Rozelieures Origine Collection

Opening a gratefully received pour of this French liquid I was obtrusively met by an aggressive spirit presence. Fifteen minutes to the side whilst clearing up after the finest roast chicken I’ve eaten in years and I am pleased to find a much more inviting dram ready to be sampled. I very much want to enjoy this, I think cognac casks are a highly interesting option for whiskies, so @cascode thank you kindly for this one. N: beautifully sweet pears, toasty grainy cereal, marzipan (unexpectedly delightful), really ripe banana, a dry leaf (tobacco?), and a suggestion of dried fruit. Big, bold, and complex. P: Moderate richness with a hint of oily presence. Nothing to write home about though. An abundantly youthful arrival marked by grainy cereals and quite a vegetal-leafy presence. Quite a lot of sweetness is present, like a thick syrupy fruit reduction with cherries and orange. There is a also a gristiness that built up with successive sips, like the dusty remnants of a bag of oats. F: Short. Latent spirit, nuttiness, and a gnats fart of smoke. Grist is what lingers the longest. An interesting entry from the French with plenty of room for growth and improvement. The nose is an aggressively complex opening. Not complex in the way of an erudite intellectual that has spent a life time adventuring to far flung corners of the earth. No. Complex, like someone just let a lion out in the middle of playground. I do not doubt that given time to mature this nose will be absolutely excellent. Thats where the enjoyment factor ends for me though. The palate is aggressively young with a grist driven profile that at times verges on acrid with a strong vegetal to spirit presence. It actually reminds me of a flavour note I was confused by in Loch Lomond Original (I cannot escape the grasp of the LL nightmare). The nose lies, thats my take away for this generously supplied highly interesting young whisky. Distiller whisky taste #164 [Pictured here with a hunk of lapis-lazuli from Sar-e-sang, Afghanistan. Not a mineral, but a rock, lapis-lazuli is an aggregate of minerals. The blue from the mineral lazurite, with additional brassy yellow pyrtie. These rocks have formed from limestones hydrothermally altered by circulating metamorphic fluids.]⁣

Nose: Cereal, pear (lots of pears), banana, hazelnut, chestnut, dried fruit, a little citrus and an infinitely small hint of smoke and vanilla. Palate: Young, sweet gristy cereal arrival. The development brings out the sherry influence with grape and mild fruit influences and an oily hint. There's an interesting mezcal-like vegetal fruit note, like green mango. An OK texture, maybe a touch watery, but a it's a very "young" profile. Finish: Short. A little spirity on the aftertaste, but crisp, sweet cereal remains. NOTE: Let this whisky sit in the glass for a while before tasting - for a young expression it responds very well to a little rest. This is a young and vigorous malt but it's by no means bad. You can, however, easily tell that it's a crisp and cereal-driven distillate given just a few years in very bright, fresh casks. It's surprisingly reminiscent of some young Australian whiskies, particularly Hellyer's Road. They share the same young cereal, lactic, gristy profile. G.Rozelieures started production in 2003 and are now the largest whisky distillery in France, but like many young distilleries they are still settling in and finding their voice (interestingly some young distilleries, like Wolfburn, seem to bypass this phase and go straight to creating magnificent whisky). They are doing as much as possible in-house, including their own maltings, and are energy sustainable. Good for them. Nice stuff, but I prophesy that this distillery has really only just taken it's first tentative steps. Watch them, in a couple of decades they will be doing some amazing things - just wait until they get their hands on some good ex-armagnac casks. This expression is fair value, selling here in Australia at prices that pit it against mid-shelf blended malts, and it puts up a good fight. "Good" : 83/100 (3.5 stars)

Much better nose than palate, with notes of dried fruit. There's a touch of salt and smoke as well. The overall impression is that this is an immature whisky, and the short finish doesn't help. Not my sort of thing, but overall ok.

Nose: white wine, vanilla, marzipan. Light. Taste: white wine, cognac. Dry, vanilla, not much depth. Definite bite and thinness is mouthfeel.

Complex flavours, notes of blue cheese and funk with slight peat. Great body with a nice, spicy finish

A little oily smell eases off to a sweet, slightly smoky palate.