Clynelish 13 Year Old 2009 Hand Filled Distillery Exclusive

Nothing is as nice as to fill your own bottle after a distillery visit. And at Clynelish we could taste it in advance, thanks to our lovely tour guide Valerie. The malt was excellent, so it took exactly 0 seconds to decide that it would come home with me. It concerns batch 2022/004, which means that this is (only?) the fourth barrel that is offered as bottle-your-own this year in this beautiful, fully renovated Highland distillery. Enjoy this malt, from an ex-bourbon barrel. At cask strength, that speaks for itself.

Delicious aromatic on all kinds of yellow and white fruit and a cartload of butterscotch. And of course also that typical waxiness that Clynelish seems to have a patent on. But powerful, though. You can just smell that it's at almost 60%, something Valerie was happy to highlight several times during our visit.

Nice and creamy on beeswax, with notes of citrus, but also something of ice cream with banana flavor. It is powerful, but the alcohol does not burn. The flavors come into their own very nicely. As far as I'm concerned, it's somewhere between the Distillery Exclusive and the classic 14 Year Old – which I love, by the way.

The finish is excellent: long, warm, spicy and waxy.

I already regret that I didn't bring two bottles of this, because £120 is really affordable. But I consider myself lucky (Manny will undoubtedly understand this).