Penny for Your Thoughts - The Franklin Room
As I mentioned in my previous post, The Franklin Room (Chicago) features a seasonal menu of about 30 whiskies that they sell for 50 percent off. The best part is that these are not commonly found bottles that one might see featured in a happy hour. These are rare, unusual, and premium expressions, including multiple $200+ bottles. At those prices, we couldn't help but try a few new expressions.
Westland Garryana 2017 (50% ABV) - At the risk of sounding hyperbolic, this whiskey likely represents the best innovation -- the first world-class contribution to world whiskey -- in decades. Westland is a Pacific Northwest distillery that focuses on making American single malts, meaning that they produce scotch-style whiskies rather than American-style bourbons or ryes. The results have been impressive thus far, even as the distillery's products tend to be much younger than their old world equivalents. Garryana is a unique expression because the wood used for some of the casks is one that no other whiskey producer uses. Quercus garryana (Oregon oak) is a species of oak from the West Coast, and is rare enough that the distillery can make casks only from naturally fallen and reclaimed wood. It purportedly produces darker, smokier, and more decadently sweet notes than the much more common quercus alba (American oak). About a fifth of the casks that go into this bottle are quercus garryana, meaning that just a little of it drastically transforms the flavor profile.
Fresh fruit leaps out of the glass, with early scents of ripe orchard fruits and apple cobbler dancing alongside strawberry and cotton candy. It alternately reminds me of a luscious white wine or a sherried scotch. After about 20 minutes, spicy oak and caramel begin to emerge, and maple syrup-soaked pecans make a late appearance at the half-hour mark. Every sip is rich and full of those flavors. Fruit is the common denominator, although on the palate it sometimes seems more like caramelized pears and honey. It's light, pleasant, and easy drinking for its respectable proof. It's woody but not overoaked, and it's the rare young malt (three or four years old) that I wouldn't want to age another minute. The finish thankfully leans away from the fruit-forward nature of the first two phases to offer a satisfying conclusion that avoids becoming cloying: smoke, dark chocolate, pepper, caramel, and Werther's butterscotch candies. This is one of the few whiskies in the world that earns its $200-250 price tag. Thank God we could drink it for $9 an ounce! A+
Old Pulteney Gordon & MacPhail 21 (43%) - I tend to be a fan of higher-proof whiskies, but some of these pours blew me away with the complexity and depth that they exhibited at near-minimum ABVs. That's possible only with high-quality casks and long aging durations. Old Pulteney is a coastal distillery in the north of Scotland best known for its maritime character, and this independently bottled dram does not disappoint. This whisky is what I imagine driving a convertible along the North Coast 500 in mid-summer smells like: sea-breeze and brine, seashells, wet shale, some faint fruit, and unburnt cigar tobacco. It's sweet on the tip of the tongue but then has that slight saline quality that's so often found in Old Pulteney, as if it had been diluted with seawater. This one must be sherry-aged, which explains that combination of smoky flavors of tobacco and dense, stewed fruit. That's how it wraps up as well, a swirl of fresh-lit cigars along with something bittersweet that somehow reminds me both of ripe cherries and their stems. A-
Arran 18 (46%) - Arran is an island scotch, and island scotches tend to defy easy classification. Some are lightly peated, like Talisker or Highland Park, and offer a comfortable middle ground between the smoky bruisers of Islay and the sweet accords of the Highlands and Speyside. Others, like Arran, don't bother with the peat, but don't share much DNA with any particular regional style. Arran is even more unusual in that it's a true independently owned and operated distillery. Not many of those left. This expression first came out in 2015 as a limited release aged exclusively in sherry casks, but then joined the regular Arran lineup in the last few years. I don't think this newer, more widely available version is a pure sherry-aged whisky, but it offered an enjoyable contrast to the Old Pulteney. It reminds me most of those tins of old butter cookies that my parents used to buy in the early 1990s. There's also some salted caramel and dried fruit in its scent profile. Its maturity allows oak, apricot, and orange to express themselves on the palate, along with a chewy, cookie-like flavor. The herbal oak and sherry coda make for a pleasurable conclusion. B+
Highland Park Fat Dram 20 (53.4%) - A $300 independent bottling of Highland Park, one of the whisky world's most prestigious and respected distilleries? Sure, we'll have one of those. If anything, it smells older than the labelled age. It's musty, like a country aristocrat's ancestral library, full of leather, parchment, and papyrus. It's meaty, too, and reminds me of bacon and charred ham. One more m-word: it's medicinal. Over time, some sweetness (cupcake frosting) appears, but it's mostly background noise. This Highland Park could pass as a well-aged Islay scotch: floral sweetness, earthy peat, savory ham, and a medicinal undertone that reminds me of Laphroaig. The finish integrates floral, light sherry, oak, and cherry in a complex and ever-lasting wrap party. This is not a straight-forward whisky by any means. It's a challenging dram best suited for more dedicated hobbyists. It's also damn good. A
Glen Scotia Gordon & MacPhail 21 (43%) - These days, Campbeltown is basically a two-man show. Unfortunately for Glen Scotia, the star of that show is Springbank. This relatively unrecognized distillery, however, produces my favorite Campbeltown scotch, the superb and well-blended Victoriana. Because we sampled this at the end of a long night, I didn't take as many notes. However, this scotch also bears a passing resemblance to its Islay or island cousins and features robust flavors of oily, dry peat, herbs, rice, salinity, mellow oak, and malty fruit. That oak ensures that this scotch doesn't get too sweet on subsequent sips or between sips. B+