This Deanston 12 year old review, part of my deep dive into bourbon-cask aged single malts, is a bit different from my usual format. Not the tasting notes themselves, they are there. But instead of the distillery info I like to share in the intro (which is something I do to also educate myself to be fair) this time I want to focus on a learning moment I got from this bottle, so today I will jump straight to the review.
Note: the original post was edited after I got the chance to compare two batches of Deanston 12 side by side. The vote below is for the original batch I tried, I added the vote for the second batch following the original review.
TL:DR: A bottle that didn’t jive with my taste preferences. Well made but with a green/unripe character that I dislike.
Vote*: 5.5 between average, in a good way, & good stuff
Let me state the obvious. Deanston is quite the Online whisky community darling. Plenty of reviewers sing its praises (though some less enthusiastic voices are there). You just need to check the recently published Dramface 40 top Scottish distilleries list which places it 10th. This in itself is remarkable considering the competition. I bought a bottle at the back of many recommendations. I had very high hopes when I went to crack the bottle open. The bottle I bought, as you will read below, didn’t live up to my expectations. Lucky for me I had received a sample from another batch which showed a better side of Deanston.
Deanston 12 year old – batch 22244
Specs
Price paid: 46.90 €
Lot/bottled date: L51613 22244 (bottling date 1/9/2022)
ABV: 46.3%
Natural colour: Not stated on the bottle or packaging, though the Deanston website does mention there is no added colouring on the entire range.
Non-chill filtered: Yes
Casks Used: Ex-Bourbon only
Tasting Notes
Colour: A nice rich gold colour. I’ll take Deanston’s website word as true and accept this is natural colour, since it is the only place which states no caramel colour is added, but why not put it on the bottle label?
Nose: The intensity of the malt aromas and bourbon cask influence immediately make a statement. There is white fruit -apple and pear- vanilla, caramel, spice (ginger, cloves), some floral heather notes, and porridge oats. After a few minutes in the glass, I start detecting a cherry candy aroma I often get in Bourbons. There is some lemon peel and a little honey, and then…an unpleasant overly floral note, hits my nose.
It’s like if someone suddenly unwrapped a cheap bar of soap or mashed cilantro in a mortar… or actually… now I know what it reminds me of… stink bugs! If you ever stepped on a stink bug by mistake (and when it is stink bug season here, it happens more often than I would like to admit) you know the smell I mean. Thinking back to my Glenlivet review, the green/unripe note I described was probably the same as I got here.
Taste: good mouthfeel. The taste is simpler than the nose, but as intense. I get vanilla, caramel, dusty porridge oats and spices, more than on the nose. Among them, a hot ginger note is the predominant one, then cloves, cinnamon and a touch of pepper. Some of that unpleasant cheap floral aroma persists. There is some oakiness, but more as a mouthfeel than an aroma.
Finish: The finish is intense and pretty long, malt-forward, with notes of dry oak, caramel and ginger. It has a slightly tannic, green and bitter aftertaste.
Vote*: 5.5 If I had to purely base it on my personal taste the vote would be a 5, I just cannot get over that soapy/buggy note. On the other hand, I do recognise there are loads of things to like and the quality building blocks are there That counts at least for half a point
* Votes are based on the scoring scale used by Dramface, slightly modified to allow half-points
Deanston 12 year old – batch 22279
Tasting Notes
Colour: Same rich gold as the previous lot, the two are indistinguishable by sight alone.
Nose: The difference between this batch and the previous one jumps out of the glass. It is as riper, sun-drenched dram, as if someone had taken the aromas from the 22244 batch and exposed them to warmth and sunlight. The vanilla, caramel and spice notes are all there but what changes dramatically is the character of the fruit, malt and floral notes. The apple and pear are there but now play second fiddle to warm peachy and tropical, maybe mango, notes. The malt note is darker and the cheap floral/stink bug note is a lovely white flower note. There is a hint of cilantro green-ness, but it is a passing stink rather than a punch in the face.
Taste: Very similar to the previous lot, with vanilla, caramel some ginger spice and a hint of oak. As with the nose in this batch the malt notes is richer and warmer, baked malt biscuit rather than uncooked porridge oats.
Finish: The finish on this batch is a tad shorter and less intense. It remains malt-forward, with notes of dry oak, caramel and ginger, but it gains some of that tropical fruit I noticed on the nose. The aftertaste remains slightly bitter and oaky, yet without that green note of the previous batch.
Vote*: 6.5 For my money, this is a much better batch of Deanston 12. It is still malt forward, floral and slightly spices but with much warmer base notes and with only a hint of that perfumy note I didn’t like. Only the shorter finish lets it down slightly. Still, given a chance I would be happy to buy a bottle from this batch.
* Votes are based on the scoring scale used by Dramface, slightly modified to allow half-points
Conclusions
Some whisky moments stick in your mind. As a new-ish drinker, there are plenty of these. You’ll never forget the first memorable dram, and the first really horrible one. The first time you “get” the effect of bourbon or sherry on the spirit. The first time you realise there is not a unique peat note, and so on.
Trying out these two batches of Deanston 12 is one of these moments for me. As a new whisky drinker, you hear the stories of batch variability. You understand that with a discontinuous process such as pot still distillation, batch variation is inevitable. Still, until you meet it face to face it is something theoretical, hard to understand.
Once you have the proof in front of you, or rather swirling around in your Glencairn glass, it becomes very real.
Just a comment on dislikes before closing this post. We all tend to associate our dislike with something being bad. This experience also made lear that at times liking or disliking a whisky does not in automatically reflect on the quality of the dram. Highlighting the difference is important to respect the hard work the distillery employees put into bringing the liquid we love to us. The two batches I tasted are very similar in many aspects, one had -and I must stress, to my taste- a note that I associate with something unpleasant. ( I don’t know anyone who loves stink bug smell, frankly). While, from time to time, something will not appeal to my or your individual taste, we can still recognise and respect the work that has gone into such a product.
I always find it interesting, after writing my tasting notes, to look at other opinions.
Here are a few other reviews of the Deanston 12 l I enjoyed:
If you have enjoyed this content, please share a comment below and consider supporting the cost of this blog via the button below