Today Deanston de la Muerte


February 2, 2024

WF's Little Duos, today
Deanston de la Muerte

We're big fans of Deanston; it's one of the distilleries that, in my opinion, has managed to make the most of 'unusual' casks to offer a broad range of amusing and sometimes quite successful variants, despite the rather 'flavoured' aspect of some offerings. But this time, we're going to push the envelope further than usual, so hold on tight…

If some tinker with our whiskies, we can tinker with our illustrations too, right? (Scotsman with sombrero, AI)

Deanston 10 yo 'Bordeaux Red Wine Finish' (46,3%, OB, 2018)

Indeed, it took us some time to decide to taste this cabernet-flavoured beast. Honestly, I already struggle with 'Bordeaux Blends' made all over the world with pseudo-French place names (clos, château, domaine etc.), so you can imagine, Scottish whiskies with 'Bordeaux' in big bold letters… Do that with 'Champagne' and the same day you'll have a black Mercedes 500 parked outside your door, with four burly men over 6'2" inside. Now it's probably very good, let's see, but the 'single' designation is starting to seem a bit overstretched for all these single malts whiskies. Colour: pale gold. No rosé. Nose: a bit of soap and curry at the start, then it turns to paraffin and porridge with syrups of raspberry and cherry. Then we get blood orange, pink pepper, overripe figs and nutmeg. I must admit it's not bad. Mouth: it's very odd, with pepper and strawberry (just missing the... champagne) then gingerbread. The good news is that everything then falls into place, with more chocolate, cinnamon, and cherry stems. Finish: rather long, spicy and on raspberry. Hints of bell pepper, must be the cabernet. Comments: I never drink whisky to find hints of raspberry, I much prefer raspberry brandy for that. That said, I was bracing for much worse, it's actually not bad at all for one of the unapologetic Doritos of malt whisky.
SGP:561 - 82 points.

Deanston 15 yo 'Tequila Cask Finish' (52.5%, OB, 2023)

Yes, this one is recent. And of course, tequila casks are 'traditional' in Scotland, there are loads mentioned in the 'Bond Books' of all distilleries from the 19th and 20th centuries. Come on, what's this joke? Lagavulin already made us smirk with their Special Release flavoured with tequila – which is very good, I must say – so what do you think. But one must have a bit of a laugh. Colour: pale gold. Nose: they should at least give the name of the tequila or even the 'NOM code' of the distillery. I hope these aren't tequila casks made in Clackmannanshire or elsewhere. Otherwise, there's lemon, rhubarb, candied ginger, and cake batter. Quite nice, hombre. With water: more on bread and tequila, but it still feels like 'whisky'. Mouth (neat): I'm not sure, it starts to veer off in different directions, with some spices not extremely well integrated. Notes of salt and gherkin. With water: it gets better, but this rose water and this lavender are unusual. Finish: medium length with more lavender. Comments: I don't feel very legitimate commenting on this kind of bottle which I would never buy anyway. I even think that shops should start separating on the shelves the 'traditional' whiskies from those flavoured like this. I also wonder if Mexican whisky enthusiasts buy these things. It's not that it's bad, not at all, on the contrary, but all these finishes are starting to bug, in my opinion.
SGP:551 - 81 points.

Update, so we will have already tasted Deanston flavoured in casks of:
Bordeaux
Cognac
Fino
Kentucky wood
Madeira
Sauternes
Stout
Tequila
Virgin oak
That makes nine, excepting traditional woods. At ten, we pop open the... champagne.

Check the index of all Deanston we've tasted so far