A BRUSSELS WATER – Score: 6/10
Bruichladdich is a distillery renowned for its innovative approach to production and blending. Following its relaunch in May 2001 under the leadership of Jim McEwan, it has consistently pushed creative boundaries. However, this inventiveness sometimes left customers perplexed, as the offerings ranged from non-peated to extremely peated whiskies. This led to the decision to clearly differentiate the products by creating three distinct brands:
- Octomore for the most heavily peated expressions,
- Port Charlotte for moderately peated whiskies,
- Bruichladdich for non-peated whiskies.
One might think this categorization would simplify things. Yet, being true to its nature, Bruichladdich introduced in 2008 a hybrid expression: Bruichladdich PEAT.
This whisky was not peated enough to qualify as Port Charlotte (whose ppm levels range from 40 to 55), with this version peaking at 35 ppm. Consequently, the team decided to retain the Bruichladdich label for this release.
This iteration is not one to be remembered as a milestone. The tasting notes lean towards chalky and acrid, evoking the sensation of drinking a calcareous whisky. The finish is earthy and bitter, overloading the palate and failing to enhance the slight smokiness imparted by the peat.
The underwhelming result likely explains why this experiment was never revisited.
