THE VAUNTED ANNUAL DIAGEO SPECIALS FOR 2020

                RARE BY NATURE EXPRESSIONS RELEASED AT CASK STRENGTH

Diageo's Special Releases Single Malt Scotch Whisky Collection for 2020 features eight vibrant expressions, each selected to bring a taste of Scotland to every enthusiast's home.

The 2020 collection, curated by Master Blender Dr. Craig Wilson, includes eight cask strength single malt Scotch whiskies drawn from some of Scotland’s most interesting distilleries. The annual collection explores unusual age points, experimental maturation techniques and this year, welcomes their first-ever release finished in pot-still Caribbean rum casks. The "Rare by Nature" theme highlights the extraordinary nature that surrounds each distillery, with each whisky visually brought to life through intricate illustrations that decorate the bottles.

This year’s Special Releases Collection has been created from some of Wilson’s favorite distilleries across Scotland, with whisky enthusiasts in mind. For those who enjoy spicy flavours, he recommends the Cardhu, and for those who favour rich, intense and smooth flavours, the Mortlach 21 year old. For those curious about discovering something very rare, the Pittyvaich - the single ghost distillery in our Special Releases Collection this year is an unforgettable dram.

The highly anticipated annual collection once again explores unusual age points and experimental maturation techniques, like its first-ever release finished in pot-still Caribbean rum casks. The encore theme highlights the extraordinary nature that surrounds each distillery, with each whisky visually brought to life through intricate illustrations that decorate the bottles.

This one of a kind line-up highlights the diversity of Diageo’s most-treasured reserves maturing in Scotland. The 2020 Special Releases collection was made available in limited quantities from specialist Scotch whisky retailers, including selected airport duty free stores and malts.com. Target markets included the US, Canada, Australia, South Africa and certain Asian countries.

While these whiskies hail from the spirits company’s 27 malt distilleries across Scotland, and vary in age, price, and availability from year to year—there are a few things that have never changed over the past decade:

• The whiskies are bottled at cask strength without chill-filtration or added colouring.
• The offerings are usually targeted at collectors, out of reach for the commoner, but priced within reach of those who want to drink them.
• There’s always a Lagavulin 12 year old.

The 2020 Special Releases Collection:

Cardhu 11-Year-Old ABV: 56.0% Region: Speyside 

Cask: From refill, new, and ex-bourbon American oak

Limited quantities worldwide RRSP £85 (US$113)

Nose: fresh and vibrant, with a nice sourness of Granny Smith apples, lime and unripe pineapple. Lemon icing on a vanilla cake. Meadow flowers, herbs and lightly floral oak. Ginger and suble heather honey as well. Coconut flakes. Nice and easy.

Palate: clean and pleasant with a fairly tart fruity side again, almost a hint of citric acid, mixed with some (virgin) oak spice. Mid-palate it turns towards sweet lemon candy, honeyed breakfast cereals and light biscuity notes. Almonds. White pepper. A very subtle bitter edge, like grapefruit peel or IPA beers.

Finish: medium, drier and quite grassy now, with limoncello, vanilla cream and peppery notes.

Cardhu is a name that is easily ignored in a Special Releases line-up, but this is actually one of the nice surprises in the 2020 selection. It shows an immaculate freshness and a kind of apéritif style, very vibrant and pleasant.

Cragganmore 20-Year-Old ABV: 55.8% Region: Speyside

Cask: From refill casks and new fresh-charred casks.

Limited quantities worldwide RRSP £130 (US$173)

Nose: sweet, rather oily, with a good dose of fresh, slightly grassy oak. Bananas, yellow plums and ripe pears. Whiffs of beeswax. Crème brûlée. A lightly fragrant touch as well, almost glue. Hints of shortbread and walnuts as well.

Palate: starts with sweet, creamy notes – plums and tangerines. It is quickly overtaken by grainy notes, oak polish and a good dose of burnt wood, including a light bitterness. Ginger and menthol, as well as liquorice and hints of Turkish coffee.

Finish: medium, still on charred notes, ginger, apple compote and marmalade.

This is quite a punched up, oak-driven expression of Cragganmore. The new oak brings a layer of charred flavours and spice, but also added sweetness. One of my favourites this year.

Dalwhinnie 30-Year-Old ABV: 51.9% Region:  Highland

Cask: From refill hogsheads; Number of bottles available: 6,978

RRSP £550 (US$732)

The oldest Special Releases 2020 were the Pittyvaich and this Dalwhinnie 30 Year Old, a 1989 vintage drawn from refill hogsheads, mostly ex-bourbon casks but also ex-sherry. Some of the last remaining drops from this vintage, according to Diageo.

