Imperial 1989 Carn Mor Review

Hi everyone,

I did hear from an industry insider, that the source of the casks for Carn Mor is different to most independent bottlers. The quality is meant to be higher and that tends to be why they are slightly more expensive than other indies. I haven’t really seen any evidence from that in terms of taste, although I’ve only had a few, but it has made me curious to try more from their celebration of the cask range.

Imperial is a closed distillery that we are seeing less and less from. There were a lot of casks from 1995 that have made it out into the world, but not much from before that, making this one quite intriguing. Especially as I’ve always found Imperial to taste older than its years anyway.

 

Imperial 1989 Carn Mor 43%

Colour: Gold

Body: Medium

Nose: Classically Imperial, dunnage, dusty fruit, lovely tropical Old Laphroaig-like pineapple and cinnamon, candied lemon peel, more herbal as it develops.

Taste: Dry, lots of oak, classy leather and tobacco, then the tropical pineapple and mango, wool, woody, slightly musty orange (in a good way).

Finish: Long length. Dry, wool, apple and orange, a little elastic rubber (which is a shame!) holding it back.

12/1989-07/2017, so 27yo from a Bourbon barrel. A lovely Imperial but the finish is just a bit out. The strength works though, despite looking quite low.

83/100

Distillery: Imperial

Average Score: 79.7

Distillery Ranking: 10th/64 places

Up/Down: 17>10- Up 7

Thanks for reading!

Scotch Review #595

Whisky Network Review #705

Network Average: 74.6

Best Score: 94

Worst Score: 12

0-49 Terrible

50-59 Bad

60-64 Just About OK

65-69 Ok to Good

70-74 Good

75-79 Very Good

80-84 Excellent

85-89 Superb

90+ Magnificent

Full Disclosure Disclaimer: I currently work as a Brand Ambassador for Penderyn Distillery. The views expressed here are purely my own and do not reflect the views of Penderyn Distillery or The Welsh Whisky Company. I try to maintain as much objectivity as I can but feel free to take my reviews with as big a pinch of salt as you like. Furthermore, my rating scale is NOT based on a Parker type wine scoring scale or a school/college/university % or A-F grade score. You can find more on my scoring here. I apologise for any seemly low or 'bad' scores given with my system and I am sorry I can't say only nice things. Please keep in mind that I am ethically compromised and I am unable to produce 100% unbiased reviews.

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