Sealed Essence Exclusive - Aged Kalakassi Whiskey The Unleashed Apothecary 2023

The glass wasn't even emptied before the stuff had already started to take its mind-bending effect. There were the rotten beams of the barns, bent downwards by the damp-swirly booze, littered with earthy bitter traces, the black streaks of licorice roots that covered the rotten wood like myriads of licorice snails. The last whiff of musty breath, then the stables were distillates in which fruit shimmered from below, somehow raisin-colored, vanilla-stained streaks of red wine on the edges of the glass of thoughts. Sometimes they were also mandarins in soft Omani pearls. You could chew them as chewing resins. Carnation nails flickered before your eyes on tiny umbrellas like dandelions and crystallized into caramel grains on the hazy planks of brandy. They had already half sunk into the peat, like rotten footbridges, drunk on whiskey, winding their way sometimes towards the barn, then into the clay soil yarn, somewhere in India.
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With ‘The Unleashed Apothecary’ (the former sub-label ‘Exclusive Blend R.A.W’), the self-taught perfumer Jimmy Bodin once split off from the Swiss label Jousset Parfums to independently distribute his handmade extraits made from rare, wild-harvested raw materials.
At the heart of the “Aged Kalakassi Whiskey” is an Indian Kalakassi oud, which unfolds here in a dark, resinous, animalistic and increasingly gentle, cinnamon-clove-spicy way, as well as a more bourbon-like whiskey. The word “aged” refers to the duration of maceration, which Bodin specifies as at least one year.
The opening however takes some getting used to, even harsh, as the combination of mild star anise and rather earthy-bitter liquorice with the subtly barnyard-animalic oud is reminiscent of the musty breath of an Al Ambar by Areej Le Doré, but then turns to the combination of wood and whiskey after just a few minutes, It draws attention to reddish-fruity notes, such as sweet mandarins (which could also come from the resin of Omani frankincense), raisins and red wine, presumably notes of whiskey, which develops under the rotten wooden barn barrel planks, first milder, with notes of vanilla and caramel, and finally spicier in the direction of peat, dusty clove and clay. A rather restrained but persistent pleasure for whiskey lovers and oud experts.

(With thanks to Snoopyelfi)