Moch, meaning “Dawn”, is an attempt by Caol Ila to justify the industry-wide practice of NAS (no age statement) bottling by marketing it as the “first” single malt from the distillery where barrel selection was done by taste instead of by age or other factors. Putting aside the fact that you’d think taste would be of primary importance to barrel selection for every…
Instead, I wanted to share with you the latest cocktail that has been single-handedly (do cocktails have hands in this analogy?) getting me through the lockdown lately. It’s called the Paper Plane, and it’s technically a whisky cocktail. Like another of my staples, the Negroni, it’s easy to make because it’s easy to remember. A note on ingredients, though. While you can use any bourbon (or rye) that you like, the Amaro Nonino is kind of mandatory.
This past Friday I was privileged to be invited to an online whisky tasting with That Boutique-y Whisky Company (TBWC henceforth). It was led by brand ambassador Dave Worthington (@BoutiqueyDave on Twitter), who hosted a rousing and informative tasting despite it being nearly 2 AM in Scotland.
The original G&H was a large Toronto distiller established in 1832 and which merged with Canadian mega conglomerate Hiram Walker in 1926. It functioned as a Hiram Walker plant until it was closed for good in 1990. The eponymous brand was re-released by current Hiram Walker owner Pernod Ricard in 2015 and is now distilled by Corby Spirits (which is mostly owned by Pernod Ricard) in Windsor, Ontario. …
…agreement that an independent bottler sometimes has to make with a whisky producer to not disclose the distillery name. The bottle has no age statement, so all we really know is that it is a Highland single malt from an ex-bourbon barrel and that is bottled at the bare legal minimum of 40% ABV. The release is a vatting of different ages from that undisclosed distillery, so it’s not a single barrel.
The distillery uses local New York grains milled using their on-site hammer mill. The mash for the Wheated Bottled-in-Bond Bourbon – 70% local corn, 20% red winter wheat, 10% malted barley – is double-distilled using a Vendome continuous still and copper thumper (basically a secondary spirit still), although the company also has a…
Dear readers, on Friday June 26th at 7:30pm Central time (5:30pm Pacific, 8:30pm Eastern), That Boutique-y Whisky Company will be hosting an online whisky tasting via Zoom. It will be hosted by @boutiqueydave and you can watch and participate by ordering a tasting set. If you’re interested I suggest ordering it ASAP – like, yesterday …
It’s definitely maritime in that it smells like something slathered on a hull to make it seaworthy. I kid. Sort of. There is an intrusion of peat but absolutely no smoke, which makes it smell and taste earthy but without evoking Islay’s style of smoky peat. The overall effect is brooding and difficult, and that so-called partial sherry cask aging is thoroughly in the background…
You know what? I’m taking the weekend off. Have a good weekend everyone; enjoy some relaxing (instead of stressed-out cabin feverish) time with your loved ones, drink some good whisky or maybe drink some bad whisky mixed into a cocktail. I’ve been drinking a bunch of Algonquin Cocktails lately. Celebrate the memory of those who …
The website for Ezra Brooks is littered with marketing gush that proclaims how “honest” and “straight-shooting” the products are, which is a laugh because there is no Ezra Brooks distillery – the brand’s bourbons are distilled by parent company Luxco’s Lux Row distillery, which also makes Rebel Yell, David Nicholson, and others. The ryes are sourced from Indiana, which means…