Bimber Small Batch Ex-Bourbon
English Single Malt OB Batch 04 | 52.1% ABV
Score: 7/10
Very Good Indeed.
TL;DR
A young bourbon-matured fruit bomb
Late to the party
A few weeks ago, I decided to open a bottle of whisky that I’d been holding onto for several years. The whisky in question is something of a unicorn. Having been discontinued back in 2005, it’s only available nowadays at auction.
I knew before I’d opened it that there was a fairly high chance the cork would fail on me. I bought this bottle in 2015, so it had been stored for at least 10 years before it even came into my possession.
The bottle in question was an original official bottling Longmorn 15 year old; a whisky that, for many, is regarded as something of a cult classic. Although I’m enjoying it, it’s not the whisky that I’m not going to review here. The story that I’m about to tell relates to the whisky that I am going to review, though, so hopefully, you’ll indulge me.
Anybody who owns an old bottle of whisky – whether they’ve bought that whisky at auction, or whether they’ve just had it in the collection for a while – will know the feeling of trepidation that comes with opening such bottles. As you peel back the seal, you cross your fingers and pray to the whisky gods that the cork won’t disintegrate on you, like a cheap digestive biscuit that’s been dunked in a mug of scalding hot tea.
Unfortunately, in the case of my bottle of Longmorn 15, that’s what happened. The glue that affixed the wooden stopper to the cork had dried out, and the wooden stopper came off in my hand, leaving me with a decade’s old cork that I couldn’t get purchase on.
Cue a lot of muttering, swearing, rifling through kitchen cabinets, drawers, a tool box (and even the garden shed), in search of a suitable appliance to remove a stopper-less cork; all accompanied by the sound of an exasperated Mrs Mackay, watching me and muttering to herself, “it’s only bloody whisky.”
Needless to say, all was well in the end. Having saved around 200 surplus corks for exactly this sort of emergency, I was able to remove the faulty cork, sieve the whisky through a tea strainer and return it to the bottle with a new cork, at which point, all was well again in the Mackay household. The incident served as a stark reminder of the need to turn my bottles though, so after pouring myself a glass of Longmorn, I decided to do just that.
For those of you who don’t turn your bottles, the idea is that by giving your bottles a turn every now and again, you moisten the cork, something which stops it from drying out. The problem is that once your collection gets beyond a certain size, turning every bottle becomes something of a chore. It’s for this reason that I probably don’t do it as much as I should. I store my whisky in rows three or four deep, so turning every bottle necessitates taking all of the whisky from the cupboard beforehand.
Now, compared to the average Dramface reader, my whisky collection is probably fairly typical. I haven’t counted them, but I’d say that I have somewhere in the region of a hundred bottles. If you’re reading this article, then that probably doesn’t sound like a lot. Even so, seeing that many bottles of whisky, laid out on the dining room table, serves as a stark reminder as to just how far down the whisky rabbit hole you’ve fallen. It did in my case, anyway.
What struck me more than anything, though, as I stood there that day, wasn’t just the size of my collection (although that definitely wasn’t lost on me), or the amount of money that I must have invested over the years.
Rather, it was this: that as much as I profess to be ‘whisky promiscuous’, to borrow a phrase from Aqvavitae, the focus of my collection is actually quite parochial.
Let me explain. When I first got into whisky, all I really wanted to do was drink heavily peated Islay malts. Believe it or not, the bottle that converted my passing interest in whisky into an all-out obsession, was a Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference Islay. That whisky sent me on a flavour chase that lasted almost a decade. I remember, in about 2010, being given a bottle of Aberlour for Christmas, tasting it once, and using the rest of it to pour into coffee, such was the narrow nature of my focus.
In 2018, though, something changed. A chance encounter with the Beast of Dufftown sent me headlong down a different rabbit hole. The bottle of Mortlach in question was something of an epiphany, and led me to explore the world of sulphurous, savoury sherry bombs. To this day, I still own more bottles from Edradour than I do from any other distillery.
