Speyburn Orach Bradan (Historical) Review

Speyburn Orach Bradan

Speyburn Bradan Orach	Data Sheet
Owner:	Inver House
Barcode:	5010509021944
Price:	NIS 115-130 in Israel, around £20-25 in the UK
Alcohol:	40% abv
Age	NAS, but estimated to be around 5-7 Years
Cask Types:	American Oak Ex-Bourbon Barrels
Chill-Filtered:	Yes
Natural Colour:	No, as stated on the back label.
Kashrus Issues:	None
Kosher Certification:	KF (as stated on the Hebrew Import label)

 

Introduction

As mentioned in my previous article on the Speyburn new branding, I started writing this review more than a month ago, but now understand that the expression has been discontinued and replaced with the Speyburn “Bourbon Cask” (or “Kentucky Bourbon Cask” in the US). So, this review is for those who happen to come across an old bottle of this in a shop.

I had never actually seen the Speyburn “Orach Bradan” on the shelves here in Israel and Speyburn distillery in general has never been on my whisky RADAR. However, I kept noticing that this “Orach Bradan” was coming up all the time in my Google search results for American Oak matured Single Malts. Searching on Israeli whisky websites I was surprised to see that it was actually available here in Israel. At least, “on paper” (or whatever the equivalent is to seeing a whisky listed online but not actually ever in stock).

It took me over a month but after trying no less than six different wine stores within the Modi’in and Jerusalem region, I finally tracked it down in היבואן משקאות – HaYavuan Mashkaot wine store in Modi’in. I say “it” because there was in fact only one single bottle left on the shelf, and from the looks of it, it had been there for quite some time.

When the salesman saw that I had gone straight for this bottle, I got the feeling that he was somewhat amused. I’ve no idea why. I asked if they had any more bottles of the Bradan Orach and he told me some story about how imports were very slow for this product, at least for now, and he could not guarantee on getting any more in stock any time soon. (Of course I later found out that Speyburn had rebranded and the “Bradan Orach” was no more, that is, discontinued).

What was even stranger, that instead of asking why I had gone straight for this bottle (in which case I would have gladly told him that I was doing a series of reviews on Kosher Single Malt Whisky from Inver House Distillers and that this was the only bottle I had yet to try, and how grateful I was that they had a bottle still in stock as I had already tried six other shops), he suggested, that this wasn’t a good choice and that instead I purchase one of three different expressions of “Glen Turner Single Malt” instead!

I let out an audible laugh at his suggestion.

He looked rather taken aback by my response and asked me why I had reacted in this way. I wasn’t in all honesty in the best of moods that evening. It was getting quite late in the evening and I was weary after going from shop to shop trying the find this one bottle, and that was after a long and difficult day at work. Besides, I was annoyed at his patronising attitude and (in my opinion) unsuitable choice and general pushy sales technique.

What I should have done was to engage him in a friendly conversation to show him the problems with his whisky suggestion and that, as a salesman who is supposed to recognise specific customer types, he had completely misread me.

I could have pointed out that:

1. The Glen Turners are all Ex-Sherry or Ex-Wine Cask matured. Would these expressions really be the best choice for a clearly Orthodox Religious Jew? (Discuss).

2. Next, I could have asked him if he knew that “Glen Turner” wasn’t actually a distillery at all but was in fact a brand name from the French Spirits company “La Martiniquaise” and was used for their anonymous Single Malt whisky range, the whisky being sourced from various cask brokerages, with the whisky coming from a number of possible malt distilleries who are known to supply sourced whisky for the mass production independent bottlers.

Then I could have expressed my view that I didn’t think it was a good idea to recommend a Single Malt where the distillery that made it wasn't known. After all, isn’t it what makes a “Single Malt” so interesting, the fact that they all have a unique character and personally all of their own? So why on earth would it be a good idea to purchase a “Single Malt” where we have no idea which distillery it was from?

Have you ever seen a bottle of wine advertising that it’s a “Single Grape Variety” but where the actual grape variety isn’t mentioned on the label? What’s the point of that?

