Tastings de la Muerte: Glentauchers Part Two


May 22, 2025

Tastings de la Muerte: Glentauchers part 2

Shall we carry on at random, moving along fairly quickly, if that’s alright with you…?

Glentauchers 10 yo 2010/2020 (46%, Hepburn’s Choice, Hunter Laing, wine barrels, 581 bottles)

Wine casks, always a tad alarming. Colour: gold. Nose: malt, bread, banana and strawberry jam. Fairly laden with stewed red berries and assorted confitures. Mouth: it’s cheerful and fruity, still very much on strawberries, rose jelly and raspberry sorbet, yet the malt keeps a firm hold of the reins and prevents the whole thing from veering too far into ‘Beaujolais’ territory. Finish: medium in length, now with more cherry, ham and leafy touches. Comments: not bad at all, we’re far from the disaster we feared, strawberries notwithstanding.
SGP:641 - 80 points.

Glentauchers 2005/2019 (43%, Gordon & MacPhail, Distillery labels)

We’d really enjoyed the 2008/2023 but that one had been bottled at 46% vol. Colour: white wine. Nose: pears and apples, gooseberries, sourdough bread. Nothing much to complain about at this stage. Mouth: nice profile, though less precise than the nose, with cherry stems, apples, sour cherries, witbier and a touch of fresh ginger. Finish: medium length, same aromas, turning a little more herbal. Then green tea. Comments: nothing to add really, a good, clean malt whisky with no major faults. Just a little… yawn…
SGP:551 - 80 points.

Glentauchers 21 yo 1992/2014 (52.7%, Duncan Taylor, Dimensions, cask #6045, 283 bottles)

Not sure this series is still active at DT. Colour: white wine. Nose: taut, on green pears, apples, grass and grapefruit zest. With water: the barley emerges beautifully. Beeswax, orgeat, and a faintly earthy honey. Mouth (neat): lovely, with demerara sugar, lemon tart and orangecello. With water: back to barley, limoncello and orgeat syrup. Hints of plaster. Finish: medium length, wax still hanging around, discreet hint of aniseed. Orange marmalade and a saline note in the aftertaste. Comments: it was a lovely bottle, but that was over… ten years ago. My apologies.
SGP:651 - 84 points.

Glentauchers 22 yo 1997/2020 (48.1%, The Whisky Baron, Renaissance, bourbon barrel, cask #3884, 124 bottles)

A cracking series, these Whisky Barons. Colour: greenish white wine. Some nails? Patches? Nose: no metallic notes in sight, rather peaches and apples, greengage jam, quince jelly, mirabelles, fougasse, patchouli and maple syrup… All very, very charming. Mouth: excellent, taut, mineral and mentholated, then back to those splendid greengages and some fir honey. Unexpected and very good indeed. Finish: medium length but with complex spices, then heaps of fir sap and black pepper. Comments: that green hue was a little unsettling, but the whisky far less so. A very pretty bottle, and something to have fun with in good company, thanks to its rather striking verdant robe.
SGP:551 - 87 points.

Glentauchers 8 yo 2013/2021 (62.6%, Franco Gasparri, The Art Collection, refill bourbon, Caol Ila finish, cask #800550, 221 bottles)

Warning, this little monster spent 36 months (they write ‘mounts’, but let’s assume they meant ‘months’) in ex-Caol Ila wood. Colour: white wine. Nose: mercurochrome, ashes, lime juice and green apples. Nothing to criticise, really. With water: same again. Fresh, peaty, coastal and citrusy. Mouth (neat): very explosive and to be honest, it’s much more Caol Ila than Glentauchers. With water: even more so, it’s a lovely Caol Ila. Finish: long, peaty, lemony, herbal and medicinal. Comments: one assumes the cask was still very ‘wet’ before its final fill. All in all, a very charming in-cask-blended malt.
SGP:464 – 85 points.

