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From Johnnie Walker’s Colour Collection, the 18-Year-Old is the new name for the old Platinum label, but the blend remains unchanged. It has the richness that characterizes Walker’s high-end spectrum but has elegance and freshness thanks to a thick citrus core. The story behind the 18-Year-Old goes back to the distillery’s private blends they used to put together for VIPs. A few years ago, this bottle shed its Platinum label and was renamed Johnnie Walker 18-Year-Old.
Intensely fragrant, Johnnie Walker 18 opens with a thick citrus core of lemons, tangerines and oranges, closely followed by the warmest vanilla flavors complemented by almond paste with hints of sweet smoke. The fantastic nose you’d to expect from the ex-Platinum.
The palate could easily overpower if it weren’t for the tight citrus backbone that gives freshness to the warm vanilla paste flavors, marzipan, cinnamon and hickory smoke running through the back-palate along the background of roasted malt.
The finish is all about roasted malts, oats, almonds and smoke, with the sweet citrus notes catching up seconds later. A very long aftertaste invites you to take another sip, in a magnificent expression that screams elegance.
You might be surprised, but for an 18-Year-Old expression, this one is not dominated by spices or oak, but by a mature fruit core ornamented with vanilla and brown spices. This is a contemporary malt that you can enjoy whether you’re into young expressions or well-aged whiskeys.
Johnnie Walker’s 18-Year-Old gives the Blue Label a run for its money. Much more elegant and fresher, but with similar richness, this could easily be the Colours Collection’s top expression. Trying the 18-Year-Old and the Blue label side by side is an expensive proposition, but they’re in the same ballpark, that’s for sure.
