Promising but, alas, flawed whisky collection

sarkozy

Where I'm living, there ain't no decent wine and OK beer. The advantage is I can sometimes get decent whisky. So I've been buying 'nice' whiskys to get me through the cold nights. Really, I never drank whisky until I once tried a Laphroaig 10.

So, my collection is:
- Laphroaig 10
- AnCnoc 12
- Ardbeg 10 (Non-Chill Filtered)
- Bowmore Surf

The last one is the flaw. It's awful stuff. To think I nearly bought Jura classic. Or the Lagavulin 16.

Well, the thing is I bought the first two in an airport duty free, the other in a diplomatic duty-free shop. I mean, these last two were cheap! €22 for the Ardbeg and €20 for the Bowmore.

A nice enough start, but I'm gutted about the crappy Bowmore! Twenty snots on that when I could have spent €57 on the Lagavulin 16 or €22 on any Jura.

IrishWhiskeyCha

sarkozy wrote: »

Where I'm living, there ain't no decent wine and OK beer. The advantage is I can sometimes get decent whisky. So I've been buying 'nice' whiskys to get me through the cold nights. Really, I never drank whisky until I once tried a Laphroaig 10.

So, my collection is:
- Laphroaig 10
- AnCnoc 12
- Ardbeg 10 (Non-Chill Filtered)
- Bowmore Surf

The last one is the flaw. It's awful stuff. To think I nearly bought Jura classic. Or the Lagavulin 16.

Well, the thing is I bought the first two in an airport duty free, the other in a diplomatic duty-free shop. I mean, these last two were cheap! €22 for the Ardbeg and €20 for the Bowmore.

A nice enough start, but I'm gutted about the crappy Bowmore! Twenty snots on that when I could have spent €57 on the Lagavulin 16 or €22 on any Jura.

Don't knock the Bowmore just yet, leave it a few months and go back to it after you've tasted a few more different whiskies but it is probably their cheapest whisky. Sometimes you can fall for the big peat and smoke and everything else does not seem to match it ... give it time and they just may grow on you, ... I say this because going by the Laphroaig & Ardbeg you seem to like big flavours.

Always a good bet to start at the entry level for single malts and go for a step up in blends.

i.e. Ardbeg 10 is the entry level Ardbeg even though not the youngest. But say you want to try Jameson go for the Jameson 12yo.

I think you'll love Lagavulin.

Others to look out for

Coal Ila (Good peatiness in this also)
Highland Park 12yo
Talisker 10yo (Pepper spice burst on the tongue)
Springbank

Don't forget to try a few Irish too.

Redbreast 12yo or just the Powers regular are 2 good Irish but if your hell bent of Smoke and peat Connemara is also one to try. I'd go for the Cask Strength over the regular as it has much more umph.

bigfeller

IrishWhiskeyCha wrote: »

Highland Park 12yo

Got a couple of bottles of this recently in Duty Free - absolutely lovely whisky. Well worth a try.

shanel23

I picked up a bottle of the Bowmore surf and I liked it - it had just the right amount of peat for me.

Brockagh

A lot of people complain that the more modern Bowmores have a lavender or floral taste and nose - some call it FWP (French Whore's Perfume), Not very flattering and not very fair. 1960s Bowmore is supposed to be one of the great whiskies. I tried a 1964 and it's the nicest whisky of any kind I've ever had.

Not usually a huge fan of the Bowmore 12, but tasted some much younger ones in the distillery a few years ago and they're back to their best, in my opinion. Even at a very young age.

The Bowmore 25 and 30 are also superb, I think, but they're very expensive. There's going to be some great Bowmores coming out in the future, though.

johnnyskeleton

Brockagh wrote: »

A lot of people complain that the more modern Bowmores have a lavender or floral taste and nose - some call it FWP (French Whore's Perfume), Not very flattering and not very fair.

Wow, that would be a whisky to remember. Of the few cheaper bowmores I've tried I liked the 17 yo the best. The 12 was a bit too smokey and the "enigma" was a fairly plain whisky. Which ones were they talking about specifically, because I'd drop 50 quid to try a whisky that tasted like lavender

Brockagh wrote: »

1960s Bowmore is supposed to be one of the great whiskies. I tried a 1964 and it's the nicest whisky of any kind I've ever had.

I hope someone gave you a sneaky sample of theirs. At £1200-6000 it's not one to drink often. You can get a 5cl sampler for £325, which is a lot of money.

If I could ever justify spending so much money on a drink then I'd like to give it a go.

Brockagh

I didn't pay to for it, needless to say. No whisky is worth that.

adrian522

Bowmore is my favourite distiller and I think theve got some fantastic whiskeys, namely the 15 and the 18. The 25 is also wonderful but very pricey. I don't think i've tasted bowmore surf..is this aged or what? Maybe some airport only thing...

IrishWhiskeyCha

Bowmore Surf is a no age statement whisky but has to be at least 3 years old to be considered whisky in the first place. However the Whisky is probably between 5-8 years old

adrian522

Bowmore is certainly superior to Jura IMO. Maybe the OPmight try a Talisker or Highland Park.

sarkozy

Hi all, yes, I'd like to try Talisker next. My whiskys are very 'Islay-centric' right now (except for AnCnoc, which I really like, though wasn't initially sure about it). I should get a better geographical variety.

The Bowmore Surf... yeah, it's 8 years, to my knowledge. Enough smoke, it's nice on the nose, nothing great, but nothing awful. It's really only after the first few seconds that you realise you're only left with the smoke and some feintly unpleasant, petrol taste.

My love affair with whisky began with Laphroaig. Having only had Irish whiskey before, I never knew this sort of thing existed (until then, I was all about wine). Laphroaig has been my nectar, but this Ardbeg 10 I tried for the first time the other night was simply transcendent. I added some water and WHOA! A cut above the Laphroaig 10. So complex, the experience lasted quite a while.

Brockagh

It might be worthwhile picking up the Ardbeg Airigh Nam Beist. It's being discontinued but still available. Won't be around for too long, though.

Also, the closest thing to Islay on this Island would be the Connemara. There is some great single-cask stuff available from them.

Brockagh

...and if you want to move away from Islay, there's a few peated highland/speyside malts, like Highland Park (excellent) and Longmorn.

Ardmore and BenRiach too...