Mortlach 15yo
Signatory Vintage Unchillfiltered 2008-2023 | 46% ABV
Score: 6/10
Good stuff.
TL;DR
Easily worth the price and miles better than anything official
Milestone Malts
If there’s one thing that whisky teaches us, it’s that there’s always something new to learn.
Just as we think we’ve explored the outer reaches of the flavour map, we find ourselves traversing new and unexpected terrain; and just as we start to believe that we’ve exercised the limits of smell and taste, we find ourselves turning another whisky corner and reevaluating how much we really know.
There are certain bottles that we encounter on our journeys that force us to reassess how far we’ve come, and how far we still have to go. For me, one such bottle was an 8 year old Mortlach that I came across a few years ago. I’d like to share that story, as well as talking a little about the highs – and lows – that come with being a Mortlach fanboy.
It was 2018, when I first tasted Mortlach, and I’d been into whisky for just over a decade. Having built up a fairly respectable collection of single malts, I was confident at the time that my love of whisky was, and always would be, firmly rooted in Islay: Ardbeg, Lagavulin, Laphroaig, Caol Ila…if it was heavily peated, and if it came in a green bottle, then that was all I really needed to know.
Although I’d tried a handful of Speyside malts, as a general rule, they didn’t really speak to me; apple, honey and toffee were all very well and good, but they weren’t my thing. I liked bigger flavours in my whisky, like bonfires, and burning rubber, and Germolene, and sticking plasters. Put simply, I thought I knew what my wheelhouse was. Needless to say, I was about to be taken to school.
We all know that whisky has a habit of surprising us, and if we don’t, we all learn it in time. Just when we think we’re entrenched in a particular rabbit-hole, another one opens up beneath us and into it we dive. This happened to me one day when I dropped into my local whisky specialist, and chanced upon an 8 year old Mortlach from Càrn Mòr .
This was back in the days when you didn’t have to sell your eldest child into slavery in order to be able to afford something that had spent more than a dozen years in a cask, but even then, £35 for a naturally presented whisky seemed pretty fair. Having heard so much about the coveted Mortlach 16 year old Flora and Fauna, I decided to take a punt. Mortlach was, after all, known as the Beast of Dufftown. I figured it must have earnt that name for a reason.
I figured right; the moniker was fitting; this was indeed a beast. I didn’t know it as I peeled back the seal and poured the first dram, but that 8 year old Mortlach would turn out to be a game-changer. Although I’d tried ‘dirty’ malts before, this one was something else. Sulphurous, salty and as unctuous as a mouthful of cod liver oil, it spoke to me in much the same way that my first taste of Islay whisky had spoken to me, a decade earlier. The notes that I took at the time, concluded with the phrase, ‘it’s like a bottle of whisky that’s been infused with a stick of celery.’ I appreciate that written down, that sounds terrible. In the glass though, it was utterly compelling.
That Càrn Mòr bottling was one of a handful of whiskies that I’ve since come to refer to as a Milestone Malt. These are rite-of-passage whiskies; whiskies that change our perceptions of what whisky can be, which open new doors, and which alter the course of our whisky journeys irrevocably. It sent me down the rabbit-hole of heavily sherried, savoury malts – those from distilleries such as Edradour, Benromach and Ben Nevis, all of which I still enjoy. It opened my eyes to the whisky landscape that lay beyond Islay. More significantly, it taught me the importance that variety, and serendipity, both play in our whisky educations.
But here’s the rub: being a Mortlach fanboy isn’t all fun and games. In fact, it’s every bit as frustrating as it is rewarding. Anybody who remembers Diageo’s cynical attempt to first brand Mortlach a decade ago, already knows that official bottlings are both poorly presented and overpriced. The launch of their much maligned core range, back in 2014, did nothing but debase the brand. As to their current core range, after a 2017 revamp, the 12 year old Wee Witchie is a decent enough whisky, but muzzled as it is at 43.4%, it lacks the necessary bite to keep me going back for more. If, like me, you crave the classic, meaty Mortlach mouthfeel, your best option is to circumvent the official bottlings altogether and go to the indies, many of whom still feature Mortlach prominently among their ranges.
This of course, comes with its own share of difficulties; not least because, when it comes to such bottlings, the flavour profile is all over the map. With their small outturns, many indy Mortlachs fly off the shelves before a single review has even appeared on whiskybase, so finding a good one can be as much of an art as a science. Still, with certain distilleries, we don’t have a choice; it’s either give up on the whisky altogether or take a chance. Despite having had a handful of disappointing bottles over the years, I’m not ready to give up on Mortlach. Not yet, anyway.
All of which brings me to the bottle that I want to talk about here: a 15 year old, 2008 Mortlach, from Signatory Vintage. Put together from a vatting of ex-bourbon hogsheads, I already knew when I bought this one that it would probably be a different animal to the heavily sherried Càrn Mòr bottling that rocked my whisky world all those years ago.
If you’re reading this, you don’t need me to tell you that £50 for a 15 year old whisky is a steal nowadays, especially if it’s naturally presented and bottled at 46%, which this one is. Being a fan of Signatory’s Unchillfiltered Collection anyway, I decided to take a punt.
