Price: £49
Purchased From: The Little Whisky Shop
ABV: 46%
I’m a fan of Living Souls – they’re good value and most of the bottles I’ve had have not disappointed. The only downside is the unavailability of them in Australia. Given they only started in 2024, hopefully with time we’ll see them making an appearance. I picked this up on my most recent trip to the UK from The Little Whisky Shop in Stockbridge, Hampshire. I usually visit there at least once every trip – it’s a great little store with a good mix of bottles and a bar with a decent selection of drams to sample.
This is batch #1 of their 15-year-old blended Scotch whisky, which uses a solera system. They’re continually topping up the solera with different malt and grain whiskies from batch to batch. There have been a couple more batches released since this initial one, and I believe this bottling is a mix of ex-Sherry matured malt whisky and ex-Bourbon matured grain whisky. Of course, like all Living Souls releases, this is natural colour and non-chill filtered.
Nose
Gentle nose, but I’m getting good amounts of the Sherry influence coming through. Orange, lemon and lime. There’s some barley sugar and baked oats in the background, which for me is strange – usually these are the first notes I’d pick up. Water brings out the Bourbon influence a bit more and softens the Sherry, but only very slightly.
Taste
Medium mouthfeel. Apricots, green apples, grapes (red and white). Salted caramel, cherries, cinnamon. Not a great deal of finish, but it does contain some malt and cereal notes. This is surprisingly clean on the palate, so I suspect we’re dealing with equal amounts of grain and malt – it’s well blended. Although bottled on the lower end at 46% ABV, I found a drop of water just took the edge off slightly and allowed it to open up a bit more.
Conclusion
A quaffable blend indeed. It’s not overly complex, but then again blends rarely are. There’s a good amount of Sherry influence from the malt and the grain isn’t overpowering. A well priced, everyday dram. At the time of writing there are still a few bottles of batch #1 available online in the UK, including at The Little Whisky Shop.