Talisker 30 y.o. (2009)
53.1% abv
Score: 92/100
One more old Talisker for the books before we move on into something else. This is the 2009 special release of 30 year old from the only distillery on the Isle of Skye. Not a lot of lead-in required here (especially after the amount of older Talisker we’ve covered in the last while). It’s a great malt from a great distillery at a great age. As you can imagine, this one is a killer.
Peat, pepper and soft fruits work together here in one of those inexplicably awesome combinations like chocolate and chili…Plant and Krauss…sex and…well…pretty much anything goes with that one, but you get what I’m saying. A little bit of heat paired with a little bit of sweet is magic.
And for any out there that want to contest that older isn’t usually* better…well…try this against the 10 year old and let me know how that works out for ya.
Nose: Peaches. Buckets of peaches. Smoke, but very soft. Chocolate of three kinds: white, dark and milk. Pepper, of course…this is Talisker, after all. Salt. This is very soft and restrained on the peat notes. Great fruits here. Kinda like canned fruit cocktail, cherries n’ all.
Palate: Starts off creamy, but dries out fairly quickly. Never hits the depths of tannic dry-mouth, but definitely leaves the sides of the mouth a little puckered. Much salt and pepper. The fruits are still here. Melon and some borderline tropical notes. The peach is less prevalent, but still there and very pleasant.
Thoughts: A beautiful old salty dog of a Talisker. Not quite as great as the 2010 edition, but hey…we’re talking single point differences. In short…exceptional.
*before the cannibals sharpen their teeth, note I said ‘usually’, not ‘always’.
– Reviewed by: Curt
– Photo: Curt
All Things Whisky 
Thanks for the heads up on Plant and Krauss – it probably won’t get me any closer to finding a Talisker 30, but I’d now buy it on that descriptor alone.
First time checking ’em out?
Yes, I wasn’t aware of the work they’d done together, but I’ll have to get a copies of Raising Sand and By Invitation Only (on another note, I love the stuff that Mark Knopfler and Emmylou Harris did together, especially their version of Done With Bonaparte). I checked out Black Dog on YouTube, and was blown away by the first lines to the same degree that Plant himself was – and he WAS honestly blown away and that’s not easy to do. If the 30 is anything like that… yeah, I’d reconfigure my piggybank.