Alberta Premium 25 Year

Review by: TOModera

Hey all, sorry for not posting for a week. Had a 30th birthday one week, and my 4th anniversary this weekend, so I needed to take a week from doing reviews to ensure I didn’t end up floating.

While out in the Collingwood area, my wife and I discovered a new, amazing, 700+ whisky pub. The Dam Pub[1] is an amazing, tasty, well mannered, and amazing. Seriously, it’s up there with The Feather’s Pub, and you know how much I gush about that place. If you are in the Collingwood area, and like whisky even a little bit, that’s where you need to go.

Unfortunately… I run into an issue. The same issue we face on a regular basis.

Pop Quiz hotshot. You have 700 choices. You know you’re maximum amount of nips/drams until you can no longer review anything else. You’ve only reviewed about 200 different whiskies. What do you do? What do you do?

Well… you have to triage your reviews and pick out the hard to find ones.

Up first, we have Alberta Premium 25 year. Released 7 years ago, this rye is, to say the least, hard to find. A small batch launched by a large distiller is normally not easy to find, as it was probably released as a one off. Not to mention the taxes involved ups the price.

Also: What if after years of being in the cask, the 100% rye isn’t that great? Thus they sold it off for $30.00 a bottle, and it ended up being a curiosity.

Let’s see if it challenges their current champ, Dark Horse.

Distillery: Alberta Distillery.

Bottler: Distillery Bottling.

Region: Canada.

ABV: 40%.

Age: 25 years.

Cask type: Oak Casks.

Price: No longer available in stores.

Color: Wheat.

Nose: Corn, butterscotch, cinnamon, underripe melon

Interesting nose, however.. well, it’s very, very light, especially for a rye. Like, scary, feather light weight.

Some fruit, far off, somewhere still in Alberta. Which is too bad, as if it was stronger, I could nose this for a long time. Longer than I did.

Not typical to a rye, more so really sweet, yet it’s missing that overall Oomph.

Taste: Caramel, salt, cayenne, cumin, floral, bubblegum

The flavour though? Damn, this is a tasty, tasty dram. Lots of spice, some floral and sweetness. More complex than a traditional Canadian whisky. I’m guessing 25 years really amps up the flavours, and the people at Alberta Premium knew what they were doing.

Finish: Floral, cinnamon & nutmeg, honey, strawberry, wheat, plum

Wow. That finish. Just, like, cinnamon honey eaten out on the porch in the garden on fresh rye bread. And if you haven’t done that yet, you’re not living life like a suburbanite New Englander, and for that, I pity you sir.

If you don’t like sweet whisky, you won’t like the finish. But the floral and spice notes may save you.

Conclusion: The floral notes are what really sells this one. Well, that and being able to find it in a pub in Collingwood. Seriously though, there are issues that don’t make it the perfect Canuck dram, and that issue is the nose. I’m guessing the low Abv. has stolen a lot of the nice, complex notes on this one.

Glad they learned from this and made the Dark Horse a higher Abv.

Final Score: 83.

Scoring Legend:

  • 95-100: As good as it gets. Jaw-dropping, eye-widening, unforgettable whisky.
  • 90-94: Sublime, a personal favorite in its category.
  • 85-89: Excellent, a standout dram.
  • 80-84: Quite good. Quality stuff.
  • 75-79: Decent whisky worth tasting.
  • 70-74: Meh. It’s definitely drinkable, but it can do better.
  • 60-69: Not so good. I might not turn down a glass if I needed a drink.
  • 50-59: Save it for mixing.
  • 0-49: Blech.

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