Highland Park 1970 – 2010 OB ‚Orcadian Vintage‘ 48,0%

Comment: A lesson in roundness, all is perfectly integrated, a  quite creamy-sweet dram lead by brighter fruits (pear, apricot) and (dried) flowers, toffee, turkish delight, Grand Marnier, a whiff of mint and Fino Sherry. Darn good, but very expensive.

Score: 92+

Highland Park 1971 – 2011 OB ‚Orcadian Vintage‘ 46,7%

Comment: Altogether quite similar to the 1970 in profile, but this one is more on herbs and heather/honey. Again I am getting the apricot and all that candyfloss jazz to be smelled at county fairs. This 1971 has a nicer oak influence but is a bit less complex than its predecessor from 1970. Anyway, great stuff.

Score: 92+

Highland Park 25 y.o. OB, 1980 – 2005, Single Sherry Cask 7363 for Germany, 55,5%

Nose: Where to start? At espresso, nougat, the earthy spice, the army of dark fruits (morello cherries, dates, prunes), at polished oak or the maritime freshness? Mmh, let me just mention the single elements of this peacock’s tail of dark aromas. Hazelnuts, maritime freshness with a hint of peat, dry sherry, candyfloss and resin should not be forgotten therein. Wow!

Palate: Coffee bean in chocolate at first, then dark wood, tobacco and the Sherry-influence (dark dry fruit) take over, even with some sulphur of the good kind. All is dark and brooding in a full-on attack with spice. Water can (but doesn’t have to) be added, which brings out the fruit more.

Finish: Eternal! Tobacco and earthy peat meet dark wood and fruits. Like having a 100% chocolate with a fine Port.

Score: 91

Comment: This chewy and potent malt is not for beginners, really. It is like a powerful sports car that needs an experienced driver. Quite rare, that such a power house also has such high complexity. This amazing single cask HP-Sauce doesn’t fit every day, but if it does, it is a real stunner.

According to participants of the Orcadian Vintage tasting in Frankfurt, Gerry was very entertaining and straightforward. Her shared his opinions about the new releases openly. Among many interesting remarks he mentioned was, that you can use old HP bottlings as ‚weather-backcasts‘. The less peaty a dram is, the windier it must have been during the days when the malt was in the kiln, because in that period of time, wind could enter the malting floor/kiln area somehow and partly blow out the phenolic smoke. I can neither confirm nor contradict this as pure B.S. – it just sounded very interesting when a friend told me about his words. Please ask Gerry for the details.

We are not into weather history today, all I do is try this stunning whisky with its heavy price tag:

Highland Park ‚Orcadian Vintage‘ 1964 – 2009, 290 btl., 42,2% (from two refill-hogsheads, one American Oak, one European Oak ex-Sherry)

Comment: This one is the inaugural release of the series and comes with a heavy box with wood inlays and a silver amulet on the front (Viking design, yeah right, I forgot). Nice but … I guess such packaging is necessary to sell it for almost 4.000 squid.Let’s just judge the spirit. An amazing cristalline nose with beautiful balance awaits the chosen few to sip it. The mix of the two different casks is a success, because one gets the best of both worlds, Bourbon (exotic fruits like passion fruit, caramel) and Sherry Casks (wonderful dark aromas of excellent Sherry, dark wood, slight mustiness, etc.). It is all the way high-class with orange-liqueur, sourish notes of rhubarb pie, marshmallows, coffee, heather, Sauce Bolognese and a little peat smoke. On the side, there is a lovely competition between the freshness of cristalline dextrose, which is so typical for the 1964 vintage, and the slight mustiness from old and forgotten Sherry casks. Let’s taste this baby now: No ‚bad‘ woodiness, just a spot-on delivery of mahogani and fruit at first, then the aromas from above ride in gloriously. A whiff of mint joins the delicate nectar on the mid-palate, leading over to a complex finish that only an old whisky like this can deliver. Nothing is in your face here, all is just hinted at. I stand in awe, this piece of liquid art is among the best 50 drams I ever had. Worth a high price for sure, but not the one they charge – hence, not many whisky lovers will get the chance to drink it.

Score: 94+