"A tasty OB from a very well-known distillery from the Speyside region at high strength and this sweet and fruity sample emptied fast"
During my early days of extensive whisky tasting, I once bought a more expensive bottle that I read raving reviews about. I wanted to expand my small collection with something really good from a higher price range than I normally was used to. It was the Glenlivet Nadurra at a time when it still had an age statement. I didn’t like it, though. Too much sense of the alcohol, too little specific taste. And now, at the second day of the blind tasting competition, we had a sample that I really liked. Beautiful bourbon cask maturation, a lot of fruity complexity. And guess what, it was the Glenlivet Nadurra, with age statement.
Nose
The impression is sweet and fruity with a slightly oily backbone. Lots of bananas, orange candies, papaya, and maybe a few drops of mango juice. It is rather civilised, no extremities and no evident alcohol in the nose. When you stick your nose longer into the glass, there is an extra layer behind the first one. Orange lemonade, juicy sweet pears, a faint hint of oak, this part is sweeter with some spicy hints. A perfect drink for a hot summer evening (like we are currently having). Honey, sugared cereals, caramel, we could have this for breakfast (but we won’t). A second nosing suggested a higher alcohol percentage, but the sweetness remains. Water does improve it and slightly dampens the sweetness leading to a better integration with the rest. Lovely nose.
Taste
Again the bourbon cask influence becomes quickly evident. We have here lots of oranges, bananas that are now unripe, pineapple and an acidic edge of grapefruit. There are definitely some oils in the aftertaste, together with a hint of liquorice and some peppermint. In particular the aftertaste is pretty excellent, and long. The acidic edge is more pronounced on the palate, especially after adding some drops of water, and I get more wood influence. Gets slightly drying after a while.
Overall
I had quite some difficulty to guess the actual distillery. Not strange, since this experience did not resemble an earlier encounter with this range of Glenlivet at all (so I went for AnCnoc). Another batch? Probably (I did not note the batch I had before), but it could also be that my taste buds have evolved during recent years due to tasting dozens of totally different whiskies. So my efforts paid off at least :-).
- Review 2018-038
- Single malt
- Glenlivet
- Glenlivet
- 16 years
- Bottled 2014
- First-fill American oak casks
- Natural colour
- Non-chill filtered
- 60.2
- Unknown number of bottles
- ±75-80
- Hard to find
- Whiskybase #66411
What others thought
Glenlivet Nadura 16 years
This sample was part of the
Scores
• these are my personal views, so do not take them too seriously… nothing beats tasting these for yourself •
- Honey
- Tropical fruits
- Cereals