Ben Nevis is a distillery I know very little about; mainly I hear what everyone does - they are owned by Japanese beverage company Nikka, and the vast majority (and best) of their distillate is used for the Nikka line of Japanese whiskies. Ben Nevis is a coastal distillery at a very high elevation - Ben Nevis is the highest mountain in the UK - and they supposedly source their water from the highest elevation water source in scotch whisky.
As you may know, Japan (until very recently?) has some odd alcohol laws, including one that allows any whisky that is stored in Japan for even a very short time - no matter where it was distilled - to be called Japanese. Hence how Nikka whiskies are actually made in Scotland by Ben Nevis. Supposedly the law has been made stricter, and soon more and better Ben Nevis will be released under its own name.
This is an 8 year, sherry-finished independent bottling from the Scotch Malt Whisky Society ("SMWS"). Here are the official notes:
We discovered sherry-derived earthiness on the nose – dried figs and dates, orange peel, fly cemeteries, hints of rum and dusty Pamplona streets – a Hemingway dram perhaps? The frisky, feisty palate had dark chocolate on crystallised orange slices and spiced damson crumble, then ginger, balsamic and toasted walnuts to finish. The reduced nose found eucalyptus and laurel, marmalade, marmite on rice cakes, butts in a bodega and spiced rum with cola. The palate now offered Viennese coffee with fig, iced ginger cake, Empire biscuits and honey on a wooden spoon. After five years in ex-bourbon wood this went into a second-fill Oloroso hogshead.
Pretty good - I love this angle of sherried whiskies (figs, orange peel, mustiness, chocolate, etc) and I have heard that Ben Nevis has an unusually good mouthfeel - big, rich, thick, chewy. Sounds like a good pairing. Kind of unusual to "finish" a 5 year old whisky, but hey, whatever works. Bottled at 60% ABV, let's die in the afternoon:
Nose: You would never know this had been within a thousand yards of a bourbon cask - the scent is entirely sherry. Rich, Macallan-style sherry: leather, barnyard, tobacco, dried fruit, resinous sulfur, black cherries, and plenty of orange oil. It's actually a really intense and "thick" aroma - surprisingly complex for an 8 year old.
With a splash of water: the bourbon comes out a bit more with water in the form of caramel, along with some ginger. Still a heavily sherried scent, though.
Deeper into the bottle (oxidized), the bourbon comes forward more and more on the nose, in the form of caramel and ginger and some baking spice. It gets strong enough that the sherry influences from the neck pour are very faint indeed.
Mouthfeel: Holy smokes, this is like drinking olive oil, it's so thick.
Palate: Ah, here is the bourbon. The sherry flavors take a backseat to thick vanilla and caramel; strong cherry cola and bitter toasted oak as well. Actually very reminiscent of straight-up bourbon like Maker's Mark or similar. Only on the periphery do you get the leather, some nuttiness, and the farm-ish tobacco notes. It dries up quickly into the finish. A surprisingly two-faced dram - the nose is one thing, the palate another completely.
I was very curious how water would affect it: the mouthfeel is curiously the same (!), and some of the sherry flavors are reclaimed a bit - especially cherry and orange. It becomes quite a bit fruitier with water, including some apple and pear notes (!), and the finish lasts a bit longer, less dry.
Opposite to the nose, after you get deeper in the bottle and let it breathe a bit, more sherry comes out on the palate - nuts, dried fruit, leather, polished wood, and more cherry cola.
Finish: Very drying, with orange peel and lots of baking spices. Lots of oak wood as well. After a few seconds, it's totally gone - quite surprisingly brief.
Verdict: I am still somewhat astounded by that rich mouthfeel - never had anything quite like it outside of some Italian amaros and, of course, actual olive oil. The nose is absolute sherry heaven, and I wish the palate had followed up on that a little more instead of transforming into a bourbon festival. And the finish is really remarkably short and dry. It's a very easy drinker, even at 60%, and I would hesitantly recommend this, but it's sort of neither here nor there.
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