Campbeltown 8yo 2014 Blended Malt - Master of Malt - 57%
From the Master of Malt website
One for the Campbeltown fans here, and a fab chance to dive into whiskies from the region if you're not all that familiar.
This 2014 vintage came to us as a single cask of "teaspooned malt" from Campbeltown, was subjected to a little cask jiggery pokery over a period of three years and then bottled up by us in 2022, with a total release of 372 bottles.
This bottling, or more specifically the labelling, caused quite a stir among the Twitterati when it was first released. Most intriguing was the description on the label of a cask size of Hogshead>Octave>Hogshead, two very different sized casks which raised questions around what the ‘jiggery pokery over a period of three years’ mentioned on the website actually involved.
Clarification came in the form of a Hogshead of the whisky being split into Oloroso Sherry Octave casks for a period of time before returning them to the original Hogshead for a final year. Whilst this explains the description on the label, it did also raise considerable discussion regarding the definition of ‘single cask’, in particular with a teaspooned malt such as this.
Tasting Notes
Appearance: Pale gold, forms a thin line which beads before falling as slow, oily legs.
Nose: Honey, caramel sauce, vanilla, slightly vegetal with salty sea breeze.
Palate: Soft, creamy mouthfeel which builds with time on the palate. Demerara sugar, Bramley apple cinnamon crumble in salted caramel sauce, a touch of Fruits of the Forest jam, a hint of barrel char and ginger warmth.
Finish: More of that warming ginger, together with salted caramel toffee and hints of ashy smoke and citrus peel before a mild peppery prickle kicks in at the close.
Summary: As far as the origins of this whisky go, my feeling is that it’s most likely to be Glen Scotia with a ‘teaspoon’ from either Glengyle or one of the Springbank brands added for good measure. That’s just speculation on my part though.
What I can say with some certainty is that this is one of those deceptively dangerous whiskies, so easy to drink you have to occasionally remind yourself of it’s elevated abv. It’s a ‘feel good’ whisky, well balanced with a lovely mouthfeel due in no small part to the lack of chill filtration and that abv.
These days you almost expect to pay well over the odds for a Campbeltown whisky, let alone one at 57% so the fact Master of Malt could put this one out there for around £40 is highly commendable.
Irrespective of the description on the label and the questions that are raised, it’s very hard to fault this whisky in terms of quality or value for money. It’s the first whisky I’ve tried under the Master of Malt label, but if it’s anything to go by it certainly won’t be my last.
Transparency: No goods or other incentives were exchanged, offered or requested for this independent review.
