Orkney
16 years old; refill sherry butt; 54.6%
Rustic, grizzly and animalistic at first sight, this muscle man has lots to offer. Burnt coconut syrup, Dundee marmalade, smoked pork buns and Demerara sugar; smouldering and rich to taste. Water gave coffee liqueur and sweet molasses.

Cask No. 33.130 The farmyard and the chip shop
11 years old; 2nd fill barrel; 56.1%
The tasting panel divided into two camps. Malt in burlap sacks, sillage, tomatoes and compost in one, versus fish and chips and lobster pots in the other. Coal buckets and barbecue smoke. Blankets with mothballs and laundry day at the beach.

Cask No. 127.38 Enticing fume of a peak reek
10 years old; refill sherry butt; 66.3%
Sweet smoke, pork cracklings, honey and soy sauce, oily mackerels and Germolene. The taste is simply huge! A peat fire blazing in a croft house. Water releases herbal aromas of fish stock and the taste Mediterranean pork with sage plums and oven-roasted tomatoes rolled in herbs.

 http://www.smws.ca