Then, around three or four years ago, I started to find myself being pulled in yet another direction. Why this happened, I don’t know, but suddenly, I began to hanker after cleaner, fruit-forward, bourbon matured malts. Glencadam 10 became a regular staple, and I developed a bit of an interest in indy Blair Athols from ex-bourbon casks. These sorts of whiskies make up the majority of my purchases now, and have begun to form the bulk of my collection.
On paper then, my whisky collection speaks of someone whose tastes range far and wide. You can see the outlines of the various rabbit holes that I’ve been down over the years, and there are many of them. It speaks of somebody whose interest in whisky is driven primarily by flavour, as opposed to brand loyalty; somebody who isn’t afraid to take a deep dive in order to find those flavours.
In short, it speaks of somebody whose approach to whisky is open minded and dynamic – until you consider that, of the hundred or so bottles of whisky that I currently own, only six are from non-Scottish producers.
I suspect that I’m not alone here. There’s no doubt that for many of us, single malt Scotch is the gold standard of whisky. Here on Dramface, we write about Scotch more than anything else. In part, that’s because half of us are based in the UK, where Scotch whisky is abundant. Even if that wasn’t the case though, I suspect that Scotch whisky would still consume much of our bandwidth. After all, Scotland to whisky is what Belgium is to beer, or what America is to jazz. The two things are synonymous. They always will be.
This is 2024, though. And whilst Scotland still dominates much of the whisky landscape – and will no doubt continue to do so throughout my lifetime – we all know that there are hundreds of new, dynamic distilleries all over the world that are doing interesting things. Being, as I am, in central England, a number of them, relatively speaking, are on my doorstep.
It’s this, then, that brings me to the whisky that I want to talk about here: an expression from Bimber, an English distillery based in London. The day that I opened that Longmorn 15 and decided to do an inventory of my collection, I also decided that it was high time that I started exploring some whiskies from other parts of the world.
The Bimber that I’m about to review has been in the stash for just over a year, and is the only bottle of English whisky that I currently own. Part of their small batch series, it was matured in ex-bourbon casks, and is something of a fruit-bomb.
It’s also a whisky that speaks to the place that I currently find myself ensconced in; namely, the bourbon-matured, fruit-forward rabbit hole. As such, I’m enjoying it a lot. At 51.2%, non-chill filtered and with no added colour, it ticks a lot of the right boxes as well.
Review
Bimber, Small Batch Ex-bourbon, Batch 04, 51.2% ABV
£65 paid
Founded in 2015, Bimber is a London based distillery that’s been making waves for the last few years. According to the Malt Whisky YearBook, the distillery features open top wooden wash-backs, and direct fired alembic stills. They also use floor malted barley.
This is the first Bimber that I’ve tasted, although that’s not to say that I haven’t been curious about them. Bimber has been on my radar for a number of years now. In the past, though, many of their bottles have flown off the shelves before I’ve had a chance to snag one.
Those that have hung around have often been aimed squarely at the collector’s market, as is the case with their Spirit of the Underground series. These are whiskies that were originally available by ballot, for triple figures, and which, having been subjected to price-gouging from the various online retailers, now command significantly more than their already high RRPs.
Young whisky from a nascent distillery, priced at £500 a bottle? Thanks, but I think I’ll pass.
Fortunately, the bottle that I’m reviewing here hung around long enough for me to grab one, and it wasn’t too expensive, either. It cost me £65. Not cheap, but I think that the whisky in the bottle justifies the price.
Score: 7/10
Very Good Indeed.
TL;DR
A young bourbon-matured fruit bomb
Nose
The first thing I get on the nose is sesame oil. It’s sweet as well. This probably sounds odd, but the best way I can think to describe it is like that smell that you sometimes get when you’re walking past a Chinese restaurant. It’s that sweet, aromatic smell of sesame oil and MSG. It’s quite a pleasant smell and is immediately evocative of the smell you get in various China towns across the UK. I recognised it the second I put my nose to it, though it took me a while to figure out what it was that it reminded me of.
