Review by: dustbunna

Glencadam doesn’t pop up very frequently in the States in my experience so far. I ordered a bottle of the 15yr from overseas, and have kept an eye out for reasonably priced local picks. Sometime after reviewing the 15yr, I had heard the 10yr compared favorably to some other distillate-forward young Highlanders I’ve enjoyed, and when I saw a lone bottle in stock one day (which turned out to have sat there about five years), I couldn’t resist trying it out. Their entry-level bottling, the 10yr is matured entirely in refill ex-bourbon without coloring or chill-filtering.

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Distillery: Glencadam.

Bottler: Distillery bottling.

Region: Highlands.

ABV: 46%.

Age: 10 years. Bottled in 2017.

Cask type: Ex-bourbon.

Price: $43 USD.

Natural Color. Non-chill-filtered.

Bottle open across approx. 7 months, notes taken leisurely across that period. Bold notes taken beneath the shoulder, regular-formatted notes taken further into the bottle past the halfway point.

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Nose: estery and fruity up front, a bit of prickly ethanol, strawberry candy, peach candy, cereal grains, Good’n’Plenty liquorice candy, bubblegum. 

Palate: medium-full body ~ crushed seashells, Windex (hang on, what?), cut grass, oranges in the background, more esters come through from the nose, peach candy, barley sugar.

Finish: medium-short ~ chalk, more fruit esters, flint, icing sugar.

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Conclusion: This nose conjures memories of eating various candies and confections when I was young, many ostensibly “fruit-flavored” but hard to discern what really made them taste like fruit. In the same way, the esters here are strong and vibrant but more like artificially flavored fruit candies than actual fruit. As was my experience with Glencadam 15, the nose and palate are disjunct, of two separate flavor worlds (especially when the bottle was freshly opened) and balance is a bit precarious and easy to disturb. It draws in with the estery, friendly nose, then whips back around to mineralic and grassy, almost like an ultra-dry white wine. The palate and finish sweeten a fair bit as the bottle opens up, but retain that austere core (and again, like the 15yr, there’s a distinct note in the palate that I can only describe as reminding me of the way Windex smells.)

This is not going to be a whisky for everybody, but I do find it a really pleasant style and quite characterful. It’s not perfect by any means, but I found myself enjoying sipping it because the interaction of flavors is so different from other bottles I have in the cabinet. I think I liked this equally as much as the 15yr, so I’ll grade them the same– at the price I paid, I’d certainly buy another one at some point, but there are other whiskies from Glencadam that I would like to seek out first.

Final Score: 83.

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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.