OK so I didn't buy the PX finished bottle (wasn't at the store I bought these at) and I'll get into as I go through this. Otherwise I'll focus on the FINO but this will be a side by side review. Nose - butter scotch, vanilla, a bit of dark fruits, perhaps some grape/wine elements. Swirling I start to get some oak, almost buttered toast. The Oloroso is drier more sherry dark fruits and less of the grape/wine element. There's a lot less butter scotch and vanilla here. Manzanilla has the vanilla notes but not the butter scotch. It's sweeter and there's a lot more just overall to smell here, much more intense. The Fino is somewhat muted. Taste - Spicy, it has a good vanilla note, some nice fino notes (I know). Some fruity elements, light fruits, but spicy. Oloroso - more spice, perhaps spicier. chocolate, dark fruits (waxy). There's more influence from the finishing I believe. Manzanilla - sweet and oily, fruity, but no distinct finishing. I could believe this was just a speyside though it's a bit too fruit forward and sweet imo to not have some finishing. My first comment is that these have incredibly improved from when i first opened them and I got nearly no finishing. That said these are still fairly bourbon forward, likely some fairly well used casks for the secondary fill. Fino - overall this is an interesting drinker. It's however not really for me. 12 years is a bit young for this one. I think heavier finishing would really help if they were going for 12 years old. That said I'm still really happy with this. At 60+ I'd not recommend this unless you want to do a side by side comp like this. This is a bottle that isn't getting killed this year and maybe not next.
About this bottle
The Tomatin Cuatro Series was released in September 2014 and features four Highland single malt expressions but finished in different types of sherry casks. All were distilled on the same day and matured for 9 years in traditional American oak casks. This first expression features Fino sherry, a generally young, white wine is most known for the layer of yeast called "flor" that protects the sherry from oxidation and develops with sufficient head room in the wine barrel. After 3 years finishing in these ex-Fino sherry butts, the whisky is bottled at 46% ABV.
Reviews
Showing the most detailed of 5 parsed reviews.
I'm with DSH. Definite improvement from the terrible terrible Goldlys but yeah well used casking and not a lot going on. Tomatin can do great stuff but it's always flashes of greatness..most of their stuff is middling.
extraordinarily smooth, notes of caramel
Relic 2017-12-07.
2019.01.29
Tastes like this
Same style and price bracket, best rated first.
