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More Whisky Geekery : Lagavulin 16 Vs. Redistilled 16

30 January 2013 868 views Written by: Gal Granov

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Time for another H2H dramming session, this time i chose two staple drams (i guess no one would argue the Talisker 10, and Laga 16 are not essential whisky bar bottles eh?) that any whisky lover should have handy: Talisker 10 and Lagavulin 16. Let’s start with the Lagavulin.

lagavulin-16-year-old-whisky

Lagavulin 16, 43% abv , £42

Nose: Smoke. Pepper. BBQ. Salt and brine. Peat and  leather. Cereals. Iodine. a  Perfect nose, no more and no less. Islay on a tray. and no wonder this is a favourite of so many whisky aficionados.

Palate: Peppery peat with sweet BBQ smoke. Leather and gum. Dry and ashy too with a lot of Cinnamon gum.

Finish: Dry. Peppery. With lots of leftover BBQ smoke & BBQ sauce. Long and rewarding.

Perfect. for this price, it’s one of the best peated whiskies on the planet.Period.

Score: 96/100

Redistilled Lagavulin 16, 43% abv , Not for sale

Nose: Quite different. Almost no smoke. Some fennel. Sweet candied peat. Fruit : unripe  banana peal. Malt. Mossy leaves.

Palate: Cereals. Bitter almonds. Sweet sour peat. Not much smoke too. A bit of unripe banana too. not much peat. Very strange.

Finish: sweet cereal. Bitter note. Almonds.

In one word: Weird stuff. Weird, especially when we compare to the original 16 (see below).

Another whisky experiment, very interesting to see how the redistilation took away so much of the original aromas and flavours, mainly the warm BBQ smoke, one learns to love so much from the original.

many thanks to Ben and the chaps at MOM  for this crazy experiment, and for lettimg me try that one off. cheers!

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  • http://www.facebook.com/berggreen Johnny Houlind Berggreen

    Sounds like a waste of a fantastic Lagavulin 16, although it was an interesting experiment. Have started looking into recasking myself, and might end up buying a few casks and ‘mature’ them with bourbo, sherry and use a clean cask to test out on a few malts.

    But a Lagavulin?

    I wouldn’t go that far :)

    • http://www.whiskyisrael.co.il Gal(WhiskyIsrael)

      Hey Jhonny

      u mean, finish whiskies you buy in those casks?

  • http://twitter.com/dontgiveadram D.T.W.C.

    Interesting comparison. I have a bottle of 16yo opened at the moment and it tastes nothing like it should. In fact is tastes much like your descriptors for the Redistilled. It has confused the hell out of me as I have purchased many a bottle of the 16yo over time. this bottle I have is sweet, little smoke, none of the expected bushfire dryness, cereals & almonds, no bitterness though. More like a younger Lagavullin 12yo cask strength. I am wondering if this batch was not quite par or if there has been some deliberate changes. Only time will tell but I promptly purchased another bottle from the same store and same case to see if this trend has continued.

    • http://www.whiskyisrael.co.il Gal(WhiskyIsrael)

      What you are saying is very weird. i know Lag 16 is very consistent across many batches and years. never encountered that in a laga 16… ;) i would love to swap samples and try it. ;)

      • http://twitter.com/dontgiveadram D.T.W.C.

        Yeah I distributed some samples out to club members and they all had the same opinion. It is very out of the ordinary – Matt