Non chill filtered, 46.3% ABV

Color: a true gold, deeper than lager, not reddish at all.

Nose: crisp apples and pears.

Mouth feel is light and dry.

Palate: a little bit of apple cider vinegar like acidity was present, but apple fruit predominates with a little bit of malt and oak sneaking in and remaining through the finish, which is surprisingly long and not surprisingly rich with apple.

Adding a little water didn’t really alter the nose; the fruit remained and was perhaps softened a tad bit.

For the palate, however, the water did splendid things. The apple was more pronounced and sweeter and the malt came through like Kellogg’s Apple Jacks cereal, but without the excessive sugar. The acidity was almost completely gone. The finish remained long and dominated by apple with a hint of oak.

Some writers have indicated a belief that this whisky maintains the vanilla flavors customary to Glen Moray expressions. I say poppycock. The vanilla is over whelmed by the apple.

By all reports, this is the first time a scotch whisky has been matured in casks that previously held apple cider. The casks were used initially for whisky, sent by Glen Moray to the Thistly Cross cidery, where they were used to create whisky casked cider, and then returned to Glen Moray where malt whisky maturing in first fill ex-bourbon barrels was transferred into the now ex-cider casks. About 2,000 bottles were released for sale in the UK, originally as an exclusive to the Whisky Exchange and then to other online retailers.

I like the imaginative use of the barrels to create what I found to be a thoroughly enjoyable and different whisky.

Well done, Graham Coull and Glen Moray!!!!!