Massaged With Birch Sap

SPIRIT NOTES

Massaged with birch sap, the treacle sponge could hardly smell sweeter, until it was served to our noses in a sauna with lashings of apricot jam. The palate offered banana bread, sweet beef jerky wrapped in a ribbon of marzipan and blobs of cookie dough laced with cinnamon and fiery ginger. Water added more woody depth – with biodynamic syrah, trail mix, figs, dates and caramel – to the nose. The finish was a mug of warm milk with crushed malt barley, pain au raisin, rice pudding dusted with nutmeg and rhubarb. After three years in an ex-bourbon hogshead, we transferred this to a second fill PX hogshead for the remainder of its maturation.