Review #: 370
Description: Bruichladdich The Laddie Valinch: #50 Graeme Kirk
Spirit: Scotch
Background: The Laddie Valnich series picks single barrels and dedicates them to employees of the distillery to commemorate their contributions to the overall production (I believe). This one for Graeme Kirk was distilled in 2006 and aged for 13 years in a refill sherry butt. Let’s taste it.
Distillery – Bruichladdich
Bottler – Bruichladdich
Brand – Bruichladdich
Selection – N/A
ABV – 63.1%
Age – 13 Years
Nose – Tons of apple both green and red, chocolate, toasted oats, there is a bit of a sour lactic note, but balanced with some sweet malt, some barnyard
Taste – Caramel, sweet malt, plums, peach, mocha
Finish – Really hits hard, green apple, bitter malt, coffee beans, grassiness. There is a fiery-ness that really lingers in the back of the throat
Score: 6
Would I buy a bottle? Probably not
Thoughts: If this barrel was picked to represent Graeme, I would conclude that they are quite the character. There’s a lot of typical Laddie notes with the lactic/sourness, but the middle really took me by surprise with the sweetness and almost tropical fruits with it. The chocolate/coffee note does well to curb the extremes, but this is an interesting pour no matter how you look at it and something I would be hard pressed to turn to night after night.