Saturday night was a very special night, for several reasons. As some of you know, this past year was a tough one as my father was diagnosed early on with terminal lung cancer, and subsequently suffered a few health crises which had him in the ICU a couple of times. For most of the past year, Jess & my lives were occupied with helping him, and visiting him regularly in New York. We were happy to do it, but it did mean a pause in our usual get togethers with friends, which we missed.
On December 10th, 2025, my father succumbed to his cancer. As you might expect, the subsequent weeks have been full of grief, and paperwork. Even death has bureaucracy.
December 10th was also the day that the Compass Box Whisky Confluence auction at Bonhams Skinner, to benefit The Wolfsonian-FIU, ended. I'd been watching the auction, but uncertain about bidding - despite being a longtime Compass Box fanatic. However, after my father passed early that morning, I decided that I needed something good to go with the day - and that was going to be winning Confluence, which I did. You only live once, as was painfully clear that day.
My birthday is at the end of December, and we had planned a small gathering with friends to celebrate - but Jess & I both came home from my father's services in NY under the weather, and not really in a celebratory mood, so we cancelled that.
Instead, yesterday we had a gathering which was partly a delayed birthday celebration, partly a toast to my father's memory, and partly an exploration of a truly unique whisky. But, more than anything, it was a gathering of good friends for the first time in quite a while - and boy did I need that more than I realized.
Thank you Jess, Jer, Shamala, Marc, Lizzy, Lisa, Carol, Friski and Betsy for making the evening wonderful.
Before we could dive into the whisky, we had to put something in on stomachs - so we had an assortment of my father's favorites, in his honor. There was an antipasto salad, some veggies and cheese, meatballs and sauce (for subs or over pasta), pickle soup (the Cafe Polonia recipe), kielbasa and sauerkraut, pierogi, a texas sheet cake, rice pudding, cupcakes, and some fine Läderach chocolates.
Properly fueled, we attacked the mission of the evening.
We'd assembled a lineup of whiskies for the evening - of course, there was the Confluence, but we also pulled some expressions from the component distilleries. Obviously, these were not *the* components used to make Confluence, but it was just a fun way to try a few things.
We'd lined up Mackmyra, a Gordon & MacPhail Miltonduff, a G&M Macallan, a Highland Park 25, a Flora & Fauna Teaninich, and a Glen Moray (which was peated, it was what we had). We also had a couple of whiskies from Nashoba Valley Distillery, right here in town - Papa's Bourbon and the Stimulus Twenty 20 year old American Single Malt. Thanks to Marc Follit, our good friend, neighbor, and distiller at Nashoba, for bringing those.
Oh, yes, and there is also the Black Tot Rum Last Consignment. It seemed like another special bottle to open - after the whiskies.
We started off with the Confluence, so that we'd have clear palates - the better to taste it with. Whisky reviewer extraordinaire, Friski Whiski, agreed to write up a joint review with input from the whole crew, and we spent quite a bit of time on that. A most enjoyable time it was, too. We avoided reading the official tasting notes before creating our own, and were pleased to see that our notes ended up aligning fairly well with the official ones once we were done.
Friski posted the review on his page (https://www.facebook.com/friski.whiski/posts/pfbid0cQjrjpvFAm7XzAwf54Y62YPcTHMwcriwn5aF1b4JifQrV9XumhkTR5NYcwrT18tMl), but here it is:
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Dram of a lifetime on 1/10/26
Compass Box
Confluence
Blended Malt Whisky
Age: NAS
Abv: 48.9%
No. of bottles: 1
Components:
The Mackmyra Distillery
Swedish Single Malt
Cherry Wine Fresh Seasoned American Oak
9%
The Mackmyra Distillery
Swedish Single Malt
Oloroso First Fill Sherry Seasoned American Oak
9%
The Mackmyra Distillery
Swedish Single Malt
American First Fill & Virgin Oak Casks
9%
The Mackmyra Distillery
Swedish Single Malt
Swedish Virgin Oak & First Fill Casks
3%
Teaninich Distillery
Scottish Single Malt
First Fill Sherry Butt
12%
Miltonduff Distillery
Scottish Single Malt
First Fill Bourbon Barrel
12%
Highland Park Distillery
Scottish Single Malt
Recharred Hogshead
3%
The Macallan Distillery
Scottish Single Malt
First Fill Bourbon Barrel
14%
Glen Moray Distillery
Scottish Single Malt
First Fill Bourbon Barrel
15%
Glen Moray Distillery
Scottish Single Malt
First Fill Bourbon Barrel
15%
Availability: 1 of 1 bottle. Bonhams auction house event "Art & Alchemy of Spirits: Presenting Compass Box to Benefit the Wolfsonian".
