I respect the apellation of Islay terrior through barley provenance and the precision of Waterford Distillery's Mark Reynier, who began this ass-clenchingly detailed pursuit with these bottlings at Bruichladdich... aimed at the geek within every enthusiast and reshaping the way we think about the balance of power between cask and distillate.

This offering from Bruichladdich is a single vintage distllation of both Optic and Oxbridge barley strains from 8 different Islay farms, also matured on the island in first-fill Bourbon, Rivesaltes, Jurancon, and Banyuls wine casks.

Bruichladdich Islay Barley 2010 50% abv, ex-Bourbon and French wine casks (2010 - 2017), non-chill filtered, no artificial coloring, Parent Co.: Remy Cointreau.

Nose: Straight away the 2010 comes on like strong tea with a big squeeze of lemon. Toast with apricot jam. A few more minutes of rest and the dram reveals its salinity with the scent of yeasty warm dough. Pungent flowers, white wine acidity and peaches come together like sangria. Mature for its young age, you can still detect trace amounts of plastic and wet carboard buried in sherry like oxidation from the wine casks. The faintest whiff of savory sweet seaweed funkiness adds another facet to the weighty base malt's vanilla, stone fruit, and honey.

Palatte: Mild acidity pleasantly counterbalances the slick, mineral laden, barley oils. Salted caramel and vanilla creme in the foreground with butter toffee and white flowers. The casks impart candied citrus peel, spice, overripe peach, and toasted vanilla to the dram, and it is most definitely complimented by a splash of water to coax out some milk chocolate and lemon.

Finish: This is typically where a malt shows it age, and there is no exception here as the finish is youthful, numbing, and a bit short on flavor. Breakfast tea tannin, spiced chocolate, and salted lemon.

Score : 84 - Recommended, for nothing else than an exploration into the nuances of malt flavor. Well crafted from start to finish, Bruichladdich is an enthusiasts distillery, mindfully delivering exemplary young single malt distillate with the aid of an impeccable cask selection. I often correlate intrinsic quality and value with a whisky's pliability, and whether it deflates or blooms to reveal depth of flavor with varying additions of water. I wish I could rationalize the expense of exploring some of Bruichladdich's more well aged stock, because I do quite enjoy it, but will instead look to compare more of these bottlings.

Cheers, and thanks for reading.