Milk & Honey Elements Peated

This peated expression in the Element trilogy from Milk & Honey was not made from peated barley. It is in fact their Classic of which a part (41%) was matured on former Islay casks, married with (59%) bourbon cask matured malt. So I’m expecting the Classic with some salty, maritime and smoky elements.

Pleasant and smoky nose on Granny Smith apples, lemon, pasty and some beach sand in the evening sun. Mind you: the peat is not in your face. The M&H DNA remains intact, but gets a nice smoky twist. It works fine. This is a good and interesting nose.

On the palate, this translates to gooseberries, lime, apples and honey, but wrapped in a smoky jackets with a sweet and sour note of grapefruit and walnuts. It’s good, but cannot wholly fulfil the promise of the nose. But a nice panoply of spices: rosemary, caraway, nutmeg and a hint of aniseed.

The finish is medium long and satisfying.

This is by far the best I’ve tried from M&H so far. The fact that this is most likely due to the Islay casks is not a compliment, of course. But they are doing things right, growing and making progress in Tel Aviv. Thanks to Buds & Barrels for the sample.