Highland Nectar

Appearance: Pale gold. Nose: Honey, orange, clove, cinnamon (and other baking spices), toffee, vanilla. Taste and Feel: Sweet honey and spices, vanilla, candied citrus (especially orange). As it sits in the mouth, more spice notes appear – cardamom, clove, and cinnamon specifically. There's also a light background of scotch whisky with a faint ashen quality. The mouth-feel is like diluted honey. This very enjoyable whisky-based liqueur is a fairly recent product from Elixir Distillers. It's an excellent example of the “honeyed/sugary” style of whisky liqueurs, and like other good examples of this style, you can actually taste the scotch whisky component in it. It can be compared to Gordon and MacPhail’s very fine Dunkeld Atholl Brose, which is the highest compliment I can give any whisky-based liqueur as it's my all-time favorite. It's not quite as good because Athol Brose has unmistakable Benromach whisky at its core, whereas this has generic scotch. However, as Atholl Brose is currently not in production (and Gordon and MacPhail have given no indication of when it will be made again), this is currently the best scotch whisky liqueur available. The texture is rich and honeyed but not cloying and syrupy, and it doesn't have the teeth-clenchingly sweet quality of Drambuie or Glayva. It's more similar to the texture of Pavan or St Germain elderflower liqueur. Highly recommended. “Excellent”: 88/100 (4.5 stars)

Sweet and spicy.