At the start of every year, we all sit down with our calendar and enter all of our annual events and occasions: The public holidays. Your partner’s birthday. Your dentist appointment. Your wedding anniversary. The release of the next Glenmorangie Private Edition bottling. The excitement this year revolves around Bacalta.
Glenmorangie’s Private Edition range is a special once-off release that comes out each year to showcase a new variation of the Glenmorangie flavour profile. Through the use of different casks or wood regimes during maturation, or by using different varieties of barley (or different peating levels), the usual Glenmorangie DNA is given a tweak and a nudge to explore new and – without fail – delicious flavour territories. Some within Glenmorangie (including Dr Bill Lumsden himself) have hinted or suggested that the Private Edition range showcases experimentation but, to my palate, the results are consistently too successful and too good to be mere experiments. No, this is a product line that knows what it’s doing. And for those who are curious, in terms of volume, the Private Edition range makes up less than 1% of Glenmorangie’s total annual production, so it is genuinely a very limited product.
Seven previous releases define the Private Edition range, namely the PX Sonalta, Finealta, Artein, Ealanta, Companta, Tusail and Milsean. (You can click directly on the links for the releases that Whisky & Wisdom has previously reviewed on these pages). For 2017, the eighth release in the Private Edition range is the Bacalta. Bacalta is Scots Gaelic for baked, and whilst that might seem obscure at first, it makes sense once you know the back story.
Glenmorangie Bacalta is a finished or extra-matured whisky, meaning that after spending 10 or so years in the regular ex-bourbon, American oak casks, the spirit was transferred to a second, different cask for the remainder of its maturation. In this case, the finishing cask is Malmsey Madeira, and the finishing term was two years. Malmsey (or Malvasia) is the sweetest of Madeiras and one of the four so-called noble grape varieties. It was no accident or arbitrary decision to leave the whisky in the Madeira casks for two years. In fact, when the project was originally conceived (roughly seven years ago), it was originally envisaged that the whisky would be in the wine casks for three to four years. However, during the maturation process, the casks were sampled and checked every three months. After two years, Dr Bill and Brendan McCarron felt the result had peaked, and any further time in the cask would detract from the whisky and the result would be too far removed from Glenmorangie’s signature.
The process for creating Madeira is where the link to baked comes in: Modern Madeira production aims to recreate or simulate the “traditional” method or phenomenon whereby the wine was subjected to extreme heat whilst the casks sat in the hull of ships nearing the equator. The more modern practice is to simply heat or “cook” the wine on land in a hot environment. Cheaper Madeira might be made by simply filling the wine in bulk stainless steel vats and wrapping them with heat coils or piped hot water. However, in the case of the four noble grape varieties (of which Malvesia is the sweetest), the highest quality Madeiras are made by storing the casks in warm rooms at the winery and being left to age naturally just by the heat of the sun. In the case of Glenmorangie Bacalta, the casks were left at the top of the roof space and baked accordingly. Of course, as we’ve come to expect from Glenmorangie, these were no ordinary casks. Whilst regular Madeira casks are larger drums holding up to 600 litres, Dr Bill commissioned specially-made, smaller 250 litre hogsheads for the Glenmorangie Bacalta undertaking. The casks were heavily toasted before being sent to Madeira to be filled with the wine.
Bacalta was launched in several countries around the world simultaneously this week, courtesy of a virtual tasting and audience with Glenmorangie’s Dr Bill Lumsden and Brendan McCarron. Via the use of a live hook-up, TV screens, internet cameras and microphones, Brendan & Dr Bill sat in the Whisky Creation room at Glenmorangie’s headquarters in Edinburgh, and were beamed directly to a number of gathered audiences around the globe. After a shared address and tasting by Bill and Brendan to everyone, each city was then given an allocated slot to speak directly with the two gents, and to ask questions, which they both happily and helpfully answered. Whisky & Wisdom was privileged to attend the Sydney launch, which also connected Mumbai and Seoul.
The initial tasting, led by both gents, commenced with Glenmorangie Original, which set an important context for the night, given that most of the Private Edition range whiskies “start out” as Original and are then manipulated beyond this. This was followed by the Lasanta. Interestingly, whilst Lasanta was originally created using Oloroso casks for the extra maturation, Brendan revealed that, roughly three years ago, they started using both Oloroso and Pedro Ximenez casks.
And then came the star of the show. So what of the whisky itself? Well, happily, the new release was being freely poured out on the night, and yours truly spent some serious time getting acquainted with it. The whisky is bottled at 46% and is non-chillfiltered. Whisky & Wisdom’s tasting notes as follows:
Glenmorangie Bacalta
Nose: Initially sweet, followed instantly by huge waves of rich, complex citrus notes. Thick marmalade and burnt orange peel. There’s a savoury, leathery note that almost takes on a smoky character. Comparing my glass directly with the Original, the Bacalta is noticeably brighter, sweeter, and richer.
Palate: Orange zest and spice. There’s a very pleasant peppery heat, almost akin to menthol, and the impact on the palate is similarly cooling. There’s some burnt, dark chocolate-coated honeycomb around the edges, but the signature Glenmorangie DNA is never too far away…malt, citrus, and oak.
Finish: The finish is long, powerful, enduring and endearing. It remains sweet and dissipates slowly.
Comments: My first reaction is that this release clearly achieves its objective: It takes the Original as its foundation, and then moves into a slightly different paddock. Except, in this case, the paddock is much bigger and better! The Bacalta is a beautiful expansion of the Original. It’s bigger, brighter, richer, sweeter, louder, and yet remains wonderfully balanced and sophisticated. It is in no way bombastic or brash, but is exceptionally crafted. It also strikes me as being incredibly versatile: It’s delicate enough to serve early in the evening; it’s big enough to be paired with a hearty meal; and it’s rich and sweet enough to work as a digestif or simply as a dessert on its own. More tellingly – and I was joined by several in this observation – it grows and expands with each repeated sip and simply gets better and better as you re-visit it.
10 out of 10, lads.
Cheers,
AD
For more reviews of Glenmorangie’s range by Whisky & Wisdom, click on the links below:
Glenmorangie Companta
Glenmorangie The Taghta
Glenmorangie Tusail
Glenmorangie Milsean
Glenmorangie 1990 Grand Vintage Malt
Glenmorangie Spios
