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To Purify or not to Purify

Ardbeg Heavy Vapours is a limited edition Islay Single Malt Scotch Whisky that was released for Ardbeg Day in May of 2023.

Ardbeg stands on the southern coast of Islay, near the town of Port Ellen. It was established in 1815 and has operated, on and off, ever since. The latter years of the 20th century saw some of the most problematic of the distillery’s long and storied life, but Glenmorangie plc‘s takeover in 1997 marked a turning point in its fortunes. Today, Ardbeg is a global brand with a devoted cult following.

A tour of a Scottish distillery – any distillery – will inevitably point out the small quirks in production that help to make the spirit unique. At Ardbeg, that usually means highlighting a strange pipe-like structure that drops down from the lyne-arm. This, is the purifier!

When the rising spirit vapour travels up the neck of the still, it crosses into the horizontal lyne arm. Heavier vapours which contain the meatier, smoky flavours travel along the bottom of the pipe while the lighter vapours drift along the top. At Ardbeg, those heavy vapours, or some of them at least, drop into the purifier to be transferred back to the pot and redistilled.

The tour guide will tell you that the purifier is crucial to the creation of Ardbeg’s character. They will say it is the reason for the spirit’s complexity and the cause of the pleasing balance between lighter, fruity notes and the trademark peat smoke. Dr Bill Lumsden, Head of Distilling & Whisky Creation at LVMH (owner of Ardbeg and Glenmorangie), is a scientist, however. By definition, that makes him a curious man.

To satisfy that curiosity, Dr Bill ran an experiment. He had the purifiers removed from the Ardbeg lyne arm for one week. The spirit produced that week matured into the whisky that was bottled as Heavy Vapours. There’s no age statement on this release but Lumsden explained in interviews, at the time of release, that it was distilled around 12 years before bottling.

Ardbeg Heavy Vapours Review

Tasting notes: The nose is particularly pungent with peat smoke and oily, diesel fumes. There’s thick ash and coal fire smoke with some medicinal touches like germolene and TCP. I get barbecued meats and a touch of liquorice and Pernod. It’s a noticeably young nose with fresh lemon and lime and a wee bit of apple. On the palate, there’s a lightly honeyed malt character with salty seawater, brine and shellfish. Aniseed and black pepper with some light citrus. The Islay peat swirls throughout with that liquorice note returning in the finish.

Thoughts: The nose comes close to living up to the Heavy Vapours nametag because the peat seems more pungent than other Ardbeg releases. On the flip side, however, there doesn’t seem to be much more going on. Perhaps it lacks the complexity you find in the best Ardbegs. The palate, too, feels a bit one-dimensionally smoky. It also feels quite young, with very little cask interaction and that’s become quite a trend with Ardbeg Day bottlings. If, as Dr Bill suggested, this whisky was distilled 12 years before bottling, it must have been matured in some very inactive casks. Even a look at the whisky in your glass will tell you that. It’s only a shade or two above new make.

In a recent review of BizarreBQ, I wrote of Ardbeg’s ongoing mission to explore changes in the production process. There was Fermutations and its long fermentation, Ardcore and its roasted barley, Hypernova with its increased phenols and now Heavy Vapours with the removal of the purifier. Each experiment produced a spirit-led whisky that showed little in the way of oak influence. From the distillery’s point of view, that makes sense – there’s no point in creating flavours in the new make only to smother it in highly active casks but from the buyer’s perspective there has been a procession of very young Ardbegs with only subtle changes to the character.

For the record, I enjoyed Heavy Vapours. I also enjoyed the drams mentioned above but they’ve felt a bit like a series of raw, unfinished experiments. Interesting sketches rather than mature single malts created for a special occasion.

In many ways, I like what Ardbeg are doing here. The Scotch industry has been too hung up on overly-dominant cask finishes and I think it’s important to explore other means of creating flavour but I don’t think these subtle changes are what people look for in special edition expressions.

Price: £95. This is where things get particularly troublesome. I like Heavy Vapours. I like the experimental concept that inspired it but I don’t think it does enough to justify the asking price. The same can be said for far too many of these limited releases.

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