Benrinnes 1999 15 Year Old Malt Cask

Rating: 12/23 Since I just tried the 2002 vintage 11 year old Benrinnes from Hepburn's choice, this is my second Benrinnes; however, it is my first Old Malt Cask. All sorts of new experiences happening today. N: Even after a couple of minutes, there isn't much happening here. It smells a bit like cooked barley with a drop of unscented dish soap. Swirling my glass helps to being out a hint of toastiness that is very faintly nutty. I am getting a little ethanol too though. This is really a not very appealing nose. P: Possibly not as viscous as I'd expected, but not exactly thin. There's a big burn going on here making this harsh. Behind that though is a really interesting profile, with all sorts of funky still flavors, including toastiness, nuttiness, waxiness, some caramel, a little vanilla. It doesn't have any sulphur that stands out, but it does have a lot of the flavors that I'd normally associate with Springbank, Old Pulteney, and Clynelish. Well, it isn't as funky as those, but it has characteristics that remind me of them. There is some nice fruitiness to this that is less common in them though. It isn't a big flavor, but there's a bit of tangerine and orange peel. The bold malt stands out here too. There's some nice cinnamon and a touch of allspice in the spice department, though there's weirdly little wood. F: toasted grain, a bit of sweet malt, and some restrained dirty stills. - Conclusion - This isn't immediately obviously better than Hepburn's Choice Benrinnes 11 (2002) (10/23). There's a lot more tasty fruit to the Hepburn's. That said, this doesn't burn any more than the Hepburn's does, despite the higher proof here. There's also a lot of tasty funk happening here. Old Pulteney 12 (14/23) is a bit more muddled than this is, but it's richer with more funk. Flavor-wise, this is close to the Old Pulteney. This is milder, but a bit less muddled. I think I'd give this a slight edge in flavor, but I need to knock it down a bit for being so harsh. Considering the harshness, I have to place this below the Old Pulteney, though it's definitely also above the Hepburn's. As sort of a tangent, it's weird that the older Benrinnes has so much more dirty still flavor. I'd have thought that the extra age would reduce it more. Anyway, this is an 11 to 13. Considering the burn, I'm leaning against a 13 a little. Oh, I just exhaled a little ethanol from this. I think that's all I needed to go down to a 12. As a final sanity check, I pulled out one of the last few sips of Ancient Ancient Age 10 Star (12/23). It has decent balance and complexity compared with this, and also no burn. This is certainly more sophisticated and tastes better, but the burn and ethanol really do show here in comparison. I have no doubt anymore that this is either an 11 or 12. I'm going with a 12.