This 8 12 months previous Bunnahabhain 2013 began its life in a bourbon hogshead. Later it moved to a Vino de Colour cask till Clever Dodger bottled it.
Vino de Colour is an allowed complimentary product in sherry manufacturing, much like E150 in whisky. In itself it isn’t a sherry however a barrel-aged mixture of younger wine with arrope, a gooey black syrup that’s the results of cooking down recent grape should (often Pedro Ximénez) to about 20% of its quantity. Arrope is much like sancocho which is cooked right down to about 33%. Prior to now, each had been important parts in Golden Sherry or Brown Sherry. In actual fact the (in)well-known Paxarete (often misspelled as paxarette) can be a sort of vino de coloration.
It fell into disuse within the Nineteen Seventies however a whole lot of sherry bodegas nonetheless have a stash of vino de coloration. It incorporates a whole lot of pigment, with numerous sweetness but additionally a agency bitter aspect. It’s slightly tough to drink neat, however it may well definitely add punch to a middle-of-the-road blended sherry. And in case you’ve ever visited Bodegas Tradición or tried La Bota n°33 from Equipo Navazos then you definitely’ll know vino de coloration may be fairly fantastic after a long time in a barrel.
There’s a sure group of whisky lovers that thinks Paxarete was the magnificent key to some legendary ‘darkish sherry’ whiskies of the Fifties and Nineteen Sixties. Personally I’m not satisfied of the advantages, supported by Pip Hills’ clarification of the (demise of the) course of in his guide Appreciating whisky. But I’m actually keen to do that Bunnahabhain. It has a deep brown color, with much less of the purple hues you’d count on from common sherry casks.
After emptying this cask, proprietor Seb Woolf used it to complete ‘On a Noticed Mill’, a blended whisky on this Minimize Your Wolf Unfastened sequence.
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Bunnahabhain 8 yo 2013 (52,3%, Clever Dodger 2021, bourbon hogshead + Vino de Colour #900710)
Nostril: fascinating. Caramel comes out first, with darkish cherries in syrup, blackberry jam, chocolate and a touch of truffle. Floor espresso too. Then a surprisingly excessive stage of acidic notes seems, like rhubarb jam, raspberry eau-de-vie and a whiff of PX sherry vinegar. Oranges with cloves. A really wide selection of aromas.
Mouth: much less spectacular now. The astringent woody notes, the natural liqueur (Fernet Branca and comparable) and bitters are nicely within the lead. Hints of quina too. I’m positive this works as a cough syrup. Extremely concentrated, thick and… slightly painful to drink. In actual fact it’s remarkably near an actual vino de coloration at excessive power.
End: lengthy, dry, natural. Some sweetness returns to spherical off the sides.
Most individuals consider Paxarete as a sort of übersweet Pedro Ximénez. They’re forgetting the melanoidins which might be the results of the Maillard response whereas cooking the grape juice, which results in bitter, burnt and coffee-like notes. Very academic whisky, however I couldn’t drink a bottle. So yeah, for now I gained’t be signing the petition to deliver again paxarete. Nonetheless accessible from Grasp of Malt in case you’re curious.
