Adelphi Caol Ila 12yo

The Maker

Adelphi was founded in 1993 by Jamie Walker. The name is derived from Glasgow's Adelphi distillery - which has links to Walker's family - that operated between 1826 and 1970. In the years since 1993 Adelphi has built a highly respected reputation for careful cask selection (rumour has it that they only accept a tiny percentage of the casks they are offered), and the sale of those casks on to consumers in low numbered outruns of integrity offerings.

This integrity does of course come with a price tag with Adelphi releases rarely being the cheapest on the market. Are they worth the premium in a market where the likes of Signatory are able to put out their 100% Proof range at around £50? I guess that's for each drinker to judge.

But regardless of where you stand on that you can't fault that reputation and the skills of whisky writer Charles MacLean who supervises their cask selections. In defence of their prices it's only fair to highlight that the rest of the business has been there in recent years to provide something for everyone. This has taken the form of several Adelphi blends - such as the MacLean's Nose - which has consistently provided great quality for the prices of standard supermarket blends.

But the biggest addition of Adelphi has undoubtedly been the founding of Ardnamurchan distillery in 2014. Over the course of this blog i've already reviewed their core AD release, and one of their annual Cask Strength editions. With a 10yo inaugural release on the go at the time of writing it's fair to say that the quality of their own produce matches the reputation of their bottlings.

The Expression

It's often said that you can't go wrong with a Caol Ila. The whisky is nearly unbreakable insomuch as no matter what it's aged in, or for how long, it always seems to come out good. In a practical sense that means two things. First that my shelves will never be short of Caol Ila. And second, that it always makes a good basis upon which to compare independent bottlers.

As a result, there have been many Caol Ila's on this blog over the years. I won't repeat what has previously been said about them. Nonetheless, if you want to read more about their history and production methods I suggest a previous entry on their core 12yo - against which this expression is best compared.

This bottle from Adelphi is another twelve year old release. But unlike the ex-bourbon dominated core range, this is a single cask release from a refill sherry butt. It yielded 531 bottles at a hefty cask strength of 57.4%. As you would expect it's all natural colour and is non chill-filtered.

The Neck Pour

Immediately the smell of this makes me happy. It's got everything that’s so wonderful about Caol Ila 12 on the nose. It’s got oil. It’s got leather. It’s got fatty pork belly. It's got smoked mackerel. It's got rock pools. It’s got samphire. It's got heather. It’s just great. It's as simple as that.

The palate has all of the above, but with the additions of a slight pine and rosemary. Once it settles in a glass the sweeter notes start to come through. The dark sugars and sultanas.

In short, it’s much like standard Caol Ila 12 but everything is elevated, plus that sweetness. The cask strength is naturally adding a lot of intensity.

The Body

Now that it has been open three months it's those sweet and smoky notes which are coming to the front of the nose and palate in addition to the usual oily savouriness.

As it does so the whole dram becomes much more rounded, despite the strength, and layers of flavour are offered up from sharp citruses through to toasted oats.

With this additional time the contrast between this and the standard 12yo become all the more apparent. It's now a whole different beast offering far more in every way.

Final Thoughts

The more I’ve had of this the better it’s got. From opening to finish it has been less than six months. This is a rare thing for me as most bottles tend to stay on my shelves for over a year as past reviews will attest.

It's hard to pay this whisky a better compliment than that. It's also just not me enjoying it. It's become the one everyone wants a dram of when they visit and the one my wife and I return to regularly. As such it's sad to see that there does not appear to be any online at the moment so replacing it isn't a possibility.

Yet my main interest when buying this was to see how a release like this, from a highly respected independent bottler, compares to a core range, and is it worth the extra £30-40? So in effect is it worth almost twice the price?

For me the answer is always going to be yes. In general I would always prefer to have less of a very good thing, than a lot of a good thing. Be that whisky, wine, red meat or anything else. So for me it makes sense to pay more, get less, but for that experience to be all the better.

That's not me saying that more expensive bottles are always better. Many are not and as far as I'm concerned there are diminishing returns above the £90-£130 bracket that many 18yo are now in. But when it's between a £40 low strength core range, and a £80 independent cask strength, more often than not the latter is going to be superior. It certainly was here.