Company: Balvenie Distillery Company
Distillery: Balvenie Distillery
Region: Dufftown, Banffshire, Scotland
Aging: 16 Years
ABV: 47.6%
Proof: 95.2
Mash Bill: 100% Single Malt
Non-Chill Filtered: No
MSRP Price: $180
Appearance: Light Honey
Balvenie French Oak Tasting Notes
Nose: Light caramel and honey, toasted oak, vanilla, beautiful fruit flavors, raisin, citrus, candied apricot, and orange
Palate: Honey, light oak, subtle but present fruit flavors ranging from candied raisins and candied apricot to lemon zest and crisp apple
Finish: Extremely smooth and buttery finish – leaves you with an excellent mouthfeel full of bold fruits full of orange citrus and light pepper on the tail end
Is Balvenie French Oak an Approachable Whisky?
Balvenie French Oak is extremely easy to drink.
It has bold flavors that are welcoming to any level of whisky drinker and has a smooth finish with nearly no heat on it.
Is Balvenie French Oak Complex?
Balvenie French Oak has a lot of layers of flavor.
It starts with a light honey sweetness with a tiny bit of toasted oak and vanilla.
It then hits you with a wide array of fruit flavors including sweet raisin, orange citrus zest (and lemon), then candied apricot, and crisp apple.
The finish then leaves you with all the bold fruit flavors but then rounds the drink out with a nice buttery mouthfeel that leaves you with a light hint of pepper on the tail end to balance it all out.
What are Balvenie French Oak’s strongest attributes/flavors?
Balvenie French Oak’s strongest attribute is the amount of fruit flavors it packs into each sip.
Balvenie is always one of my favorite Scotches because of its heavy raisin and light fruit notes, but the additional finish in the Pineau des Charentes casks really adds an additional layer.
From the Balvenie website:
“Pineau des Charentes is a fortified wine made from unfermented grape juice, to which a Cognac eau-de-vie is added and then matured.”
If you’ve ever had Cognac before, you will certainly recognize some of the flavors that it has added to this whisky.
Is Balvenie French Oak a go-to whisky?
Balvenie French Oak is easily a whisky I could drink all the time.
However, the price tag is a bit steep to be a daily sipper, so this is a bottle that I will be reserve for special occasions.
Is Balvenie French Oak priced accurately to its quality?
Balvenie French Oak does deliver on its price tag.
While it costs $180 as of the time of this posting, I do feel like its quality is high enough to justify that price.
With that being said, I remember just 3 years ago when I could get a bottle of Balvenie 21 Year for only $180 and that is even better than this Scotch Whisky.
Conclusion for Balvenie French Oak
This bottle of Balvenie French Oak is a bottle I will be reserving for special occasions or to share with friends.
If I am going to drink a Balvenie whisky on a regular basis, I would probably go with a cheaper option like the Balvenie Caribbean Cask or the Balvenie Doublewood.
It’s hard to justify springing the $180 for this bottle unless you are really looking for a special occasion to celebrate or just want to splurge and spoil yourself a little.
All-in-all, this is an excellent Scotch Whisky and I really enjoy the additional Pineau finish on this one.
Let Us Know What You Think
I hope you enjoyed this tasting experience with me.
If you decide to give this bottle a shot, please let me know on social media via Reddit, Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter.
Thanks for reading and cheers!
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