Malt Maniacs Awards 2015 – The Winners

This year (2015) sees the 13th edition of The Malt Maniacs Awards and once again we’ve seen some very strong competition throughout the three different categories for those prestigious awards.

Our three categories are based on high street price and are as follows:

Daily Drams – Whiskies with a retail price up to €50

Premium Whiskies – Whiskies with a retail price between €51 and €150

Ultra Premium Whiskies – Whiskies with a retail price over €150

Within each category we offer five Awards; Supreme Winner, Best Sherried Whisky, Best Peated Whisky, Best Natural Cask Whisky and a “Thumbs Up” Award for a whisky we believe deserves a special mention.

The competition is judged 100% blind, using only numbered samples and also judged only by a panel of our amateur members.

So, without further ado here are our deserving award winners for 2015:

Supreme Champion (Winner of Winners) Kavalan Solist (OB), Sherry Cask No. S060904024

Scoring an average 91 points across all our judges

    

 

 

 

 

Daily Drams category

Supreme Winner – TTL Nantou (OB for Aroma TW) Sherry Cask No.841 58%

Best Sherried Whisky – TTL Nantou “Omar” Sherry Cask No.21091305 58.4%

Best Peated Whisky – Lagavulin 16y OB 43%

Best Natural Cask Whisky – Nantou (OB) “Omar” Bourbon Cask No.11090105 56.8%

Thumbs Up – Edradour (OB) Ballechin 10y Bourbon & Oloroso Casks & Heavily Peated 46% (Awarded for great quality and solid performance from this small Independent distillery.)

Premium Whiskies category

Supreme Winner – Kavalan Solist (OB), Sherry Cask No. S060904024 (Also Supreme Champion)

Best Sherried Whisky – Kavalan Solist Sherry Cask No. S081229019 (OB for Asia Palate Assoc) 56.3%

Best Sherried Whisky – Kavalan Solist Sherry Cask No. S081229020 (OB for Asia Palate Assoc) 57.1%

(Both of these Kavalans scored an exact 90 points, drawing for the Best Sherried Premium Award)

Best Peated Whisky – Blackadder “Raw Cask” Peated Amrut Cask BA20/2015 62.1%

Best Natural Cask Whisky – Ichiro’s Malt Chichibu “Chibi Daru” 53.5%

Thumbs Up – Amrut (OB) Spectrum 50% (Awarded for ‘cask innovation’ for creating a finishing cask of 5 different woods)

Ultra Premium category

Supreme Winner – Glenfarclas (OB) “Family Casks” 19y Oloroso Casks 3913 & 3914 58.7%

Best Sherried Whisky – Macallan “Remix” (OB) Special Asian Release, 58.9%

Best Peated Whisky – Wilson & Morgan “Barrel Selection” Caol Ila 25y Casks 4707 & 4708 54.3%

Best Natural Cask Whisky –Adelphi “Slaney Malt” 23y Cask No.8585 59%

Thumbs Up – Overeem “Old Hobart” Cask OHD-074 60% (Awarded for outstanding performance of this and all Overeem whiskies this year).

In addition to our Awards we recognize quality with our Medals based upon the average attained scores across all our judges, with our coveted Gold Medals being given to any whisky achieving an average of 90 points or more.

This year four whiskies have won our coveted Gold Medals and they are:

Kavalan Solist (OB), Sherry Cask No. S060904024 91pts

Kavalan Solist Sherry Cask No. S081229019 (OB for Asia Palate Assoc) 90pts

Kavalan Solist Sherry Cask No. S081229020 (OB for Asia Palate Assoc) 90pts

Glenfarclas (OB) “Family Casks” 19y Oloroso Casks 3913 & 3914 90pts

Full details and scores for MMA 2015 can be found on the Malt Maniacs website http://www.maltmaniacs.net/

and

also our Malt Maniacs & Friends (MM&F) facebook page https://www.facebook.com/groups/MaltManiacs/