The Long Awaited Pop of that Lagavulin Feis Ile 2015

The Long Awaited Pop of that Lagavulin Feis Ile 2015

Ever have a best friend that you've never met, never spoken to, never emailed or texted?  That's how we feel about Thomas and Ansgar Speller, fellow bloggers who write WhiskySpeller about their travels and tastings around the world. How did the Spellers capture such favor? Well they know the key to a beasts heart: vintage Lagavulin. Thomas and Ansgar went to last year's Feis Ile (Islay's annual spring festival) and sent us a bottle of Lagauvlin's limited release Feis Ile 2015.

Feis Ile happens the last week of May. All week long, one day is dedicated to a specific Islay distillery. They open their doors with tours, parties, music and tastings. Malt whisky fanatics from all over the world come to celebrate the beauty that is Islay. It's also become tradition for each distillery to offer a limited release festival bottling. These are small batch releases of casks hand-picked by the distillery managers. They're often served up uncolored, at cask strength, and have some special characteristics like age or maturation. If that doesn't make your eyes light up, then we're just not speaking the same language.

We haven't been to Islay yet. It's in the cards, but with a 4.5 year old at home it's not so easy to hop over for a week of sipping malt, sleeping in a charming B&B, and watching the waves at Port Ellen. Just writing about it brings a tear to my eye. We'll get there. 

That's why when our bottle from last year's festival arrived, we were excited. Excited doesn't even really cover it. Ecstatic? Giddy? Something like that. As you know if you're a fan of SmokyBeast, Lagavulin is our first and still greatest love when it comes to whisky. And we'd never tasted one of their special limited release Feis Ile bottlings.

The 2015 Feis Ile bottle was a very special run, even by Feis Ile standards. Iain McArthur, Lag's legendary warehouse manager of 40 years, chose extra aged casks for a twenty-four year release that came in at a whopping 59.9% ABV. This will be the oldest, and the strongest Lag we've ever tasted.  in summary: Oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy!!!!!

We were so excited that we let the bottle sit on our shelf and gazed longingly at it for almost a whole year. It was like an unspoken pact that we would save it for a special occasion. Well almost a year later, with Feis Ile 2016 coming up next week, this seemed like as good an occasion as any.  

Tasting Notes

Nose: The peat is so subtle in the nose here it's all rose petals and heath and lavender. There's a healthy punch of saddle leather and expensive men's cologne. It tails off with a little more smoke, and some melons - cantaloupes and honeydew.

Palate: It opens up and shows its Islay roots in the palate with a big thick mouthfeel of peat and honey. More melons, apricots.  It's so integrated, the peat and the spirit and the sweetness are all wrapped up into a perfect balance.

Finish: Compared to the cask strength 12-year this is a very subtle finish. It's not a fire-breather by any means. The tongue is coated in honey and the smoke rests at the top of the palate drifting up into the nostrils.

Conclusion

It's just superb. At almost 120 proof we expected this to be a ripper, but it's just the opposite. It's a super mellow well balanced whiskey that hits all the right notes. It pulls you in with sweetness and florals before rewarding you with the desired smoke. We felt this one was just perfect with about two eyedropper drops of water (room temperature spring water of course) per ounce. The tiny bit of water opens it up beautifully and it's just a killer dram. Real desert island stuff here, probably in the top ten malts we've reviewed on the site.  A big SmokyBeast "A"!