A proper rarity from independent bottler Carn Mor's Celebration of the Cask series. This is a 27-year old single cask of Glen Mhor, an obscure Highlands distillery that closed in 1983 and was demolished a couple of years later. Seems like a great way to celebrate the tenth anniversary of Peated Perfection!
Image from dramface.com
Glen Mhor Distillery was founded in 1892 in Inverness, the largest city in the Highlands, which is around 3.5-hours north of Edinburgh by road. The name is pronounced "glen vore", and translates to "great valley" or "big valley" in English. This is a relatively obscure distillery that was among the dozen DCL / United Distillers (predecessor to Diageo) distilleries that met their end in 1983. Unlike some of those which have been preserved in some way or have since been rebuilt, both Glen Mhor and its Inverness neighbour Glen Albyn were completely demolished a few years after their closure. The former distillery site is now a shopping centre. Glen Mhor's main claims to fame were its water source, the famous Loch Ness - which would be a marketing goldmine these days - and the use of Saladin box maltings from 1952 to 1980, producing a lightly peated malt which went through the distillery's single pair of pot stills. The distillery's malting floors were decommissioned prior to the Saladin boxes being installed, since they're a much more efficient and large-scale method of malting grains. They require far less manual labour than traditional malting floors - mechanical screws turn the grain inside the bins and steeping and malting happen in one vessel, rather than people spreading the wet grain on to a malting floor with wheelbarrows and turning it with shovels and rakes. That improved efficiency didn't save the Saladin boxes from the chopping block when DCL purchased the distillery in 1980, citing high operating costs as their reasoning, switching to commercial malted barley. The same reasoning was apparently used for the closure of the distillery three years later, although it's widely known that there was a huge slump in demand in the early 1980s, resulting in an oversupply - "surplus to requirements" is the phrase in common usage. Until recently there were no whisky distilleries in Inverness, which is a little odd given the number of tourists that pass through or stop in this rather beautiful place. There are plenty of distillery options close by, such as Balblair, Glenmorangie, Benromach, and Tomatin. We're still talking about Scotland, after all! There is a distillery in the city itself now, but as far as I know they haven't released any whisky yet.
There were a couple of quasi-official bottlings of Glen Mhor released in United Distillers / DCL's legendary "Rare Malts Selection" batches; a 22-year old and a 28-year old, but like most of these dead distilleries the vast majority of contemporary bottlings are from the older independent bottlers like Gordon & MacPhail, Signatory Vintage, and Cadenhead's. But this is quite an obscure distillery and production was relatively low, so offerings are thin on the ground even in comparison to the other demolished distilleries like Littlemill or St. Magdalene / Linlithgow. Personally this is the first bottling of Glen Mhor that I've seen in person, and was the first example that I had tasted. The obscurity of these dead & demolished distilleries makes the pricing & values hard to guess, although none of them have a fraction of the followings of the legendary big three; Ileach Port Ellen, Highlander Brora, and Lowlander Rosebank. But don't get me wrong, that certainly doesn't mean that they're cheap! These days just about any example of a dead distillery's single malt is going to be in four-figure ($AUD) territory at the secondary auctions, regardless of provenance.
This particular example is a cask strength single cask release from independent bottler Carn Mor, and is part of their high-end "Celebration of the Cask" series. This 27-year old Glen Mhor from cask number #1233 was distilled in August 1982, spending over 27-years in a refill hogshead (250-litre cask) before being bottled in February 2010 with a yield of 270 bottles at 52.0% ABV. Yes, it was bottled over foutrteen years ago! Indy bottler Carn Mor is owned by Morrison Distillers, the former owners of Bowmore, Glen Garioch, and Auchentoshan distilleries, before they sold the trio to Suntory in 1994. As far as I can deduce from Whiskybase this is the only Glen Mhor that the company has ever bottled. As you can see from the image below, the labelling and packaging is terrible, and it doesn't do this dearly-departed distillery any justice. The two tiny words on the small & crudely printed (and annoyingly vertical) label is all we get when it comes to the distillery name, seemingly the vintage year was the most (or only?) important part. Thankfully the Celebration of the Cask series has had a bit of a packaging revamp since this one was bottled! Let's get to it then. My first Glen Mhor!
Glen Mhor 27-Year Old, 52.0%, Carn Mor Celebration of the Cask. Highlands, Scotland.
Dead & demolished distillery, closed in 1983. Single refill hogshead distilled in August 1982 and bottled in February 2014. Non-chill filtered, natural colour. Cask #1233, 270 bottles.
Colour: Gold.
Nose: Oily, malty, spicy, dry, very "old school". White pepper, toasted rye bread (sweet pumpernickel bread?), sweet powdery red apples, damp biscuity malted barley. Brown sugar. Touches of apple cider vinegar, dried lemon peel, and old leather armchair. Cigar smoke and a slight mineral (flinty?) note around the edges.
Texture: Medium-heavy weight. Oily, malty, and lightly smoky. No heat at all.
Taste: Oily & malty, lightly smoky, rich & complex again. White pepper, toasted rye bread (but less sweet and more spicy now), soft leather, dried orange peel. Earthy peat smoke, balsamic vinegar, malt biscuits, and olive oil. Touches of black dried tea leaves & dark chocolate.
Finish: Long length. Dry, oily. Earthy peat smoke, olive oil, rye bread, and a little sawdust. More dark chocolate, balsamic vinegar, and touches of dried herbs (mint?) and flinty mineral notes. Slight touch of horseradish, dusty old paperback books, and oxidised red apples to finish.
Score: 4.5 out of 5.
Notes: Fascinating. Very complex and very delicious. This is a very "old school" whisky with quite a unique profile that is basically impossible to compare with any modern distilleries. That oily, dry, acidic, malty, leathery, and lightly smoky character has me thinking somewhere between Brora, Littlemill, and the dirty (not fruity) side of Ben Nevis. Which is probably no help at all... Regardless, it's very delicious, and a great example of an old Highlands single malt. What a treat!
Today (4th of May '24) is the tenth anniversary of this amateur blog, having first posted on this date back in 2014. It's been a great ride so far, thanks to you all for reading and hopefully enjoying. Here's to the next ten years!
Cheers!