Crowd source notes: MegaZone, Jess Terry, Jer Johnson, Shamala Rao, Marc Follit, Lizzy Nicolai, Lisa Mulvehill, Carol Ann, Betsey Hendricks, and Friski Whiski.
Color: Medium honey and golden syrup
Neat (without water)
Nose: Soft and crisp. Honey, green apple, marzipan, cooked caramelized pineapple, confectioner’s sugar, lemon citrus, orange peel, with hints of cardamom and anise.
Texture: Warm. Creamy, buttery, slightly drying through the finish and pleasantly astringent.
Palate: Apple blossom honey, honey comb, marzipan, caramel, and birchwood. Swedish Kanelbulle (which is a classic Scandinavian cinnamon bun, spiced with cardamom in the dough, less gooey and use a lighter cinnamon application).
Finish: A roller coaster ride of white pepper, fresh green olive oil, saline, toasted almonds, fine Corinthian leather, oak, grapefruit pith, and oleo saccharum.
Unleash the serpent (with water)
Nose: An orchard house of fruit moved to the forefront. Pear, apple frangipane, sliced almonds, sweet cracked malt and fresh cream. Birchbeer float with vanilla bean ice cream. Lakrits, lemon blossoms where floral and citrus combine into a confluence of marriage.
Texture: Creamy, buttery, woody without the tannic astringency.
Palate: Baked apple dumplings, roasted butternut squash, demerara sugar, sweet cream, and candied meyer lemon.
Finish: Earthy notes get amplified. Warm spiced sweet potato pie with a pastry crust, sea spray, salted caramel, walnut skins, and toffee with subtle hints of a gentle smoke.
Tasting notes glass used: Open Up Chef and Sommelier 5.5oz glass.
The morning after glass: Sweet cracked malt, dust, vanilla, and caramel
Pairings...
Season: Any
Music: Lovefool by The Cardigans
Food: Rosemary pork loin with homemade applesauce
Media: Best enjoyed with great company and good conversation.
Overall: From first nose to final sip, several of us ended up in a journey from an apple orchard to our grandmother's seaside cottage while various desserts were being cooked. Fantastic debut from Angela D'Orazio at Compass Box! We really look forward to her future creations.
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As you can see, we loved it. This is a fantastic whisky, IMHO, and I'm thrilled that we were able to try it. Whisky is for sharing, not for staring. It would have been a crying shame for this to sit on someone's shelf, never to be tasted. You can tell we enjoyed it - we went through about 1/3 of the bottle compiling those tasting notes. ;-)
Afterwards we did taste through the other whiskies - which were good, but kind of paled a bit after Confluence. The Mackmyra was well-loved as well, and you can see the influence in Confluence. The other standout for the group was the Flora & Fauna Teaninich - really good. Enough so that we're going to be looking for more Teaninich at auctions to try in the future.
Really, everything was good - and, more importantly, we had a lot of laughs and great conversation trying them.
After we ran the line of whisky, we did open the Last Consignment - and I figured out why it comes with two extra corks! The cork in the bottle is fully seated and covered in wax - so you have to pull it like a wine bottle, and it isn't really designed to go back in. So you use one of the supplied corks to reseal the bottle. Mystery solved!
It is a very rich, unctuous rum that those who tried enjoyed. It is also liquid history, and it was special just to be trying it. The previous evening I'd also read through the little booklet that is included, going through the history of the rum and rituals in the Royal Navy, and that was quite interesting.
The molasses note is front and center, but there are tropical fruits, spices, chocolate, leather, a bit of funk (there has to be some Jamaican rum in there)... a really thought-provoking sip.
As the evening ran down, and some of the crew left for home, we decided to keep the evening going with a few additional drams. So I grabbed some Glenmorangie. We hit Year of the Snake first - I'd opened this, but some of the others had not had a chance. This is still a standout dram - a blend of ex-Bourbon and Amontillado finishing casks.
They we opened the Rare Cask 21 year Mizunara finish. As expected, this is a very fine whisky, but the Snake was still in the lead by consensus.
And we last turned to the new 25 year, The Altus. This is mostly aged in designer bourbon casks, but is seasoned with a little whisky finished in Malmsey Madeira casks. A very juicy, fruit-forward dram, this ended up coming in second place, bumping the Mizunara to 3rd. Still, they're all fantastic.
That pretty much wrapped up the night. It was an amazing time start to finish - fantastic drams, but even better friends.
Next Saturday we're doing a larger gathering - this time for Raising Glasses rums. Should be fun!
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