Review by: dustbunna
Glann ar Mor, in Bretagne on the northern coast of France, has a lot going for it as a distillery to attract enthusiasts. All their stills are direct-fired with an open flame (extremely unusual these days), they use worm tub condensers, and everything they make is natural color and without chill filtration. Kornog is their peated distillate, using barley peated to 40ppm, and Roc’h Hir is their flagship core release. For reasons beyond my comprehension, this bottle retails extremely high in my area, close to $140 (it’s much, much cheaper in Europe, it seems.) I bought it on sale for $80, still a slight premium over some of its equivalent peers from Islay, but at least in the ballpark.
Distillery: Glann ar Mor.
Bottler: Distillery bottling.
Region: Bretagne, France.
ABV: 46%.
Age: NAS. Bottle code KRG 33/290.
Cask type: Ex-bourbon.
Price: $80 USD.
Natural Color. Non-chill-filtered.
Bottle open across approx. 4 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, italicized notes taken towards the heel.
Nose: clay, lemon zest, mild grassiness, a farmy note in the background, vanilla icing, lime oil, hay.
Palate: medium-thin body ~ wet rocks, lemon drops, green fruits (grapes, honeydew melon), goes a bit more mineralic, icing sugar.
Finish: medium-long ~ peat smoke, minerals, ash, char, sweetens a bit more.
Conclusion: Youthful, but quite engaging. A French Ardbeg Ten, basically, with the phenols, clay and lemon zest giving me strong vibes of that Islay distillery’s profile. The green grassy notes feel just a touch young here, and make the youth more noticeable than with Ardbeg. Kornog releases some single casks with a 6-year age statement, so I imagine this has to be a fair bit younger than that for them to leave off any official age markings (I have seen references to it being 3 years old, which I would believe, but can’t confirm personally.)
I’d really like to try this with a touch more age and/or a slightly higher ABV. There’s a lot to like here, and I plan to keep an eye on this distillery going forward.
Final Score: 81.
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.
Malt Runners 