Glencadam 21yo
Official Bottling | 46% ABV
Score: 8/10
Something special.
TL;DR
A basket load of delicious fruits
How useful is a review of a whisky that is unobtainable?
It’s a question I often think about when deciding which of my bottles to review. Is there any point in sharing my opinion of a whisky if the reader can’t go into a shop or to an online retailer and pick up a bottle?
As an example, a 250 bottle, single cask, UK only release that has long sold out might not have much relevance to others. In this case, it’s a 21 year old single malt that the distillery has discontinued until such a time when the stocks catch up. Does it still warrant talking about?
From my perspective, yes. I still enjoy reading reviews of whiskies I cannot buy. There is always something to be taken away from the tasting notes, conclusions and scores. The distillery or independent bottler will likely have other whiskies I can get my hands on, and therefore knowing they are bottling quality whisky is important in my purchasing decisions, particularly if I am not already familiar with them.
This is one of the ways word gets out that we should be taking notice or, perhaps in other cases, avoid. That’s why I have decided to go ahead and review a whisky you probably can’t buy, but one which will return in the future when stocks are of suitable age following the closure of the distillery between 2000 and 2003. I guess that means it could theoretically return this year, but as the 18 only returned towards the end of 2023, I suspect we may need to wait a little longer.
There’s always the option of searching for a bottle on auction too, and with the prices we are seeing recently, you may be able to grab one for RRP, or even less. In fact, anything from £90-£120 seems to be the going rate when they do crop up. There’s no doubt a few bottles hanging around in the dusty corners of some local stores too, just like there was in this case.
I wanted some sort of occasion to open this bottle and decided that I would break the seal for my dad and I to share on Boxing Day. My dad is in his 80th year now and has had a few health issues recently, which further brings into focus the appreciation of the time I do have to spend in his company. I hope we still have a decade or more to come, but nothing is guaranteed, and it’s important to treasure the moments we have now, and there are few moments that cannot be improved by sharing a good bottle of whisky.
Boxing day is always the big celebration in our family. Dozens of us gather together to share food, drink, chat and laughter. It’s one of my favourite days. When things start to quieten down at around 10pm, my dad and I get the whisky out. In the past we have done flights of five or six drams each, but as dad has gotten older, his desire to drink in that sort of quantity has diminished. With that in mind, I had this one (hopefully) nice bottle I had planned to take and share with him.
He has always been a man who has purchased 40% whisky from the supermarket; Famous Grouse, Glenfiddich 12 and Glenmorangie 10 are the bottles I always remember being around and in the drinks cabinet. As much as I have plied him with samples of integrity malts at 46% and above over the years, and as much as he appreciates it, I feel it is largely lost on him.
He is a hard man to read at times, and he won’t offer an opinion on any whisky. If I ask what he thinks, he will say “Yes, it’s nice” and that will be that. He is quite simply a man who enjoys a glass of whisky of an evening from time to time, and an easy, smooth, low strength whisky is perfect for him. I think that probably accounts for 90% of whisky drinkers - maybe more. Being as passionate about whisky as we are remains a small percentage of the whisky drinking crowd, and however much that community grows, I suspect the ratio won’t change a great deal.
My dad is incredible; isn’t everyone’s? He is from a different generation. A generation who never boasted, and never talked a great deal about their past, unless questioned on the subject. In the social media era of over sharing – something I am often guilty of – it is lost on the majority of this generation, which can be both a positive and a negative.
He grew up on Merseyside, and once told me very casually, and most likely only when the subject came up, about a time he was in a club in the early 60’s and the as yet fairly unknown band who were performing on stage came and sat at the bar next to him. All four of them in a line with their mop top haircuts. He thought very little of it at the time and continued with his drink, but The Beatles ended up becoming the biggest band of all time. What a story to carry with you and not recall to others with any regularity whatsoever. I am pretty sure I won’t have any such incredible stories to recount when I am his age, but it was no big deal for him at the time, and remains so now.