All this sounds great in retrospection. Unfortunately, this wasn’t what I said to him. (I think I ought to go back and apologise).

 

The Name "Bradan Orach"

Bradan Orach means “Golden Salmon” in Gaelic, named because the river Spey is a popular spot for salmon fishing.

From https://speydoctor.com/spey-steelhead-school.html

Unfortunately, I have never seen Scottish Salmon, let alone Scottish Smoked Salmon here in Israel and it’s one of the things I look forward to eating when back in the UK. (You can actually get Scottish Smoked Salmon as well as fresh Scottish salmon here in Israel but as far as I know, they are only sold in these specialist fish stores in Tel Aviv and the Haifa area in shops that also sell sea-food and other non-kosher fish items, so none of their products have a hechsher).

If someone knows where I can find Scottish Smoked Salmon with a hechsher here in Israel then please let me know.

The first thing you notice about Scottish Salmon is that it's a lot redder (actually orange-red) than Norwegian or Alaskan Salmon, these being the most common types of smoked salmon we can get here in Israel. I have also come across Smoked Salmon from Eastern Europe and South America.

See how pale his is compared with the Scottish Salmon above

The taste of Scottish Salmon is also a lot richer compared to the others. In contrast, Norwegian Salmon looks greyish pink. Besides, due to the Norwegian government announcing that they will abide by the corrupt ICC call to arrest members of the Israeli government if they ever enter Norway, I would rather not buy Norwegian salmon at the moment. (I also avoid herring from Belarus being that they are allies with Putin’s Russia).

You can also get Alaskan Smoked Salmon but its silvery-greyish-pink and does not look very appetizing, although it tastes OK.

Scottish on Left - Norwegian on Right

A few weeks ago, I just happened to come across some lovely looking Pinkish Red Smoked Salmon from Chile with a hechsher from the OU. It came in a kilo strip, all pre-sliced. It was actually very tasty but when I went back to the shop the next week to buy some more, it was all gone! I asked if they’d be getting any more in and was met with a blank face.

Actually, some of the so called “Smoked Salmon” you can buy here in Israel is not actually Salmon at all but a close relative, the “Pink Sea Trout”, usually from Eastern Europe. They will occasionally say on the label “פורל ים” – “Forrel Yam”.

The one I looked at had a hechsher from the “EEK” which after Googling, found that it was short for “Eastern European Kosher”, from the Ukraine. Asking a few kashrus experts, their opinion was not favourable, one describing it (I’m sure he was being diplomatic) as a “weak” hechsher. Pekitzu, the general consensus was not to buy this.

Speyburn Distillery

While looking online for reviews of the “Orach Bradan” (in truth there aren’t many), I came across a review from 2013 (and with an older packaging than my bottle), on the scotchnoob.com site where they astutely commented that this Speyburn was,

“at first glance [being in] the cheap section of the whisky shelf, seems like one of those fake distilleries that is actually independently bottled from a secret source”.

I really had a chuckle at that as it’s so true. (Perhaps the salesman thought that too which is why he recommended the Glen Turners?). The generic sounding name and packaging really do make it look like it’s another one of those “Glen Turner” or “Shieldaig” bottles where the name makes it sound like they are Scottish distilleries but are actually simply brand names for sourced Single Malt whisky from an unnamed distillery. As is the case with all Single Malts from anonymous sourced whisky, it’s very possible that one batch of Glen Turner might be from one distillery and the next batch will be from a different distillery.

Spey What?

I am always mixing up the various “Spey” distilleries. There is Speyside distillery going under the name of “Spey” (I’d fire their marketing company), owned by Harvey’s of Edinburgh. There is of course Speyburn from Inver House. Then there’s Glen Spey distillery, one of Diageo’s lesser-known distilleries. Of course, the use of “Spey” is not as bad as remembering all the distilleries beginning with “Glen”, but I find the use of “Spey” more confusing and much more difficult to Google because of the 50+ Speyside [region] distilleries.

