Notes: This is one of three whiskies released by this company -the others are: a vintage 19 year old variation on Sheep Dip called Leatherback and Pigs Nose, a 5 year old vatted malt neither of which we have had a chance to review as yet.

Sheep Dip is a generic term used for an insecticide used on sheep to kill various ticks and lice. It was also what a farmer would label barrels of illegal, untaxed homemade whisky to camouflage their stocks. Later the same term was used on invoices/bills for legal whisky from merchants to avoid commentaries from farmers wives. This vatted whisky borrows the term. Made from the blending of 4 different single malt whiskies (one from each major distilling area) with ages ranging from 8 to 12 years old.

Appearance: Golden straw in the bottle, nice edge line on the glass when you swirl it, smooth layer of whiskey on swirling some legs to it.

First Impression: Peat a whisper of iodine, heather orange,citrus, some floral notes, melons,leather and hints of pipe tobacco. You can pick out the individual regions where the malts came from.

Taste: Buttery entry, grassy, old leather, peat, sherry and vanilla notes, touches of iodine in the finish.

Drinks: Works well in most classic Scotch cocktails where you want a good scotch with backbone but does not clash with other ingredients.

Cigars: Mild cigar. 

Bottle: A clear very standard issue Scotch bottle – the slightly squat, bulbous, rounded edges, bottle you see almost everywhere. Label, neckwrap and general packaging/appearance is frankly a bit generic for a bottle on the far side of $30 – however the presentation box version makes up somewhat for this.

Final Thoughts: Decent middle of the road, an easy drinking Scotch whisky. At $39 a bottle, it is competitive with Johnny Walker Black Label and much better for the novice. While not as distinctive as a single malt, it has a good amount of flavor. Good as a gift as it covers all the Scotch taste bases – something for everyone or everyone’s palette plus the name is charming in a self deprecating way.

Web site:http://www.sheepdipwhisky.com

Not a great deal of information – in fact not much beyond a standard shelf talker.