Great Southern Distillery Limeburners Cask M66

My wife and I were in the middle of a Australian Whisky tasting down in Margaret River. There had been a massive storm the night before and from what the weather reports and everyone was saying it was going to be even worse tonight.

We'd tried Hellyers Road, Timboon, Sullivan's Cove, Lark and Bakery Hill. The final distillery in the group was Limeburners.

Now Limeburners is the only distillery in Western Australia and the only distillery that The Grove (where the tasting is taking place) was allowed to sell.

The normal whisky session was a series of six whiskies over an hour.

Our lovely host had just given us seven whiskies and spent almost two hours with us before she was called away to help the other employees.

Before she'd left I'd asked if it would be OK to try some more of the bottles. She's said sure and then opened three more bottles.

M66 which was a Riesling finished bottle.

M59 which was the first peated whisky that Limeburners had distilled.

And then M33 which was the first distillers edition and ran for roughly $400 a bottle.

YUM!

This review is about the M66, Riesling finished bottle.

I decided to start with the M66 because I figured being a Riesling finished whisky that it would be lighter and more delicate.

I'd also never had a Riesling finished whisky, nor had I heard of it being done before although I'm sure it has so I was VERY curious about what it would taste and smell like.

As we nosed the glencairn the first thing that comes to us is what my wife has now termed the Limeburner spices.

Now that's not a bad thing, it's quite nice. Limeburners is one of the few whiskies that my wife can nose and immediately name the distillery.

There's also quite a bit of citrus notes in the nose, but I'm hard pressed to name the fruits.

However the spice that I always get is hints of cinnamon. It's quite a distinctive nose.

When I sip though I'm really impressed with the flavors.

Lovely and sweet

Vanilla, raisins, oranges, sherry, toffee, hints of other fruits.

The finish is short to medium length with the spices and citrus going down with hints of orange and raisins and sherry following it all down.

After it hit the stomach it filled my belly with a lovely warmth that suits the winter weather even though the flavors were more summery.

Have I said lovely?

This wound up being one of my favorite whiskies of the tasting and was the second bottle that I immediately set aside to pick up.

It ran me somewhere along the lines of $130ish and was completely worth it.

The bottle is 173 out of 323 and between this bottle and the M31 I have no decided that I absolutely HATE single barrel whiskies.

Now that statement right there may have just made you blink, but there's a good reason behind this hatred and it's this.

If I pick up a bottle of Ardbeg 10 yr old and I like it, when I finish that bottle I can go out and pick up another bottle of Ardbeg 10 yr old which will more likely then not be just as yummy.

Not so with single barrels where there's just a few hundred bottles released.

Once I finish that bottle, it's gone.

For good.

Forever.

This makes me sad.

Excuse me but I need another drink of Limeburners M66 to console me.