Glenfiddich 21 year old
Gran Reserva Rum Cask Finish Official Bottling | 40% ABV
Score: 3/10
Disappointing.
TL;DR
Steer clear and buy three or four decent bottles instead
Some Learning Curves Are Steeper Than Others
Isn’t it disappointing to realise that, before you could gain the experience to spot and avoid it, marketing has worked its dark voodoo magic on you?
Let me take you back in time to 2020. I was 22. My whisky journey started in the first big Covid-lockdown of that year. It was April, maybe May.
As a classical singer and actor, my lessons at the conservatory were put on hold as the big, invisible cloak of Covid-19 was spreading its shadow over the world. Theory classes would continue via Zoom, but there was no chance of doing any of the practical singing and acting that way. There’s only so much studying you can do when there’s no studying to be done anymore. And so, bored out of my mind, I sat in my little student apartment.
Call it fate or call it foreshadowing, but I suddenly remembered that I once sipped some whisky my dad had on hand and that I had quite enjoyed it. This thought came out of nowhere. I vaguely remembered a green bottle with a stag on it. I got Googling. Ah yes, Glenfiddich. I watched a review on YouTube and decided that I’d like to try it. Yes, I’d have my own bottle of whisky that I would buy myself. For myself. I was, on paper after all, a grown-up.
I went out and bought a bottle of Glenfiddich 12yo and cracked it open that very evening; poured some in a tumbler and added three drops of water, because I heard you were supposed to do that. I sat down to watch a film, yet found myself distracted throughout the entire two hours or so by the vivid, golden liquid in the glass I was holding. What were those flavours? How enticing! Is that a whiff of fruit flavoured sweeties? No, wait… it’s grass-ish? Or maybe both? And why do I smell apples and some sort of sugary thing? I properly enjoyed it.
So much so that the next morning I was sitting on the floor, in a spot by the window as spring sunlight poured into the room, holding the bottle in the light and admiring the gold lettering against the classy green background of the label. I opened the bottle and smelled it again, fascinated. Then I put the cork back in and read the back label. Matured in ex-bourbon and ex-oloroso sherry casks. I had no idea what that meant. Then there was something about their ‘stills’. I didn’t know what stills were, but I preferred my water still instead of sparkling… so that was… good?
Little did I know that casual purchase would be the beginning of an obsession. For a year or two I dabbled with ubiquitous bottles here and there: the likes of Monkey Shoulder, Johnnie Walker Black Label, even a Talisker 10yo that I enjoyed very much. Because those were the familiar, advertised brands and I didn’t know any better. In those two years I bought that Glenfiddich 12yo another two times or so. It felt like home.
Fast forward again to summer 2022. I went to my local liquor store that I knew had a big whisky selection. In my pocket was some birthday money from family. I decided it was time to get a ‘proper’ whisky. A treat-myself-special-bottle that I’d keep and open one day in the future.
I was browsing the shelves when my eyes fell on this big, orange, fancy box with that familiar golden stag and, underneath it, a beautifully decorated 21 years age statement. How pretty it was! I had already seen it online and often wondered what it would taste like. I loved my Glenfiddich 12yo and this was much older, and therefore must be superior. That’s why it was retailing everywhere at over €230, right? I’d never be able to spend that on a bottle. So you can imagine my surprise when I saw that this store was selling it for €156,99.
I felt like I had struck gold! That age statement? At almost €75 less than regular retail price? You could almost consider it a bargain. I’d be mad if I didn’t jump at that opportunity. (Ah, youthful optimistic naivety). Besides, depending on when it was bottled and how much time it had spent sitting on that shelf in the shop, I might have been only a year old when it was distilled. It might even have been distilled before I was born. That was so intriguing.
And so, ten minutes later I drove home with the big, beautiful, box on the passenger seat. I had to restrain myself from not putting it in a seatbelt. I felt proud and in awe of the fact that I had a 21 year old “luxury” version of the malt I loved. And at so much less than RRP. I was the whisky bargain-Indiana-Jones. Upon arriving home I admired the bottle and the writing on the box for a while and then decided that I should keep it somewhere safe. I’d open it in a few years' time when I had some more experience under my belt and could appreciate its qualities more.