The fact I spent over £100 on this bottle was not something I shared with him. He would have thought I was stupid if he had known, and he would be absolutely spot on by most measures of sanity. It is a pretty obscene amount of money to spend on a drink, and I reckon we would all have thought the same before we got neck deep in whisky. I have only breached the three figure barrier a handful of times, and don’t intend on doing it much in the future either.
I also shared a small drop with my non-whisky drinking older brother, who simply screwed up his face, declared it horrible just like all whisky he has tasted, and went back to his pink gin and lemonade. I fear some people are beyond help, but I’ll forgive him.
After the Glencadam, dad brought out a couple of bottles from his cabinet. A Glenfiddich 12 and an Aberlour 12. I must say I really enjoyed sharing the Aberlour, and maybe that is a bottle I should explore further, despite only being 40%.
Then again, maybe the moment carried it?
Review
Glencadam 21yo, Official bottling, 46% ABV
£110 paid. Discontinued but can be found occasionally.
When I reviewed the 18 year old a few months ago, I mentioned that I had also purchased the 21 year old from the same retailer in the picturesque fishing town of St Ives in Cornwall. It was priced at £110, which is £10 more than it was when available a couple of years ago, but finding another is very difficult, and I was fine with paying slightly extra. T
here was at least one more bottle on the shelf, but the credit card had been punished enough. This one appears to have been sitting there since not long after it was bottled, which according to the date stamp was 9th October 2015. The sea air may well have played a hand in the rusted edge of the tin it came in, but the bottle was in perfect condition. What we are looking at here was distilled in 1994 at the latest, with possibly some older casks in the mix if they were over-aging at Glencadam.
Score: 8/10
Something special.
TL;DR
A basket load of delicious fruits
Nose
Honeydew melon, tangerine, slightly tart green apple, sweet pear, and the ripe banana note I get across the entire Glencadam core range. It’s a basket full of fruit notes, with floral meadow flowers appearing amongst them also. There is light sweetness of caramel and a background dunnage note, as well as plain candle wax and gentle oak.
Palate
Again we are in fresh and fruity territory, with sweet and sour orchard fruits, beautiful effervescent lemon and pineapple cubes. There is more oak in this than the 18 year old, but it’s a mellow oak, and not the more drying type you can sometimes get that can put me off a whisky. Here it’s elegant and refined, complimenting things nicely. There’s a very light peppery spice, with ginger syrup, vanilla and coconut. As it finishes, I get chocolate limes amongst the creamy vanilla and coconut.
The Dregs
That first pour with my dad on Boxing day would have garnered the same reaction from me that I am used to hearing from him, “Yes, it’s nice”. It’s only when I have had time to sit down quietly on my own that this whisky has shone. The nose is a beautiful array of fruity aromas, with the palate backing it up and bringing sweet, sour and that touch of fizz to the range of sensations.
With the 18 year old sitting at around £135 with some retailers, or £145 on their own website, we can already see what will happen to the 21. Feel free to add your guesses to the comments. I will take a punt at £225.
It’s hard not to be a little frustrated by prices, but I don’t mourn the loss of these older Glencadam bottlings too much, or older whisky in general. Sure, I would love to be able to pick them up at reasonable prices, especially when they are this good, but the 10, 13 and 15 are all excellent whiskies, and I have been impressed by the new range of cask finished non-age statement Reservas they have released recently for around £45 a bottle. The PX finish is the one I purchased and have thoroughly enjoyed, and from what I have been reading, they are all solid choices for the money.
It’s hard to separate both the 18 and the 21. I really should have kept a sample for this very purpose, but before I knew it the 18yo was rinsed. Looking back at my notes from the 18 year old they unsurprisingly have very similar traits.
Same score too.
Score: 8/10
Tried this? Share your thoughts in the comments below. RT
-
Dramface is free.
Its fierce independence and community-focused content is funded by that same community. We don’t do ads, sponsorships or paid-for content. If you like what we do you can support us by becoming a Dramface member for the price of a magazine.
However, if you’ve found a particular article valuable, you also have the option to make a direct donation to the writer, here: buy me a dram - you’d make their day. Thank you.
For more on Dramface and our funding read our about page here.
Other opinions on this:
Got a link to a reliable review? Tell us.
