The Glenlivet Distillery, Scotland     founded: 1824 | active
For more detailed mapping of the distilleries in the area from our whisky map page, use this link.

If every flavour has to be backed up by a friend, then this would smell of Christmas pudding and cherries only. Having said that, individual nosings weren't far away from that summary, with sultanas, treacle, butterscotch and caramel. To sum it up in a way that makes things slightly more confusing, it was said to contain 'delicious fumes'.

If there was ever a whisky whose nose was no indication of what was to come in the palate, then here it is. It's like a nasal ninja, popping up your nose and lieing to your face. The sweetness has all gone, replaced with more of a spice and sour combo, even slightly burnt. It keeps coming though, and a subtle smoke lingers. It was a book about cherries that hadn't been taken out of the library for a while, or bitter lemon, depending on who you asked. It was felt to be slightly disappointing ("tastes like a cheaper nice whisky") and poor value, yet solid and quite nice ("tastes like the sound of the big bang!") - think the price was just too high.

It was long and it really hung around - the age came to the fore here. It lingered, but kept evolving, with a grapey feeling popping in and out but a similar sweetness to the taste.

~£218 (70cl)

Master of Malt: Glenlivet 25yo   |   http://www.masterofmalt.com/whiskies/the-glen

We've always scored out of 10 in our group (see number in red box, below), with scores regularly given across that spectrum. The value out of 100 below is adjusted to the scale most commonly used for whisky reviews, to allow for better comparison.

79 / 100