Lagavulin 16 Year Old is truly a benchmark Islay whisky. It’s loved for its deep, earthy, and maritime character with rich notes of dried fruit, vanilla, and smokiness that comes from Islay peat but is more akin to Lapsang Souchong tea in profile.
Before Lagavulin 16, the distillery did have a 12-year-old single malt. But when Diageo launched the Classic Malt series in the 1980s, Lagavulin 16 Year Old was introduced and became the distillery's flagship bottling. It received a boost in popularity after featuring in Parks and Recreation as a favourite drink of Nick Offerman’s character Ron Swanson. Offerman has since collaborated with the distillery on several occasions.
If you're looking for a food pairing for this beauty, try intensely flavoured salty blue cheeses, which complement the intense, peat-rich, sweet and salty character of this Lagavulin wonderfully.
More like Lapsang Souchong tea than Lapsang Souchong! One of the smokiest noses from Islay. It's big, very, very concentrated, and redolent of iodine, sweet spices, good, mature Sherry and creamy vanilla. Stunning.
Very thick and rich. A massive mouthful of malt and Sherry with good fruity sweetness, but also a wonderful sweetness. Big, powerful peat and oak.
Long, spicy finish, figs, dates, peat smoke, vanilla.
Absolutely love the complexity of this scotch.
I have been drinking Lagavulin 16 for almost 10 years. I have a few in the cabinet like: Highland Park, Jura and Caol Ila but my favorite of all is Lagavulin. Great with a single ice cube, single drop of water or neat. It does not matter.
I had high expectations about this malt ... and I must say , the widely exceeded . Of course who believes otherwise is not used to a taste with a complex of sensations construction. Not a whiskey for inexperienced rookies.
I could not taste anything besides gasoline and paint thinner. I wished desperately to enjoy it, though.
Prior to experiencing Lagavulin 16, I only enjoyed certain Islays. A lot of them simply seemed to pungent and overbearing for my palate. But once I came to try this, I was totally hooked not only on this particular Islay, but to others as well. Another reviewer described it as a "great entry-level Islay," and I would say that is a fair description. Yet, even though I've moved on to, and have grown to love, many others, I still find myself coming back to this.
