Longrow Peated

NAS Official Bottling | 46% ABV

Score: 6/10

Good Stuff.

TL;DR

My view of this sweet, peaty drop is not entirely objective

The only useful thing I did over lockdown was get into whisky

It’s a well-worn cliché that drinking whisky evokes, represents, even manifests the past. It can render tangible years of hard work on the part of many experts and craftspeople. It can place a drop of a much bigger whisky history and mythology in your very hands and mouth. It can also, to varying degrees, just smell and taste of ‘age’ (in the case of one 50-year-old whisky I once tried, age smelled like dust and tasted mouth-dryingly of paprika and iodine!).

Less frequently discussed is the fact that whisky captures not just these kinds of pasts, but also our own. As we taste and drink and explore, the whiskies we come to know take on shifting meanings. They come to remind us of past revelry and contemplation, attach themselves to the milestones they have celebrated, become our companions for a time.

No whisky is more evocative of this for me that Longrow Peated NAS, the first bottle of whisky I ever bought (though not drank—I believe that was Laphroaig 10, but I’m really not sure anymore). When I purchased the Longrow in summer 2020 from Whisky.de, it was priced at €39.90. It’s now listed there for €52.90 euros: that’s an increase of about a third. I’d complain, but hey—at least they have this Campbeltown whisky available for purchase at all.

This was actually billed as an entry-level single malt by the above-mentioned retailer (an interesting thought when you think of what is usually recommended as a gateway whisky, and a comment on the role of availability and accessibility in all this). That said, as you’ll see below, I don’t agree with their estimation (at least in the customary YouTube review by proprietor Horst Lüning) that this whisky is primarily smoke and nothing else. I’m also not to be congratulated for choosing such a comparatively good first whisky to purchase: I was going off a recommendation, as I still so often do.

“ I feel sort of moved by the fact that the first bottle of whisky I ever purchased is coming to an end…”

— a sad Gallie

Now, there’s just a dram or two remaining in my bottle of this expression, and it’s time for me to do the honours. I’m back in my childhood bedroom, the same place I spent many a lockdown pub quiz with a glass of this Longrow in hand (sad, I know). I’ve got the same drinking vessel on standby: a cut-glass sherry copita I haphazardly purchased from Ebay once the Longrow was in the post (never having even heard of a Glencairn).

Popping out the cork and smelling the neck of the bottle reveals a mixture of apple cider vinegar, smoky peat and caramel. Could the first one be the effect of oxidation, perhaps? It doesn’t matter; it’s not at all unpleasant to a Kombucha aficionado like me. The satisfyingly shaped SPRINGBANK DISTILLERY bottle is stamped with “01.02.2019 19/034.” Both indicate the date of bottling, as February 1st was the 34th day of the Year Of Our Lord 2019.

I’m not one for schmaltzy sentimentality, but I feel sort of moved by the fact that the first bottle of whisky I ever purchased is coming to an end: I’ve tasted so many since I first poured this and met so many people in pursuit of a good dram. But enough of such self-indulgence—let’s indulge in a pour.

Review

Longrow Peated NAS, 2019 Release, 46% ABV. Matured in ex-bourbon casks, non-chill-filtered, natural colour.
Occasionally available for 45–50 units of money; slightly more available than other J. & A. Mitchell products.

I’ll taste from the little copita (which is rather too straight and narrow up and down, bulb-wise, for my taste nowadays) and then from a more bulbous, stemmy wine glass.

Nose

Although I haven’t poured this whisky for a while, I’ve smelled it so many times that it’s hard to disentangle myself from the thought of, “Yep, this is Longrow Peated.” More concentrated sniffing reveals something fusty along with the obvious peat. This doesn’t smell quite as sweet as I remember (I’m pretty sure I found it almost like a burnt marshmallow the first time). There’s a slight pepper note, and the classic (to me, at least) apple sweetness of peated whiskies matured in bourbon. It definitely smells inviting, ticking all five whisky flavour boxes of sweet, salty, sour, savoury and peaty. The alcohol seems to be growing stronger, the longer I nose, stinging my nostrils like a coastal breeze.

In the bigger glass, the nose—unsurprisingly—feels much fuller. The fustiness becomes an enticingly musty cellar. All the above notes are there, but there’s more sourness, like the stem of a fresh-cut flower, along with a raisin-like fruit quality. Slight carrot, pear vinegar, wood polish. The peat feels fresh, breezy, vegetal. The apple smell incorporates tannin now.

Palate

Wow, the sweetness is certainly still there on the palate. The first thing that hits you is the syrupy sweetness of a caramel so fresh and light, it’s sour (I’m aware that makes little sense). Then, a thinner, ashier peat than I expected—though still primarily a mixture of cinder and medicinal notes—creeps in steadily until it fills your palate. There’s burnt wood, something milky, and a lingering tannic quality that makes me feel I’ve just drunk a nice strong tea. It warms the mouth pleasantly without causing any significant alcohol burn (46% really is a pleasing bottling strength). The finish is slightly rubbery, slightly grapey.

The Dregs

The marshmallowy sweetness came back when I nosed later on, and more sips revealed an undeniably raisin hue to the palate. At the end of the day, I just find this very sippable; that combination of sweetness and peat is just so alluring. I ended up getting distracted by the pure enjoyment of the whisky, and it was gone before I knew it.

‘Sloyd4life’ on Whiskybase said of the 2020 version, which was released the year after mine: “Much dirtier compared to the 2019 version. The peat is much more present.” (Unfortunately, I’ve been unable to compare). Sloyd may have a point; after my most recent J. & A. Mitchell purchase, a Kilkerran 12 of slightly disappointing lightness, it’s nice to return to this. But then, I don’t have the Kilkerran here with me to compare, and I may just be giving the whisky in front of me with the proverbial rosy tint.

True enough, this Longrow is not the most complex whisky I’ve ever had, but it displays a lovely gentleness despite its youth. I do think it would make an excellent entry-level peated malt—I’ll pick up a few next time they’re on offer in Sainsbury’s…