Glen Scotia Campbeltown Malts Festival 2023 Limited Edition - 11yo Peated White Port

As well as being my birthday the end of April usually sees the release of @GlenScotia's Campbeltown Malts Festival Limited Edition.

This year they've gone with an 11yo finished in a White Port cask.

This year's Campbeltown Malts Festival Limited Edition is an 11yo Lightly Peated White Port Finish.

Iain McAlister, Glen Scotia's Master Distiller, describes it as:

"This year’s Festival Edition release is another superb, limited-edition that showcases the scope of what Glen Scotia can offer; the white port cask finish provides something different for us, while still maintaining that wonderful fruity, robust, and subtly saline Campbeltown signature profile." 

The whisky was matured for 10 years in 100% first fill ex-bourbon casks, a sweet spot for Glen Scotia (see my single cask reviews here). The whisky was then finished for 12 months in White Port Casks. What the distillery can't tell us, probably because they don't know, is what type of White Port Cask they were! Their supplier would have been very tight lipped about them as they aren't a very common cask.

White Port, like it's Ruby or Tawny cousins is made from grapes grown and processed in the demarcated Douro region of Portugal. The wine is fortified by the addition of a neutral grape spirit known as aguardiente to stop the fermentation, leaving residual sugar in the wine, and to boost the alcohol content. The fortification spirit is sometimes referred to as brandy, but it bears little resemblance to commercial brandies.

Ruby and Tawny Ports are made from red grapes, Ruby is usually bottled young after maturing in tanks or maybe oak casks. Tawny is always aged in oak casks usually for 10s of years. White Port is made from white grapes and can be bottled young giving a dry port or aged giving a sweeter nuttier port.

Distillery info:

Our annual limited edition Festival bottlings are intriguing, bold, and appeal to those looking to be wonderfully surprised. After a 12-month finish in white port casks, this 11-year-old lightly peated single malt is brimming with bright spiced orchard fruit flavours interwoven with a signature Campbeltown soft smoke and sea salt.

Cask Strength 54.7% ABV - Non Chill Filtered - Natural Colour

Nose : Warming spiced stone fruit, almost like stewed white peach & cloves, with a fresher lemongrass and a slight mineral element.. 

Palate : Molasses, caramel sweetness with more prune and fig notes with waxed wood and sandalwood spice. 

Finish : Fills the mouth with a long fragrant finish.

 

So let's see what it's like:

My thoughts:

Appearance: Dark gold in the glass, swirls cling as a thin line, bead up slowly to form small beads which falls as slow thin oily legs.

Nose: Toffee chewing nuts, tropical fruit: pineapples, kiwi, banana, peaches; some dates and black cherries. There's a little hint of smoke and some robust salinity. A little citrus zest and gentle spice finish things off nicely.

Palate: Thick syrupy arrival, sweet honey, toffee and brown sugar to start. The salinity and gentle ashy smoke dries the tongue immediately. A few more sips are required and the fruit from the nose come through - tropical and black stoned - this time the dates are joined by figs and prunes. I think I was expecting more hedgerow berries from the Port but this is more like a sherry cask maturation. There's a little dry spice - cinnamon and black pepper. Alternative sips swap between toffee and fruit as I make my way down to the bottom of the glass - Yummy!

Finish: Lingering dry ash, cinnamon spice and a little salinity..

Overall: I think this is only the 2nd White Port matured whisky I've tried, the other was a Glencadam, and I think I was expecting more berries and cherries like you get from Ruby or Tawny Port but this is a different beast altogether - more sherry cask maturation like. Maybe the casks used had previously matured the white port for a short time - there is a lot of dryness in this whisky? The smoke is gentle and ashy - not something I recall from many Glen Scotia but the distinctive dry salinity is there! 

There's around 24,000 bottles so this isn't going to sell out in a week but at £65 (a £10 increase on last year's bottle) I'd suggest getting a case fairly soon so you have time to buy another before it all goes!

 

Huge thanks to Iain and the team for a wonderful dram!

Geeky stuff:

There aren't many distilleries who've used White Port casks before, I can only think of Glencadam, Tomintoul, Auchentoshan, Teeling and Douglas Laing's Epicurean. Let me know if you can think of any others!

Geeky stuff 2:

Glen Scotia have made a big thing, on both the box and bottle, about joining their Whisky Experiment. Scan the QR code on the box and you're taken to a page on the Glen Scotia website where you can "join Distillery Manager & Master Distiller Iain McAlister on a sensorial journey through Campeltown (yes the message on the box is missing the 'B') from the comfort of your own home"!

The experiment is basically asking you to measure the amount of Sweet, Sour, Bitter, Salt & Umami (meat) notes that you get from the dram - firstly straight from the bottle, then after watching a video which guides you towards sweetness and then a video which guides you towards salinity. Each of your three measurements are then plotted on a chart and you can compare yourselves to Iain, Hector and Hannah from the distillery!

My results

Geeky stuff 3:

This is the 6th Campbeltown Malts festival release - you can read my thoughts on the other 4 here and here!

Glen Scotia - Campbeltown Malts Festival
Release	Cask type	ABV	Age	Price
2023	Peated White Port Finish	54.7%	11yo	£65
2022	Peated PX Finish	56.5%	8yo	£55
2021	Unpeated Bordeaux Red Wine Finish	56.1%	10yo	£50
2020	Peated Tawny Port Finish	52.8%	14yo	£75
2019	2003 Peated Rum Cask Finish	51.3%	15yo	£??
2018	2008 Peated Ruby Port Finish	57.8%	10yo	£??

Thanks to @WhiskyResource for the photos!