The Macallan - 1976 - 18 yo - Tasting Notes

So, what do you get when whisky and friends come together? Sometimes very nice line ups for sure to try out and talk about with each other. So was the case when Werner came around for a night last year and brought some whiskies to share along. He brought some older bottlings he found recently along of The Macallan to try out. 

Not a huge fan of newer The Macallan bottlings must say sadly so this was a great opportunity to taste some of the older ones every one keeps talking about against some of the newer ones he and us had around the house. Well, always in for a line up like this to compare it and talk about, I was also not saying no to this bottling from 1976, being my birth year. This one I just had to sit down with and make some notes on. It ended up being a night filled with trying out more whiskies from all over the world with each other and discussing them. Was great making notes on this one, and some others that night, but the most important thing as always is, that it was great fun and loved sharing and talking about it with whisky lovers. Thanks Werner for sharing these!

Nose
Dark sweet honey, leather, tobacco, vanilla, raisin, dried fruits, deep Sherry notes. Sweet forrest fruits lying underneath, bit creamy and light toffee notes.

Becomes sweeter with time, more toffee and dark chocolate notes coming to the front. The Sherry influence is very clear here but is not too overpowering.

Palate
Pepper, spices. sweet, bit bitter nutty note and leather/tobacco dryness at first. It fades back and releases sweeter notes underlying beneath the walnuts, honey, vanilla, raisin, cassis, red berry, raspberries an tea biscuits. Reminds me of Spekuk on the palate a bit. bit sweet and spices.

With some time the bitter notes become less present and becomes more a combination of dark chocolate and walnuts. And giving it even more time the sweet dark and red forrest fruit notes become stronger.

Finish
Medium length and sweet. Honey and demerara sugar sweetness on the teeth.

Score
It is on the nose and palate balanced and warm, with a good complexity to it. A good 7,5 out of 10 for sure for me.