Spica 29 Year Old 1989 North Star Spirits

I tasted the 20-year-old version of the Spica from North Star Spirits, a very nice and tasteful blend of this bottler that won prizes again in 2021. But today we go a step further and taste a 29-year-old, all components of which were distilled in 1989.

Beautiful nose! Baked apples with cinnamon, cherries and fudge, with some brown sugar in the background. You have to have some patience for it, but it's worth it. Then there are notes of strawberry and autumn leaves. There's a fresh sour touch to it too. Think grapefruit. Pleasant, absolutely.

Oily, almost creamy. That's undoubtedly the grain component, although I can hardly find it on the palate. That's an advantage, of course. Nice and sweet on chewing tobacco, orange peels, caramel, red fruit and raisins. It's hard to find a flaw in this. Nice and spicy, too. Cloves and nutmeg. Hint of pepper.

The finish is medium-long, warm and spicy, but above all sweet with red fruit and cinnamon, overdrawn fruit tea and soft notes of the oak.

This can easily stand next to a modern Macallan. Thank you for the sample, Manny.