Review
Glenfiddich 21yo, ‘Gran Reserva’, Official Bottling, 40% ABV
€160 paid (£165 - £200 typical) with wide availability
In the two and a half years that followed I took a deep dive into WhiskyTube and started accumulating very different sorts of whiskies that taught me valuable lessons as a novice. Whisky comes alive at higher strength. Chill filtration takes away texture and mouthfeel. This is so important for our tasting experiences. The addition of caramel colourant takes away the opportunity to read anything from the colour of the liquid.
Gradually the realisation also set in that age and quality are two very different things. I started to gain more experience, diving head first into the big peat bogs of Islay, embracing sherry bombs and even getting my hands on some Campbeltown goodness. In that frenzy of voracious accumulation and discovery, I kind of forgot I had this Glenfiddich 21yo. Until one day, a couple of months ago, I remembered it and excitedly dug it out from the back of the cabinet.
I was so curious. It was about time I tried something of this age. Carefully, I removed it from its handsome, colourful, fancy box and started reading the label; “40%.”
Oh. Well, that’s okay. I half-heartedly expected that from Glenfiddich. “Contains E150a.” Hm… no matter! I have had bottles with those specifications which I’ve loved! And this would be the first time I tried a whisky of this age. Plus, I paid good money for this one. Just because I was too inexperienced to read those particular specs on the bottle at the time of buying doesn’t mean that I’ve bought a dud.
I bravely decided that I was going to put my sensible hat on and judge this not based on the specs of the bottle, but on the taste of that well aged liquid. So here goes.
Score: 3/10
Disappointing.
TL;DR
Steer clear and buy three or four decent bottles instead
Nose
Flat. A processed vanilla aroma that you buy in supermarkets for baking purposes. A bit of nail polish, mixed with a dominating saccharine artificial sweetener note. There’s some sherry influence, which, together with the rum cask finish, brings some light kitchen spices on the nose. But on the whole it’s quite uneventful. There is a bit of a lemon note, but that too is faint. It’s fairly quiet, but not in an elegant discover-my-hidden-qualities kind of way. Just in a this-is-all-I-have way.
It does seem to give up a little bit more with some time in the glass.
Palate
It’s really thin. Just watery.
In terms of mouthfeel it has nothing to offer. You’d expect, at this age, that some wood oils from 21 years in casks would make themselves known, but no. It’s just so thin. This is heavily, heavily chill filtered. That saccharine chemical sweetener note from the nose carries through on the palate and leaves little room for the rest. Some hints of that citrus and vanilla from the nose. But those two quickly fade away within a second or two and that chemical sweetener takes over and it turns into a flat tanginess. It’s the sort of unpleasant, tangy, bitter, chemical flavouring aftertaste that I’d always find in a can of Diet Coke as a kid; as if you could taste the aluminium can it came in.
This is also the only aspect of the flavour that lingers for a bit before the finish just drops off a cliff. I suspect that that’s the note they’ve tried to play off in the tasting notes on the box as “sharp ginger”? Power of suggestion and such…
The Dregs
Something about this whisky isn’t terrible. But that bitter chemical note spoils whatever good it had going for it. It just takes over. More than anything it suffers incredibly from the way it‘s presented. It looks at you from inside the glass, whimpering like a young dog who, in its prime, just had its reproductive organs removed by a vet. It feels so thin, so diluted; chill filtered and neutered to within an inch of its life. And I suspect that they’ve been fairly generous with the addition of caramel colourant.
There is promise in there somewhere, screaming for a higher bottling strength and much more in the way of decent casks. It would do wonders, I presume, as it would with most whiskies. But I cannot judge a dram for what it would be like if it had this, or didn’t have that, or was a bit more like so. I can only judge it based on what I paid for it and how it tastes the way it is presented to me.
If I’m honest, I wouldn’t even recommend it as a calibrator dram. Even if it was €50,- a bottle. As I’m writing this final section, there’s a young Blended Scotch in my glass that cost me less than a quarter of this Glenfiddich. I recommend you buy that instead and save the rest for other exciting bottles. As a whisky experience it’ll leave this one in the dust every day of the week. I can only roll my eyes at myself and chuckle at that realisation.
Early on in my journey I walked straight into this €157 trap and of course I regret it, but it’s happened. History. I was blinded by the big beautiful box, well chosen fonts and colours, and a luxury placement in the lineup. It happens to the best of us. And to me.
Score: 3/10
Tried this? Share your thoughts in the comments below. MM
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