Review
Mortlach 15yo, Signatory Vintage Unchillfiltered Series, Natural colour, Feb 2008 - Mar 2023, Matured in bourbon hogsheads – casks 302169, 302184, 302188, 302240, 46% ABV
£50 still some availability
Again, if you’re reading this, then chances are you know as much, if not more, about the whisky making process than I do, so I won’t pretend to be an expert on Mortlach’s complicated distillation method. Apparently, its weighty, robust character comes from its 2.81 distillation times, but beyond that, my own understanding is limited. If you’re interested, then there’s an excellent review of the 16yo Distiller’s Dram here in which Dougie Crystal goes into the distillation process in more detail, and does it more justice than I ever could.
That being said, in my own personal experience, that dense, meaty character that Mortlach is so renowned for, tends to be enhanced by maturation in sherry casks, particularly PX. Bourbon matured Mortlach tends to be a little bit more subdued.
Score: 6/10
Good stuff.
TL;DR
Easily worth the price and miles better than anything official
Nose
Initially I get vanilla, some crisp white wine, some banana and a little cream soda, but on the whole, the nose is pretty uptight. The only distinctive thing here is a slightly soapy note, a little bit like camomile, although it’s fairly subtle. As I write this, I’m just a dram or two from finishing the bottle, and the nose hasn’t really changed much since the first pour. There’s a little green apple, some wine gums and maybe a touch of clementine, but it’s all fairly muted and difficult to pick apart.
Palate
Fortunately, the palate is a lot more expressive.
It’s complex and herbaceous. There’s more of that camomile that I picked up on the nose, along with a touch of star anise. There’s fruit here as well: I get watermelon, some pear, a little lemon and some overripe kiwi. There’s also a prickly, effervescent note, like ginger. Some oak tannins appear in the finish, but they’re not overly bitter. Whilst I wouldn’t describe the mouthfeel as unctuous, it still has some weight to it.
Although it’s elusive, there’s a lovely, soft farmyard note here as well. Think cow manure. Playing in the background is also a lot of salt. From time to time, I get custard creams, cream soda and vanilla, but not much of it. This isn’t a whisky that was put together from particularly active casks, and being matured in ex-bourbon, with no sherry influence, there’s no sulphur here. If anything, this is a quiet, complex, understated whisky, which doesn’t fit the typical distillery profile. If you’re after a big bruiser of a Mortlach, this isn’t the one. That being said, it’s decent nonetheless.
The Dregs
The American poet, Maya Angelou, once said, ‘when somebody tells you who they are, believe them the first time.’ With the benefit of hindsight, it’s easy to see that when Diageo launched their short-lived, ultra-premiumized Mortlach core range, back in 2014, they were telling us exactly who they were.
Although they eventually rowed back on their disastrous own goal, they’ve since increased their prices across the board, something which means that many of their once cherished core expressions – most notably Lagavulin 16 and Talisker 18 – are now either beyond our reach, or simply not worth the asking price. In the case of Mortlach, much of the damage was done long ago. With the premiumisation of the brand, many a whisky botherer abandoned the distillery altogether.
Perhaps this is why, as I write this, Mortlach’s position in the Dramface Top 40 is a woeful #38. Admittedly, with its sulphurous character, it can be something of a Marmite whisky, but even so, belonging as it does to the loose pantheon of ‘dirty’ malts, it should be higher. Two of the malts that I mentioned earlier, Benromach and Edradour, currently sit at #9 and #18 respectively, something that suggests that this style of savoury, characterful whisky remains popular amongst enthusiasts. The fact that Mortlach is at risk of slipping out of the top 40 altogether is testament to Diageo’s debasement of the brand. Truth be told, had my only exposure to Mortlach come in the form of the 12 year old Wee Witchie, I doubt that I’d be banging this particular drum myself.
That original Càrn Mòr bottling, though – along with a spectacular G&M Distillery Labels bottle that I got my hands on a few years ago – showed me just what this distillery is capable of, and I’ve been on a quest to find good Mortlach ever since. Fortunately, unlike some of its Diageo stablemates, the independent bottlers continue to put the stuff out there. That said, with the value of casks ever increasing – and with more and more people investing privately in them – there’s a very real risk that this will dry up in the future.
As for this one, if you can find it in your market, then it’s worth the £50 price tag. If, by the time you read this, it’s already disappeared, you might take solace in the fact that Signatory regularly seem to bottle Mortlach at a similar price point. I’ve had a few now, and whilst none of them have been spectacular, they’ve all been affordable, naturally presented, integrity-forward products.
This one’s no exception. Being matured in bourbon casks, it doesn’t yield as much in the way of the meaty, savoury characteristics that heavily sherried Mortlach is prized for, but that shouldn’t put you off. In fact, if you like quieter, bourbon matured whiskies, this might just be your thing.
As to the distillery more generally, whether or not Mortlach continues to play a part in my own whisky journey, will depend on the continued availability – and affordability – of bottlings such as this one.
In the meantime, it’s reassuring to know that if you’ve been bitten by the beast, there are still good Mortlachs out there to be had. Don’t get me wrong, they’re few and far between, but you can still find them, out there in the wild. You just have to be willing to hunt for them, after all moments with Milestone Malts should be a little elusive.
Score: 6/10
Tried this? Share your thoughts in the comments below. FM
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