Again a distillery that was founded in the Pattison crash year of 1898. Building was finished one year later and the first spirit that came off the still was on the 3rd of june 1899. It’s history is like many other distilleries. Closures during both world wars, and of course a big fire on the 9th of April 1939. The last day spirit came off the stills was the 16th of March 1983. 1983, a dark year when a lot of distilleries were closed. In 1986 the distillery was sold to Historic Scotland who run the place as a museum now.

Color: Full Gold

Nose: Fruity and sweet. Lightly woody. Fresh and a bit rural. Distant farmyness. Wet grasslands. Wet trees. That sort of thing. Hard powdered candy with some liquorice. Woody vanilla ice cream. Smoked bacon with cardboard and almonds.

Taste: Sweet and sherried. Cardboard in here too. There also seems to be some smoke in here. Watery vanilla ice cream. Some sourness of the wood is in the finish and later on some bitterness too. Nothing to worry about.

It’s very easy drinkable. But for me this is an example of those G&M’s from the past where the whisky didn’t stand the reduction to 40%. Also I find that the caramel coloring changed the original whisky considerably. Fortunately G&M know their market and don’t reduce their whiskies that much. Don’t know about the coloring though…

In the past I hated these Map labeled Connoisseurs whiskies and in fact I believe I don’t own even one. For me they got reduced too much and some are that much colored, that the caramel coloring changes the character of the whisky. The industry made you believe that it doesn’t alter the whisky, but having done some tests, it certainly does. It brings some sort of roundness and balance you get from most blends and it makes all of those Connoisseurs Choice Whiskies a bit similar in taste and definitively similar in color. Still the old Dallas Dhu that’s in here shines through.

Points: 86

Again Muchos Grazias to Nico for this sample.