The style of this distillate is slightly peculiar. In 1986 Dalwhinnie switched from worm tubs to shell and tube condensers which create a lighter style. They weren’t entirely happy with the result so they switch back to traditional condensers in 1995 (only to notice the character wasn’t the same as before either).

Nose: elegant, starting on ripe plums, gooseberries and yellow apples with sweet herbs and floral notes in the high end. This blends nicely with oak polish, cigar boxes and beeswax. Dusty library and very subtle oily and leafy notes in the background.

Palate: the onset is rather hot. The second wave is sweet (peach, honey) and spicy (ginger and black pepper). Some creamy custard and butterscotch. Liquorice roots and some earthy, green herbs. Plenty of grapefruit peel as well, leaving a slightly tense and bitter impression towards the end.

Finish: medium length, rather sharp, on zesty lemons, menthol and a very faint smoky touch.

This is quite an energetic, complex Dalwhinnie. There’s some oak polish and old-style fruits on the nose that I really like, but it’s remarkably green and earthy on the palate, so somehow it doesn’t win me over entirely. The Pittyvaich is cheaper and better in my opinion.

Lagavulin 12-Year-Old ABV: 56.4% Region: Islay

Cask: From refill American oak casks

Limited quantities worldwide RRSP £125 (US$166)

The yearly Lagavulin 12 Years Special Release is a single vintage 2007 single malt, matured in refill American oak casks selected to stay quiet and make place for the distillery character.

Without doubt this is one of the reliable whiskies among Diageo’s Special Releases, one you can buy without hesitating.

Nose: saline and smoky, with gentle iodine and medicinal notes but this year also a roundness and sweet fruitiness that I was often missing in previous years. Smoked pineapple and lemons alongside briney seafood, light herbs and aniseed. Pretty great.

Palate: bam! This is where it hits you in the face. Dark tarry smoke, Lapsang tea and dark chocolate. Hints of salted caramel. Again this is sweeter than how I remember it. Deep earthy notes and barbecue smoke. Bright flashes of lemon and eucalyptus. Towards the end the TCP* and olive brine becomes stronger.

Finish: very long, coastal and immensely ashy, with crushed peppercorns and drying tarry notes.

A rather sweeter version of this classic this year, but it’s still a benchmark Lagavulin 12 with dark smoke, punchy spice and plenty of coastal notes. They’ve managed to improve a superb whisky.

* TCP is a mild antiseptic, produced in France by Laboratoires Chemineau in Vouvray and sold in the United Kingdom by Omega  Pharma. It is often taken to mean Taste of Chlorinated Phenol, which is incorrect by extant status, but close enough to pass examination.

Mortlach 21 yo 1999 56.9% ABV, OB Special Releases 2020,
PX & Oloroso seasoned cask finish, 7692 btl. Price: £575/€ 650/$700.

The Mortlach in this year’s Special Releases is a 21 year-old finished in Pedro Ximénez and Oloroso seasoned casks. Just a finish, so one may expect a slightly toned down version of last year’s Mortlach 26 YO.

Nose: surprisingly mild and naked, even a little generic. It shows plenty of malty notes, oranges and golden raisins, as well as some oak polish. Ginger and citrus. Growing golden syrup in the background, a little pineapple and fig too. There’s an uncommon lightness to this spirit and the sherry casks are pretty shy as well.

Palate: a more firm character now, but mostly because of the high ABV, I would say. Just a certain hint of meatiness. Melons and lemons, lightly caramelised malt, hints of chocolate. Nutmeg and ginger, with a little mint. Then rather big resinous notes and polished leather, mixed with slightly bitter oak char.

Finish: long, with yellow apples, more nutmeg and other spices.

If the purpose was to show a different, leaner kind of Mortlach, then well done. However those who expect the typical Mortlach weight may be disappointed. While complex enough to merit mention and trigger the memory cells for comparatives, it is a tad expensive for what you’re getting.

Pittyvaich 30 Years (Special Releases 2020) 50.8% ABV Region Speyside; 7056 bottles RRSP: £400/€ 440/$510

The only ghost distillery this year. A 1989 vintage bottled at 50.8% ABV finished in first-fill bourbon casks – that’s a first.  It was originally built to support Arthur Bell's top selling Blended Scotch.  

