For my very first review on this blog I honoured one of my favourite distilleries by pouring the final glass of a rare 24yo Linkwood. Now it’s time to give a couple of younger ‘Linkies’ a good run for their (considerably lesser) money.
The first bottle, from the esteemed — some might say hyped — Thompson Bros. independent bottler in Dornoch, my ledger tells me was purchased online in May 2021 for £44.95. Apparently the 9th full bottle of Linkwood in my possession in the 3.5 years of my serious whisky interest up until that point. Just disclosing some biases…
Whisky review
Linkwood 10yo of 2011 vintage at 52.1% bottled by Thompson Bros.
Single Cask • Dechar/Rechar American Oak Hogshead
70cl bottle bought in 2021 for £44.95
Nose: We have entered a fruit orchard! Pears, apples, green grapes; a sweet floral scent (perhaps geranium); white wine. Some light dunnage warehouse notes. On the palate it feels substantial, and has a slight but enticing bitterness; flavour is of fruit salad, Turkish delight, candied ginger. The finish is not very long. Overall, a real fruity treat without any particular flaws.
❤️Personal Favourite • My WB score: 87-88
Before Christmas 2022 I walked into Cadenhead’s whisky shop on Edinburgh’s Canongate on the lookout for something new and unexpected. Popping into Cadenhead’s feels very nostalgic to me: this is where my whisky journey really took off around 2017. In those days I just went to Cadenhead’s whenever I started to run low on whisky, asked for recommendations, sample a few whiskies, and invariably left with at least one bottle. I have since evolved my whisky procurement habits, but Cadenhead’s remains a particularly trusted independent bottler and retailer.
When the pandemic started, Cadenhead’s stopped offering in-store tasting samples and had customers wait outdoors to avoid crowding. Magic gone. This time around, though, I discovered to my delight that tasters were once again freely distributed. They had also revamped their design of the 20cl bottles, and this is where I focussed my attention: so much more exciting to leave with three different smaller bottles than with one standard sized! (Even though the price per ml is a little bit higher.)
Among the offerings was a Linkwood that was only being sold as 20cl for £22.50. The low ABV, 43.2%, is apparently cask strength as I was told. It might hold the story of a leaky cask. For my Committee’s Choice dram for a WOLS tasting in 2020, I had chosen a low cask strength Linkwood that was fantastic. So I was hoping for my Cadenhead’s bottle to establish a pattern.
Whisky review
Linkwood 15yo of 2017 vintage at 43.2% bottled by Cadenhead’s
Cask Strength • Natural Colour • Bourbon Hogshead
20cl bottle for £22.50
Lovely nose with freshly cut grass alongside litchi, apple, lemon zest, and elderflower; also something a little dusty: like the smell of summer rain falling on dry ground (the fancy word is petrichor). On the palate, malty meets bitter meets sour in beautiful balance; dry rather than sweet. There’s a burst of fruity flavours, and even a whiff of smoke–not at all coming from peat, but perhaps from the inside charring of the cask. The flavours follow into a medium-length finish. Overall: This is so delicate and delicious, and manages to evoke deeply rooted scent memories of summer for me.
❤️Personal Favourite • My WB score: 90
Amazing the amount of flavour at this low ABV! A cask this age ought to be at least 50%. But if the low alcohol has been reached by a greedy angels or devils (angel’s share and devil’s share are the common colourful terms for natural evaporation and leakage, respectively) rather than the addition of water, I imagine this could well result in a concentration of flavour.
Contradicting my stated excitement for 20cl bottles: I now wish I had one or two full bottles of this stuff!
DuckDrams 
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