Laphroaig PX

Yup - and I like it. Similar to the Triple Wood (the former travel retail exclusive) but with more sweetness. Very typical of current Laphroaigs, with similarity to the Quarter Cask as well.

I'm suprised you didn't get the peat and smoke of a regular Laphroaig - sounds like a duff bottle.

@cowfish There was some smoke on the nose (no risk of mistaking it for a Glenkinchie), but on the palate the overwhelming impression was sweetness (reminded me of the Fettercairn Fior). Strange, because I really liked the Triple Wood.

@olivier: I think you may have been unlucky as @cowfish suggests. Even the most careful of producers can present a less than satisfactory bottle at times.

If it was me, I would drop a note (email) to the distillery and voice your concerns. This may result in the distillery asking for a sample. Believe it or not, distillers like to know when something has gone wrong - And, there are lots of things that can taint a bottle; a sub standard cork, an unclean bottle, a problem with bottling equipment etc. can change an otherwise fine 'drop'.

I had a truly awful bot. of Bomore once which they were happy to know about and replaced with two fine bottles.

Good Luck.

I have (purely for research purposes) tried a bit of the PX over the last couple of nights and my bottle is definitely not a watery dram. Lots of sweetness but also a nice peaty pungency underneath.

Like A'bunadhman suggests I'd drop them a line - if it's a bad bottle they're generally good at replacing it. Most of the time they have people complaining that the flavour is too intense :)

Thanks everyone. I have just contacted Laphroaig. I'll let you know what happens.

I have an unopened bottle of the PX, saving it for an occasion but hope it's of the "tasty" variety! Hope things go well with contacting the distillery, I hope my impression of them as a super customer friendly operation is correct! Let us know how it goes :)

This thread prompted me to open my bottle. Def not watery and went down nicely with a joint of gammon!

@olivier Good luck, I am looking forward to read the future events happening. Hope you get a substitution.

A quick update on this thread.

Someone from Laphroaig responded the next day to my enquiry and after some (very friendly) back and forth it would seem that the problem is that this expression was designed to be dry and woody, both of which I do not personally like in Whiskies (and did not expect from Laphroaig). So it seems it is just a question of taste.

But Laphroaig asked me to send a sample from my bottle to be analysed, just in case there is something odd with my bottle.

Stay tuned ...

@olivier Sorry to resurrect this old thread, but I'm interested to know what the outcome was?

@systemdown Sorry I never posted the conclusion.

Laphroaig did answer my email and analyze my sample and their comment was that

>

I hasten to say that all through our email exchanges the PR department of Jim Beam (new owners of Laphroaig) was extremely friendly and their follow-up was quick and detailed.

@olivier Ooops, I guess puttin stuff in between doble angle brace hides them. So here is the Laphroaig reply again:

"The sample was checked against a standard and no difference was detected. This means it is in fact representative of the Laphroaig PX expression"

Thanks @olivier! I was looking at Laph PX reviews today and found this thread via search. Had a taste yesterday, I found it rather dry and without the impact of standard Laphroaig. On the nose I still had smoky bacon. Overall it was definitely enjoyable but it didn't blow me away. I found the sherry component to be pretty weak and with a label of "PX" I was expecting something different.

Thanks @olivier and @systemdown, I was also curious about the follow-up, since I had searched this thread while I was in the airport. I took the plunge anyway, and will plan to write a review within the next month or so. Overall, I'm not unhappy to have made the purchase. At first, the bottle did not live up to my too-high expectations, but I have noticed improvement in the couple months since I first opened it, and I expect the trend to continue.

Compared to your experience, I feel my bottle must be much better: in contrast to your opening comments, it is not watery, and there is certainly peat influence (enough to remind me of the QC). I also do not agree with some of the descriptions in this thread: I would not describe it as "dry and woody"; I rather think the PX sweetness comes through fine (even if fruit does not), with some (initial) PX tannins. AND whereas I could see that the peat might bear resemblance to bacon smoke, I could not say the malt gives an impression "like bacon", since there is no fatty or musky component. It is just a good, sweet and smoky whisky that happens to start off a bit off-balance. But of course, one year later from the original thread, I am probably now sampling a different batch (and my tastebuds might just be closer to @cowfish 's than to others here).