Pittyvaich: this Speyside distillery is making a name for itself in the Special Releases, with three subsequent releases over the past years, usually with a high score. It is also the only ghost distillery these days, closed in 1993. I’ve always wondered why it survived the big crisis of the early 1980s only to close shortly after.

This year we’re getting a Pittyvaich 30 Years distilled in 1989 and matured in first-fill bourbon.

Nose: convinces immediately. This oily, fruity profile with bananas, unripe pear and pineapple, as well as some etheral citrus oil and Earl Grey. Distant vanilla sweetness with light hints of beeswax. Some mineral and green herbal touches.

Palate: this an oily, creamy quality, with slightly tropical fruits (green mango, bananas, guava) and vanilla cream. Sponge cake. Gets more mineral again, with some chalky touches and green elements (peppercorns, bay leaf). Something of an aromatic Tripel beer. Just a tad boozy perhaps, but a great profile nonetheless.

Finish: not too long, but clean with fresh fruits, now zesty citrus, ginger and mint too.

Probably the best of the Pittyvaichs so far, and one of the better Special Releases this year too. Bright, with a nice (slightly hoppy) fruitiness and above average complexity.

Talisker 8-Year-Old ABV: 57.9% Region: Isle of Skye

Cask: From pot-still Caribbean rum casks.

Limited quantities worldwide RRSP £90/€110/US$120

For a few years now, the Talisker is one of the most anticipated options among the yearly Special Releases. The distillery doesn’t regularly release new offerings and they’re among the younger and more affordable choices in this series. In the Special Releases 2020 there is this Talisker 8 Years, which has been finished in Jamaican pot still rum casks. It was distilled in 2011.

Nose: a slightly funky mix of maritime notes (oyster shells, dried seaweed) with olive brine and pickled gherkins, but also pear drops, lime and a little roasted pineapple. Some mashy notes, toasted wood and heathery notes. The rum is quite shy.

Palate: classic young Talisker with white pepper, heather smoke and a hint of antiseptic with added notes of ripe banana. Sweet and salty, on olives and saltwater, as well as lemons and a drop of soy sauce.

Finish: not too long, slightly hot, with green apple and white pepper.

Mixed feelings. While the recipe is pretty good, the rum feels a little underexposed, leaving the spirit to display its slightly immature side. Maybe not the highlight that some people make of it.

The Singleton of Dufftown 17-Year-Old ABV: 55.1% Region: Highland; Cask: Matured only in refill American oak hogsheads.

Limited quantities worldwide RRSP £110/€125/US$146

This is the first release of Singleton of Dufftown to be matured solely in refill American oak hogsheads.

The eighth and final whisky in the Rare by Nature editions comes from the Singleton Distillery. The 2020 Special Releases marks the first time a theme repeats itself. Due to the popularity of the 2019 Rare By Nature collection, Diageo has released a part two. This gives Master Blender, Dr. Craig Wilson the ability to showcase whiskies as an encore from these distilleries that would possibly not get bottled on their own.

The 2020 edition is younger by one year than the 2019 edition. It comes in at 17-years-old this year.

The Singleton Distillery is not the only Dufftown distillery in the 2020 Rare by Nature Special Releases. Rome may have been built on seven hills, but “Dufftown stands on seven stills.” The salmon on the Rare by Nature bottles is not a coincidence, it is also Singleton’s logo because they go their own way. The distillery started its journey upstream in 1897 at the edge of the River Fiddich. You will also see the distillery go by its full name The Singleton of the Glendullan. During the past ten years, the Mortlach Distillery neighbour has been updating; e.g., a state of the art biodiversity plant opened at Glendullan in 2013.

Appearance: Chardonnay

Nose: Buttery rich popcorn greets the nose instantly. It has sweet touches of honey and caramel. It’s reminiscent of a traditional candy shoppe. Marshmallow and fudge also seem to stand out. In the midst of all the sweet notes is candied ginger and orange peel.

Palate: This one burns at its natural cask strength. The mouthfeel is soft. Candied orange peel and ginger come out in droves. It has a touch of vanilla fudge that lingers on the finish, however, the oak dries out the mouth. Finally, the aftertaste is full of acetone.

The Singleton 17 Year in the 2020 Rare by Nature Diageo Special Releases is more about being in the mood for it. The nose is so different from the palate it feels like a lie and is unbalanced. At times it tastes like one thing, but then at other times it tastes like a different thing. It's still a decent whisky, but maybe spring for others in the 2020 Rare by Nature collection first.