Beyond the slightly weird but rather appealing sesame oil / MSG combo, I also get fruit tea and strawberry laces, along with a bit of white chocolate. If you’ve ever had strawberry chocolate mice, then I’m thinking of that smell. It’s not a complex nose by any means, but it’s sweet, fruity and definitely invites you to dive in.
Palate
The first thing that strikes me from tasting it is that this is a very sweet whisky. It’s young, and a bit hot, but there’s definitely a clear line of direction. It’s all fruit and confectionery.
I get strawberry Hubba Bubba, as well as a little more of that sesame oil that I picked up on the nose. I also get candied fruits, white chocolate, some dried apricot and some quince jam. There’s some fruit tea here, some strawberry Maoams and some Cherryade as well. There’s also some white pepper that plays through the development and into the finish. The finish is slightly bitter – think grapefruit – but it balances things out nicely.
My only criticism is that it is a little rough around the edges. The age shows through with some prickly heat, which isn’t off putting, but which is a touch abrasive. Water dials it down somewhat, but not entirely.
That said, this is still a solid whisky. It’s a really unique expression that doesn’t taste like anything else I currently own a bottle of, and on that basis, I’m happy to have it on the shelf and definitely think it’s worth the RRP. The score I’ve given reflects that, although I would caveat it by saying that it’s obviously young and may not be for everyone.
The Dregs
I mentioned earlier in the review that when I look at my whisky collection, I can see the outlines of the various rabbit holes that I’ve been down over the last couple of decades. Much like my record collection, my whisky collection speaks of my evolving tastes and interests. To borrow another Aqvavitae-ism, it’s something of a ‘cookie trail.’
More than that, though, my whisky collection speaks of who I am as a person, as do all of our collections, regardless of what they’re focused on. It’s for this reason that I think that collections of anything – be it whisky, records or otherwise – are endlessly fascinating. There’s something eminently human about collecting things. I don’t care whether it’s stamps, coins, whisky, antique sheet music, or whatever. Collections interest me.
It’s probably why one of my favourite TV shows is American Pickers (if you’ve never seen it, then it’s basically about two guys who drive across America, buying antiques from people who have amassed more stuff than they can reasonably keep track of). I love seeing a collection that somebody has dedicated their life to. It speaks to a passion that not everybody has. And, let’s face it, life is better when you find something you’re passionate about.
Back to my own whisky collection – which isn’t on the scale of anything you’ll see on American Pickers – as I already alluded to, this Bimber speaks to where I am currently on my whisky journey. I’m pretty sure that, had I been given a bottle of this a decade ago, I’d probably have found it fairly unremarkable. With no peat and no sherry, it’s not what you’d call a ‘shouty’ whisky.
Our tastes change, though, and our collections reflect that. This Bimber, whilst young and still a bit spirity, is one that I’m enjoying. Whilst I’ve previously been put off by the pricing and collectability factor of some of their expressions, I think that this one’s worth the money.
As to whisky more broadly, whilst Scottish single malts will no doubt always have my heart, I’m going to make more of an effort to traverse the whisk(e)y landscape a bit more widely in future.
After all, this is 2024. There’s a whole other world of whisky out there to explore. Moving forward, my collecting habits may well come to reflect that.
Score: 7/10
Tried this? Share your thoughts in the comments below. FMc
-
Dramface is free.
Its fierce independence and community-focused content is funded by that same community. We don’t do ads, sponsorships or paid-for content. If you like what we do you can support us by becoming a Dramface member for the price of a magazine.
However, if you’ve found a particular article valuable, you also have the option to make a direct donation to the writer, here: buy me a dram - you’d make their day. Thank you.
For more on Dramface and our funding read our about page here.
