Regular readers will know Hellyers Road holds a special place here - they were quite literally the very first whiskies I ever wrote about on this blog (all the way back to "Tasted #1"), 14 years ago, and I was very happy to re-acquaint myself with the distillery earlier this year thanks to some nicely-aged samples.
The thing that struck me about their well-aged releases was just how complex, mature and delicious they'd become. Clearly the plan was working...but what about their younger releases? Earlier Hellyers Road whiskies could be divisive, but how are they now, especially those under 10 years old?
Enter the Richly Peated Aged 9 Years. The distillery has been working with Scottish peated malt since around 2004 (as opposed to local barley), so it's fair to say they should know a thing or two about making a peated whisky. A permanent core range addition, the whisky features a 100% peated mash bill and has been matured entirely in first fill American oak ex-Bourbon casks from Heaven Hill.
We then step it up a bit in age with two very different 20 year olds. First up, American Oak Aged 20 Years (Cask 4253.04) is known around the distillery simply as "Peaches" — fifteen casks were filled on 9 September 2004, and this was the only one to go the full two decades. 179 bottles were produced at 52.8%, each in a hand-crafted Huon Pine, Myrtle and Celery Top Pine box by local wood worker Rob van Tholen (complete with a secret locking mechanism).
Its stablemate, the Voyager Cask Aged 20 Years (cask 20F10c05), took a Gold medal and the Category Winner gong for Australian Small Batch Single Malt (13-20 years) at last year's World Whiskies Awards, and the name is well earned - after 16 years in first fill American oak ex-Bourbon, it spent its final four years in a French oak cask that had previously held Tasmanian Pinot Noir, then was used to macerate Christmas fruit, then to age local fortified Ruby Pinot Noir, before it made its way to the distillery. A cask with a story!
Let's get into them...
Hellyers Road "Richly Peated" Aged 9 Years (48.3% ABV, Single Malt, 9yo, first fill ex-Bourbon, Tasmania, Australia, $190AUD)
Colour: Light, golden sunset.
Nose: Significant, noticeable peat, with sweet smoked ham, maple bacon, and after time a slightly herbal salinity.
Palate: The peat is less noticeable than on the nose (but still there), whilst there are notes of sweet charcuterie, earthy moss, pecan pie, oak and then bringing up the rear, a little more peat smoke.
Finish: Long, warming campfire peat with slight oak tannins.
Rating (on my very non-scientific scale): 91/100 (Martin). Excellent stuff.
Hellyers Road "Voyager Cask" Aged 20 Years (Cask #20F10c05) (54.7% ABV, Single Malt, 20yo, Tasmania, Australia, $690AUD)
Colour: Deep honeyed gold.
Nose: Sweet toffee, red and green apple, jelly frogs (red and green), with an underlying slightly earthy funk. With time comes some herbal lozenges. Complex right out the gate.
Palate: Follows the nose, and hugely complex - wafting between sweet, herbal and earthy lozenges, dark chocolate, big orange zest notes, pecan and some mandarin.
Finish: Long, citrus, herbal oak.
Rating (on my very non-scientific scale): 92/100 (Martin). Yes! Love that aged Aussie whisky can be this complex.
Hellyers Road "Voyager Cask" Aged 20 Years (Cask #20F10c05) (54.7% ABV, Single Malt, 20yo, Tasmania, Australia, [bottle count TBC], $690AUD)
Colour: Amber gold
Nose: So tropical. Peach notes, but in the form of creamy peach ice cream. Passionfruit, nectarine, whole orange pieces.
Palate: Follows the nose faithfully, with more passionfruit pulp, stewed peaches this time, grilled pineapple, and vanilla. Super viscous, super delicious.
Finish: Tropical to the end, with some residual vanilla spice and oak.
Rating (on my very non-scientific scale): 93/100 (Martin). So tropical, so good.
It really is great to see what this distillery has become. As I write this, I'm staring at another single cask sample (this one 23yo) and I can't wait to tuck in and let you all know about that one too.
Samples of all three whiskies were kindly provided by Hellyers Road Distillery, however (as always) notes and opinions are my own.
Cheers,
Martin.
