Libation Review: Redbreast 12 Year Cask Strength

Name: Redbreast 12 Cask Strength
Type: Whiskey
Origin: Ireland
ABV: 58.2% (Batch 1/14)
Price: $69.99 at our local Total Wine

I, like seemingly half or more of my friends, family, or co-workers, have some sort of cold or flu bug hitting them right now. While it is nothing more than an annoyance, it has kept me away from smoking cigars for the last week or so. However, as one of my college professors taught me once upon a time, “You might as well enjoy yourself in your misery”. And that’s where the Redbreast comes in…

My first experience with Redbreast was in Las Vegas at the Nine Fine Irishmen several years ago. My wife and I were on vacation and ended up there to enjoy the freshest Guinness we could get. While there, we met a community college professor from California on vacation with his wife and her parents who ordered one. A few hours later and several rounds of Guinness and Redbreast bought between our two groups, not only were we really drunk but left wondering why we had never heard of Redbreast before. Seeing the cask strength variety on our recent visit to Total Wine (and the fact we drank all the whiskey in the house), made this an easy purchase, and one for dual purpose.

According to the bottle, the aroma notes for the Redbreast 12 Year Cask Strength are the following:

Exotic fruit, little citrus, apricot, sultana, pot still spices and toasted wood.

Now, my sense of smell isn’t exactly working right now being stuffed up. Despite that, I can detect the fruit/apricot notes and the spices, but nothing else. The flavor notes on the palette hit with dried fruit, spices and a hint of smokiness. The finish for this is long; you’ll feel it going all the way down along with what a few of my friends consider a “medicine” aftertaste. This is likely due to the high alcohol content of the drink and the full bodied flavor of the whiskey.

My first several tastes of the Cask Strength Redbreast reminded me of an Arbeg or a lesser (not as strong) version of Octomore, which in my opinion is cause for celebration (some of you may disagree). I think for those who don’t usually enjoy a whiskey of this strength would be advised to add a few drops of water to help ease the hit to your palette. If you are a Jameson fan (made by the same company), think of this like a refined but much stronger, fuller flavored version of it. Fans of Ardbeg, Laphroaig, and Octomore will be right at home with this. As for the appropriate pairing with a cigar, you’ll likely want a cigar that is full bodied to compete with the flavor profile.

Because of the price point, this won’t be a staple to my liquor supply but as a once-a-few-month purchase, I would gladly accept it into my home.

Final Score: 9/10

As always, thank you very much for reading and I look forward to the next time I can share my thoughts with you.