For information on Speyburn distillery, please see my article on “An overview of Inver House distilleries”:

https://rebmordechaireviews.blogspot.com/2024/09/an-overview-of-inver-house-distillers.html

 Package Design

I’ll repeat here what I wrote about the Speyburn packages in my article from September 2024.

“To say that the branding and artwork of Speyburn is bland and genetic would be an understatement. It’s as if a TV props department was asked to design a non-descript bottle of Single Malt to go on the table on the latest episode of some detective series. With its cheap budget / Supermarket level image it has up until now pretty much gone under my RADAR”.

The Cork Stopper

One good thing which I can say about this is that, for a budget Single Malt, it comes with a surprisingly high-quality cork stopper. Real cork with a real wooden top. Why can’t Inver House use the same cork stoppers for Knockdhu distillery? Even their Single Cask Editions come with bargain-basement £-Store plastic cork stoppers. It makes no sense.

Hebrew Import Stickers

One of my pet hates is when Israeli importers think it’s OK to stick their amateurishly and poorly printed import stickers over the original back bottle label. I simply don’t understand it, as there is plenty of room on the bottle to stick the label. Why cover up the back label which usually contains useful information? It's not as if they are replacing the original text in English with a Hebrew translation. Please stop doing this!

Moreover, if they are going to cover up the original label with their import label, at least use adhesive which can be easily peeled off. I did try carefully peeling off the label but still managed to pretty much destroy it as it's printed on really thin paper. I could however, at last now read the original back label. This revealed a table of Nutritional information, which seems to be a common feature of Inver House products as the only other bottles I’ve seen this on were the anCnoc 12, and the Balblair 12, both Single Malts from this company.

The real interesting piece of information which you rarely see on a whisky label bound for the Israeli market (as well as bottles in the UK), is the infamous statement:

“Farven justeret med karamel mit Farbstoff”.

This statement is only mandated by law in Europe, and sure enough, it seems that this bottle was meant for the European market as the next line confirms: “Distributed in the EU by Inver House Distillers (ROI) Limited, Dublin 7.

So, what may you ask does “Farven justeret med karamel mit Farbstoff” mean?

Well, whenever I have seen this declaration it has always been in German, and I thought that this was also in German, but "Google Translate" for some reason recognised it as Danish.

Anyway translating it into Yiddish we get:

די קאָליר איז אַדזשאַסטיד מיט קאַראַמעל פאַרבסטאָף

…which translated into English means:

“The colour [of this whisky] was adjusted with caramel colourant”

In other words, it’s telling us that this whisky has had E150a caramel spirit colour added, that is, It’s not natural colour. Information about the use of this colourant is mandated by law in some European countries but not in Israel, the UK or the USA for that matter. In my opinion, it should be mandated in the next update of the SWA (Scotch Whisky Association) regulations. Either it should say “Natural Colour” or print “Caramel Colouring Added” or even “Includes E150a” is good enough.

 

The Review

Appearance

For a 40% abv whisky, surprisingly these tears/legs look pretty substantial. Swirling the liquid around in my Glencairn glass, It certainly doesn’t look watery.

Yes, as already established, there is E150a caramel spirit colouring but compared to say Talisker 10 or Old Pulteney 12, it seems very little. What’s strange about this Single Malt is that if anything, (and I’m sure that it’s just not my imagination), it has a slight green tinge to it. I have come across green whiskies before but they are quite rare.

On The Nose

This is one of these Ex-Bourbon matured Single malts very much in the Green Apples style. Apple orchard, light lemon citrus, honeydew melon, honey, floral, soft vanilla  / caramel travel sweets, sweet sultanas. There is a lovely fresh “just out the oven” bread smell and (something which I personally like but might put off others), the smell of sweet copper piping. There are also some lovely soft oak spices in the background. Adding a few drops of water improves the nose slightly by magnifying those floral and fruity notes.

Tasting

Caramelised Apple strudel with a drizzle of vanilla cream, honey and sultanas eaten in a copper bowl. Juicy green fruits, slight green citrus notes, fresh yeasty bread, copper pipes and soft kitchen spices.

