{"id":3309,"date":"2017-03-09T14:05:15","date_gmt":"2017-03-09T19:05:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/whiskyanalysis.com\/?p=3309"},"modified":"2017-03-09T14:36:06","modified_gmt":"2017-03-09T19:36:06","slug":"mcclellands-islay-single-malt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/whiskyanalysis.com\/index.php\/2017\/03\/09\/mcclellands-islay-single-malt\/","title":{"rendered":"McClelland’s Islay Single Malt"},"content":{"rendered":"

Most reviewer’s naturally migrate to higher quality, more complex – and more expensive – whiskies as time goes by. But it is always worthwhile to take a step back and explore entry-level malts and blends, so see if there are any good value buys out there.<\/p>\n

McClelland’s is an unusual “brand”. It produces what is known in the biz as “mystery malts” (or more colloquially, “bastard malts”), where the source distillery for each single malt expression is not identified. McClelland’s was originally a Glasgow-based whisky blending and export firm, until it was purchased in 1970 by what was to eventually become known today as Morrison Bowmore Distillers.<\/p>\n

Morrison Bowmore owns three malt distilleries – the Lowland Auchentoshan, the Highland Glen Garioch, and Isle of Islay’s Bowmore. They sell a wide range of official bottlings of single malts from these distilleries. But Morrison Bowmore has long used the McClelland\u2019s brand for unspecified single malt bottlings of “Lowland”, “Highland”, and “Islay” regional whiskies.\u00a0 Care to make any guesses as to where they are likely sourcing the barrels for those three regions? \ud83d\ude09\u00a0 It’s not much of a stretch to imagine.\u00a0 Since 1999, they have also been producing a “Speyside” expression (source of barrels unknown).<\/p>\n

There are plenty of independent bottlings of these three distilleries as well – which raises the question of what sorts of barrels are finding their way into the budget McClelland’s offerings. As a point of reference, all the McClelland’s regional single malt whiskies sell for $45 CAD at the LCBO – whereas the entry-level NAS expressions for these three distilleries all start at $60 CAD.<\/p>\n

I had skipped over these McClelland’s in my early scotch drinking exposure, and didn’t even bother incorporating them into my Meta-Critic database initially.\u00a0 But I had the chance to sample the McClelland’s Islay Single Malt recently at a bar. Here is what I found in the glass:<\/p>\n

Nose<\/strong>: Wow, that’s more potent than I expected – heavy medicinal peat, with lots of salty seaweed. Very strong coastal Islay presence, with greater complexity than your typical entry-level Bowmore (with its typically simple smoke). Has a decaying vegetative character, with a touch of iodine. Unfortunately, with that also comes some unusual funky notes, like old sweats socks. Beyond that (and it takes a while to get past that), some lemony spirit asserts itself, along with some sweet light caramel and vanilla. A bit of ethanol burn. While young, this is actually a surprisingly promising start.<\/p>\n

Palate<\/strong>: Ok, where did it go?\u00a0 After that heavy olfactory assault, it just seems to disappear in the mouth. Lightly sweet, with standard caramel and vanilla. Some kind of vague fruitiness, but artificial. Nutty (peanuts). Extremely watery mouthfeel, hard to believe this is even 40% ABV. All the smell of Islay and none of the flavour – I don’t think I’ve ever experienced a single malt evaporating so quickly in the mouth.<\/p>\n

Finish<\/strong>: Fairly short (although that’s not necessarily a bad thing here). Touch of vegetal character comes back, with that funk in particular. Smoke lingers, but then so does the funk. Sweet vanilla lasts to the end.<\/p>\n

I actually spent a fair amount of time nosing this one, as I was taken aback by its complexity. Perhaps I had unfairly misjudged these entry-level mystery malts, I thought.\u00a0 But the first sip made it clear why this falls into the category it does – there is really not much here.<\/p>\n

Here is how the McClelland’s compare in my Meta-Critic database, relative to their underlying base distilleries owned by Morrison Bowmore.<\/p>\n

McClelland’s Speyside Single Malt: 6.71 \u00b1 0.48 on 6 reviews ($$)
\nMcClelland’s Highland Single Malt: 7.08 \u00b1 0.47 on 7 reviews ($$)
\nMcClelland’s Lowland Single Malt: 7.04 \u00b1 0.51 on 4 reviews ($$)
\nMcClelland’s Islay Single Malt: 7.94 \u00b1 0.64 on 8 reviews ($$)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Auchentoshan American Oak: 7.55 \u00b1 0.91 on 7 reviews ($$)
\nAuchentoshan 12yo: 8.29 \u00b1 0.26 on 21 reviews ($$$)
\nBowmore Small Batch: 8.28 \u00b1 0.56 on 10 reviews ($$$)
\nBowmore 12yo: 8.39 \u00b1 0.29 on 18 reviews ($$$)
\nGlen Garioch Founder’s Reserve: 8.35 \u00b1 0.38 on 16 reviews ($$$)
\nGlen Garioch Virgin Oak: 8.12 \u00b1 0.50 on 6 reviews ($$$$)
\nGlen Garioch 12yo: 8.65 \u00b1 0.32 on 14 reviews ($$$$)<\/p>\n

\"McClellands.Islay\"As you can see above, this Islay is actually the highest ranked member of the McClelland’s family – although all are ranked well below the official bottlings from the (presumed) source distilleries. I would personally score the McClelland’s Islay lower than the Meta-Critic average.<\/p>\n

The most positive reviews for this Islay expression come for the guys at Quebec Whisky<\/a>. My own assessment is more in line with Jan of Best Shot Whisky<\/a> and Josh the Whiskey Jug<\/a>. Josh’s review in particular closely matches my own tasting notes. I also share his assessment that Morrison Bowmore is likely using McClelland’s as a dumping ground for poor quality barrels they can’t otherwise offload.<\/p>\n

In my view, I think you are best sticking with the entry level age-statement expressions from the underlying distilleries here. And if you are ok with a bit less smoke, for $5 CAD less than the McClelland’s Islay you can pick up the quite decent Te Bheag<\/a> blended scotch whisky at the LCBO.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Most reviewer’s naturally migrate to higher quality, more complex – and more expensive – whiskies as time goes by. But it is always worthwhile to take a step back and explore entry-level malts and blends, so see if there are any good value buys out there. McClelland’s is an unusual “brand”. It produces what is known in the biz as<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3398,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[18,80,17],"class_list":["post-3309","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-whiskies","tag-nas","tag-peated","tag-single-malt"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/whiskyanalysis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3309","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/whiskyanalysis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/whiskyanalysis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whiskyanalysis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whiskyanalysis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3309"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/whiskyanalysis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3309\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3407,"href":"https:\/\/whiskyanalysis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3309\/revisions\/3407"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whiskyanalysis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3398"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/whiskyanalysis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3309"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whiskyanalysis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3309"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whiskyanalysis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3309"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}