Glentauchers 6 yo 2014/2020 (53.9%, Boogieman Import, Scottish Warrior, 199 bottles)

A rather frightening bottle, but our soul is pure and our heart brave, so let’s go. Colour: full gold. Nose: metal polish and… metal polish, then cumin, menthol and walnut liqueur. With water: waxed fir wood, beeswax polish, even a touch of solvent. Mouth (neat): rich, thick, modern, spicy and heavily cask-driven. Ginger and cinnamon at 300 miles per hour. With water: everything calms down, almost turns gentle. Hints of paint and paraffin, plus service tree berries and holly eau-de-vie. If you’ve never tasted anything like this, you really should. Finish: long, slightly drying, on speculoos, black tea and aubergine. Quite a bit of bitterness in the aftertaste. Comments: ultra-dry, a bit loco-loco, but we rather like it.
SGP:272 - 84 points.

Glentauchers 8 yo 2012/2021 (61.3%, Scotch Malt Whisky Society, #63.75, 2nd Fill Ex-Bourbon Barrel, ‘Ett Tropiskt Party I Svenskt Norrsken’, 238 bottles)

An exclusive bottling for Sweden, hence the utterly incomprehensible name—unless you’re thoroughly sloshed, or a distinguished Swede, naturally. Even Ikea wouldn’t have dared. Colour: white wine. Nose: cold coffee, and not much else. With water: small apples, jujubes, service berries—not terribly expressive, but elegant nonetheless. Mouth (neat): hits hard, like uncut tutti-frutti straight off the still. Quick, quick… With water: still a bit brutal and rustic, but there are some lovely honeyed notes too. Finish: long, simple, robust, on green and white fruits. Comments: you’d be speaking near-fluent Swedish after two or three drams of this little monster, which could also double as antifreeze for your Volvo or that old Saab convertible (with leather seats, mind). But honestly, we quite like it.
SGP:461 - 82 points.

Glentauchers-Glenlivet 12 yo 2007/2019 (60.0%, Cadenhead, Authentic Collection, hogshead, 252 bottles)

Is this baby also going to try and rip our heads off? Colour: pale white wine. Nose: very simple, on apple spirit and green bananas. Pleasant enough, but nothing that’s going to win a prize in San Francisco at this stage. With water: frankly, these batches are tricky—we’re not far off antifreeze here. Mouth (neat): well now, this is nice, if simple, all on limoncello and apple spirit. With water: indeed, it’s fruity, very simple, clearly defined. Apple and lemon, with a pinch of salt. Finish: long but a bit more rustic. Comments: probably not the most dazzling single malt ever bottled by humankind, but not without its uses. Could serve nicely as a muscular decongestant or in a cocktail with exotic fruit juices.
SGP:361 - 77 points.

Glentauchers 21 yo 1997/2019 (54.5%, The Whisky Exchange, barrel, cask #402, 182 bottles)

Here we have a kind of positive premonition. Colour: light gold. Nose: this one’s far oilier, more austere, more on sunflower oil and grape seed oil. It’s also more elegant, one might say. With water: ink, slag, fruit peelings—heavens, how charmingly austere! Mouth (neat): linseed oil, grapefruit zest, grass juice. With water: modelling clay and those bitter herbs, with an austerity verging on the Spanish Inquisition. Finish: long, entirely herbal. Comments: rare to find a profile this herbal and austere that remains so compelling; next to it, Stockhausen was Céline Dion (what?)
SGP:261 - 85 points.

One last one for today (cross my heart, there won’t be another this time, I mean not today) …

Glentauchers 27 yo 1996/2024 (51.1%, The Antelope Macau & Kanpakai Japan, refill barrel, cask #8003966, 181 bottles)

Colour: gold. Nose: we’re landing squarely in old fruity Speyside territory, with bananas, fully ripe Williams pears, orange cake and mead, then quite a bit of custard. With water: not much change, just a few extra herbs and even more custard. Mouth (neat): this is simply excellent, the influence of time is clear, with white pepper, honey and black tea, though the tannicity is steadily creeping up. In short, not a done deal yet. With water: veers into dried fruit territory—longans, jujubes, dried mulberries, goji berries… But there’s also quite a bit of rather drying wood. It all feels a tad undecided in the end. Finish: medium in length, herbal, fairly dry and a little drying. Comments: not the easiest customer in the end, unless we’ve somehow missed the point (though I doubt it). Still, this remains a very, very good, properly dry old Speysider.
SGP:351 - 85 points.

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