Finish

Really delicious, sweet fresh green fruits, tangy and coppery on the finish like an old Victorian sooty kettle. A great sipping whisky for relaxing with at the end of hard day.

 

What Does Speyburn have in common with Springbank?

Before we get to my conclusions, we have to deal with the main problem here.

If you do a search for "ספייברן ברדן אורץ" then you’ll find only two wine chains in Israel who claim to have it in stock: “HaYavuan Mashkaot” where I eventually found a single bottle and “Sar HaMashkaot” where I went beforehand but they didn’t have any and no information as to when they were getting more in. (As I mentioned above, I didn’t know then that they’d discontinued this expression).

Although I have written a review of this Single Malt, if I were giving this “marks out of ten” (which I don’t) I’d have to mark it down due to the fact that it’s so difficult to find here in Israel. It could be the greatest tasting budget Single Malt Whisky by far on the market, but if you can’t get hold of it, then what’s the point.

It reminds me of that old British World War II joke about the pound of sausages.

Dad's Army BBC TV

A man goes to the butchers and asks how much a pound of sausages costs. The butcher replies “one shilling”. The man says that the butcher down the road sells his sausages for “tenpunce” (10d) a pound. The butcher replied, “So go down the road and buy from him!”. The man says “Well, I would, but he’s out of sausages!”. To that the butcher says “Well, when I’m out of stock, I’ll sell them for "ninepunce" (9d)”.

Recently, there has been much discussion about giving Springbank Single Malt another OSWAs award as it has become so difficult to obtain. They argue that awards should only be given to Single Malts which people have a reasonable chance to be able to purchase. I tend to have sympathy with this view. What do you think? Should a whisky be given a top Whisky Award if most people can’t actually buy it?

Conclusion

When the Bradan Orach was first released in 2013, it was universally panned. Reviewers described it as being far too young, awful, astringent like nail polish remover (acetone) and with a thin / watery consistency and aftertaste. However, interestingly I have found that recent reviews from 2020 onwards have been overwhelmingly positive. Now, how can that be?

It seems obvious to me that Speyburn started putting older whisky in the vatting which raises the overall quality. In no way would this whisky be described as thin and watery. (See my review on the Glenmorangie 12 where I complain that this does taste watery and thin).

Why would they start adding older whisky? Perhaps someone at Pernod Ricard got round to tasting it after 8 years of it being on the market and decided that it was an embarrassment? Who knows?

Yes, The Speyburn Bradan Orach is absolutely delicious and in all honesty, it doesn’t taste like a budget NIS 120 single malt.

I think it’s a case of bad marketing, which seems to be a common theme with Speyburn, in my opinion. Speyburn has the presentation of a budget supermarket brand whisky, but is, in my humble opinion, in a different league. It’s one of these occasions when selling a product at such a cheap price is actually hurting sales.

In order to improve sales, they should invest in a more innovative and attractive packaging, something in the style of a craft distillery like Deanston or Arran, bottle this at 43% instead of the minimum legal 40% and stop adding E150a caramel colouring. (Honestly, it doesn’t need it). If they really wanted to be daring then they’d add an Age Statement to it “Six Years”, “Seven Years”, whatever. Then they could sell this for around NIS 200 (or £35 in the UK), or more, and it would be a smash hit, in my opinion.

Unfortunately, Inver House have different ideas and have rebranded the entire range of Speyburn and incredibly managed to make Speyburn even more generic than the previous artwork. What’s more, I’m willing to bet that the replacement to the “Bradan Orach”, the “Bourbon Cask” will get as poor reviews as this Single Malt got when it was first released. It seems that some executives never learn.

If you see a bottle with the same branding as my bottle on the shelf (that is, green, white and grey, and not the older cream label that came in a round can), for around NIS 120 or £20 and you aren’t a whisky purist snob, I’d say it was well worth buying. I can’t say that I’m looking forward to sampling its replacement – The Speyburn Bourbon Cask, perhaps coming to our whisky shelves soon. You never know, it might surprise us.