Aah, grain whisky. Grain as in not malted barley. Not something I often try. What I somehow know, not so much by experience but through… reading? folklore?… is that grain whisky produced by continuous distillation in column still tends to lack the complexity of malt whisky distilled in copper stills. The presence of grain spirit is what demotes a “blended malt whisky” to a mere “blended whisky”- tsk tsk tsk! But if a grain whisky is left in solitary confinement in an oak cask for about a life-time sentence it might just come out soft, mellow, and mature… or a hardened criminal ready to re-offend innocent taste buds?
Today I’ll be sampling three old grain whisky 3cl samples that I got off of MasterOfMalt.com: two single grains bottled by MoM for their own recently revamped brand, and one blended grain from That Boutique-y Whisky Company. All are plenty old: 39, 45, 46 long years in the cask, respectively. A bottle of malt whisky of comparable age would set one back €500 and more often several times that amount. These three bottles each retailed in the range £150-200 in the UK, so the price-per-year-in-cask is very decent on paper.
I’m coming into this tasting quite open minded really, hoping to discover something a bit different than what I usually imbibe. Let’s-a-go!
Comparative Review
Trio of old grain whiskies
North of Scotland 46yo 1971 at 41%
by Master of Malt
Single Grain • Refill Bourbon Cask
Cameronbridge 1979 39yo at 44.6%
by Master of Malt
Single Grain • Ex-Bourbon Cask
“Blended Grain 1 – Batch 3” 1976 45yo at 44.2%
by That Boutique-y Whisky Company
Blended Grain (apparently of Carsebridge and North of Scotland)
Let’s try them one by one, neat, and with but a few minutes rest.
First impressions
First out, the North of Scotland 46yo:
Nose: Pancakes with plenty of syrup; oak wood, cinnamon, and vanilla, a bit perfumed. A generous and enticing nose. Some sour and vegetal notes hiding in the background though. Palate: flavourful and creamy in taste, but light in texture. Sweet, vanilla finish. Well integrated.
Next up, Cameronbridge 39yo:
Nose: at first very closed, making it seem mostly chalky and dunnage-y. A bit buttery, some confectionary notes developing, but the woody and vegetal notes are more pronounced here than in the NoS. Wood spice, polished wood, almost sour wood too. Palate has some zing! compared to NoS, and more texture. Drying and a bit sour. Orange marmalade, maybe some stewed apples – but not very sweet. Finish is quite oaky, with tannins.
Let’s go, Blended grain 45yo!
Nose: quite closed, whiff of citrus and peach, but then onto sour oaky, vegetal territory. Maybe some sourdough. There is some pastry goodness there too, but not a whole lot. Again, cinnamon is present. Much closer to the CB than to the NoS. Palette: Tannins and sourness, some “zing”. Wood polish. Finish: quite drying, some vanilla.
Already it’s quite clear who the winner is – the North of Scotland. Who doesn’t love pancakes with syrup? The Cameronbridge is a nose ahead of the Blend (pun intended), having a bit more of the cinnamon to distract me from oaky and sour notes. Now I will let the drams sit to aerate for some 30 min (the first round of tasting took maybe 20 min in total), and I will come back and see if / how the experience changes.
Second impressions
Returning to North of Scotland 46yo:
Still close to the initial experience. Maybe a bit more polished wood, and a little less pancakes. Finish is perhaps a bit weak. Next!
Cameronbridge 39yo:
Ooh, here’s more sweet pastry than I remember from earlier. Not as closed as at first, and less vegetal. Some milk chocolate. A faint trace of a leathery note (more please!). But the main experience is still wood. The sourness is less vinegary and more citric now. Now the nose is sort of nice, actually, if a bit too woodsy. Taste: still tannic… very tannic – there’s an astringent coating on the teeth. Not great.
Last drop of the night, Blended grain 45yo:
On the nose, a bit of floral honey competing with the sour wood. Taste: on the good side, some vanilla, and tannic but not nearly as much as the CB. But honestly, not that appealing. Finish is now sour, ugh.
Verdict *:
In total I find the NS 46yo to be good but not fantastic; the CB 39yo and the blended grain 45yo are too unbalanced by the wood to be more than decent, but they are certainly not dull. Hence*
North of Scotland 46yo: ⭐Notable Quality
Cameronbridge 39yo: ✔️ Decent
Blended grain 45yo: ✔️ Decent
* Recast into the new scoring system 21st May 2023
To summarise, I’m a bit disappointed. IMHO the long time in wood has done more to impart tannic, sour oak flavours, than bring juicy oak complexity. The reviews on WhiskyBase seem quite more positive, though. Perhaps I need to acclimate my palate more to grain whisky, in order to see some quality here that currently eludes me. But I suspect there might be good reason why single grains for the enthusiast market are often bottle around the 30-year mark; this might find the right balance of complexity form aging without imparting to much wood notes.
I did save about 30% of each sample. Since I’m not particularly craving more of any one of them right now, I will combine them into my own blended grain sample, and revisit this tannic trio some other time. Perhaps to contrast with a 30 “youngster”.
DuckDrams 
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