Infectious Charm. Devastating Wit. Below Average Looks.
Japanese whisky as a category hasn’t really buttered our bread as a club. We don’t have a whole lot of options to choose from on the shelf, the shortages have hurt the age stated expressions and biggest of all it is quite expensive across the board. We only have one rich dentist in the club... Continue Reading →
Never fret when you are presented with a young, peated Scotch. Surely, if you’re a peat lover, you’re not drinking Ardbeg 10 for the lovely vanilla sweetness. You’re drinking it for smoky napalm. Don’t lie. But if you’re an aged Scotch lover, and seeing 8 or 10 years on the label isn’t exactly bagging your... Continue Reading →
Believe it or not, India is the biggest spirit producer in the world in terms of volume. I had trouble believing this, but slap me around and call me Jim, these folks churn this stuff out. Granted, most of their product is a blend of distilled molasses and grain whisky, but more recognizable incarnations of... Continue Reading →
You will all be sufficiently forlorn to learn that the Pappy craze, having gone from annoying, then evolving to insane, and now to a new “blood shooting from my eyes” kind of psychopathy, has jumped every kind of shark in the ocean. The secondary market of re-sold Pappy Van Winkle bourbons and rye whiskies is... Continue Reading →
I am no high minded bourbon purist. I certainly do not think I am some sort of gatekeeper of the tradition or Keeper of the Bourbon Quaich, judging what one can and can’t do to their bourbon whiskey. I don’t think I need to be, bourbon is well regulated legally already and folks seem to... Continue Reading →
Upon learning about the warehouse collapse at 1792 Barton Distillery earlier this year, my first cruel thought was, “phew, at least it was a bourbon I don’t drink.” That’s how much of a dirtbag I am. If a warehouse on the grounds of Buffalo Trace had come crumbling down like a bourbon soaked Jericho, I... Continue Reading →
Because I am so cutting edge and hip to the scene and woke and everything like that, we present yet another review for a bottle that is leaving the shelf, Jura 16 Diurach’s Own. Jura is revamping their core range with new whiskies and labels, and unfortunately, or fortunately depending on your taste, the 16... Continue Reading →
Dalwhinnie’s story is a common one. The majority of their malt production is reserved for a blend, namely Black & White, while a portion is bottled as a standalone single malt. The recently reviewed bottlings from Royal Lochnagar, Aberfeldy have similar arrangements. While sampling component malts of major Scotch blends isn’t exactly a favorite hobby... Continue Reading →
Vintage Reserve is our first saunter into the Glenrothes universe. There is very little we know of the brand/distillery and perhaps that's a good thing. We focused our sensory gaze upon it, generally enjoyed it, and happily moved on with our fine day. But apparently, after a quick screening of information available online, there was... Continue Reading →
George Dickel Tennessee Whiskey might as well be called "that other Tennessee whiskey not called Jack Daniels." This phrase, on a plain white label in Times New Roman, on a bottle with a plastic screw cap on the bottom shelf, reflects really the strength of George Dickel's market share as compared to the taut Jack... Continue Reading →
God bless value bourbons. Especially the bottles that ain’t bad. Bourbon has long been a Helm’s Deep for whiskey people getting left out of the party by steeply rising prices for a decent bottle. Scotch skyrocketed. Irish, too. The good Canadian stuff is in the premium price category, and even the top end bourbon bottles... Continue Reading →
Being by far the biggest advocate for Canadian whisky in the club, I still have my criticisms. That being said, I don’t think I can often blame Canada for these nit picks of mine. One of the said nit picks is primarily a legal one in the famed “9.09%” rule for Canadian whisky sold in... Continue Reading →
Aberfeldy’s recent brand makeover seemed to me to be an attempt to remind the whisky world that their whisky still exists and is not just meant to be blended into Dewar’s. It is also promising that Aberfeldy didn’t just redesign the label, and if you’re into that sort thing, it was an improvement, but they... Continue Reading →
Continuing our treasured practice of reviewing bottles you will probably never find ever, we continue with an even more rare and hard to find specimen in Cadenhead’s Royal Lochnagar 18. Owned by J.A. Mitchell and Co., Cadenhead's is the oldest independent bottler in existence and specializes in single cask malt whiskies without chill-filtration or coloring.... Continue Reading →
It’s been some time since we cruelly reviewed a whisky you likely will not be able to find, and because those are so helpful, we submit to you a few pieces of info on Talisker Port Ruighe... It sure does come in handy that we as a whiskey club are able from time to time... Continue Reading →
The old story is that Prohibition destroyed Rye. It destroyed distilleries, is what it really did, which in turn destroyed brands, only a few of which have survived, or have been revived, to today’s time. And now that I have used 5 commas in a sentence, a feat I am certain has been unattainable until... Continue Reading →
It should go without saying, but inherent to whisky recommendations is the subjection of yourself to someone else’s opinion. Even our best tasters are still dispensing subjective opinions despite their great skill in sensory evaluation. Many of those opinion makers sing songs of high praise for Old Potrero, distilled by the San Francisco based Anchor... Continue Reading →
For today’s review I was preparing to snarkily opine about yet another US company (a Californian winery, in today’s case) sourcing a good whisky from somewhere else, bottling it themselves and slapping some historical figure’s name from the 1800’s on their label and charging a horse’s hind end load for it. It would be a... Continue Reading →
It was Macallan night during one of our monthly SWC meetings. We had on the docket the 10, 12, and 15 year old expressions. I was excited. How could you not be with Macallan? Life was good. As we went through each whisky, nosing with patience, tasting with gusto, living life as God intended, our... Continue Reading →
