Monthly Archives: May 2010

Autumn, Blind Tastings, Springtime

Rick’s Mystery Dram series – Week 2 of 10 – Sample #2

Ah yes, Rick’s mystery dram series continues.  As a refresher: I am not Rick, my name is Joshua.  Rick is a loyal JSMWS blog reader who challenged me to a mystery dram /blind taste testing.  There are 10 drams in all and I decided to spread the challenge over 10 weeks.

So, how did I get the samples?  Initially we were going to do a sample trade through the mail but when I found out I was going to be traveling near to wear Rick lives, I suggested we meet for a dram or two and do the trade then and there.

Here are the samples Rick provided:

Rick suggested we meet at a whisky bar called “The Daily Pint” which is in Santa Monica California.  If you’re ever in the area, check it out.  If you do plan to go, bring A LOT of cash – this is one pricey whisky bar!!

So the planning of the meeting was easy.  As part of my job, I travel for work travel for work and had a trip planned already to the LA area so we knew the date and the time was easy to figure.  Rick found The Daily Pint so, we had the place.  What was hard (for me) was finding the damn place!  I think I circled the block about 5 times before Rick finally called to ask where I was.

I passed the place each of the five times I circled the block but, in truth, I should have seen it off the bat as G-d himself was telling me where to look.  Yes folks, right next to The Daily Pint was “Adonai Cleaners” – Dry Cleaning:

As a side note, and for any and all non-Jews out there who may not know, one of many the Hebrew names for G-d is “Adonai” (others are: YHWH (the unpronounceable name of G-d not to be mis-pronounced as Yahweh or Jehovah), Shechina, Elohim, Shadai, the list can go on – if interested, check out this wikipedia page on the Names of G-d in Judaism).

Back to the whisky-story at hand — I told Rick that if I had even the slightest inkling as to what this week’s dram was that I’d take a guess.  Well, I don’t so I wont.  I’ll let you, the good reader, try to figure it out.  Even if you want to take a shot in the dark, please enter your guess in the comments section.  Rick will post the answer this Friday or Saturday (June 4th or 5th, 2010).

OK, onto the tasting – this one is a mystery to me for sure!

On the nose — Perfect for Memorial Day – another American whiskey.  The nose is similar to the dram in the first mystery dram but not at strong.  A bit more corn here (think creamed corn), green apples, fresh cut wood

On the mouth — Hmmm, a bit flat here or should I say, smooth?  Not smooth good, smooth as in “where’s the beef?”.  Not an amazingly strong attack so I’m guessing this is more like 45-47%ABV, A touch grassy (maybe some wheat influence)?  Ginger, grape soda.  

Nutmeg and clove (spicy but subtle in a way… as if these notes want to make more of an appearance but are not being allowed to.  Like a kid who really wants to play piano but his/her dad wants him/her to play tennis instead – subdued and could/should be more than allowed).

Finish — Spice and burn on the sides and back of my tongue, flat cola (the flavor of, not the feel of).

In sum — Great promise on the nose but flavor fell flat for me.  Sorry Rick.  I was not pleased or very impressed with this one.

Here are the clues:

Strong nose with some obvious corn notes and apples and fresh cut wood (Timber!!)

Palate is subdued but has some interesting grape soda notes, ginger and (I’m guessing) wheat influence.

Standard ABV of 45% (90 proof)

For last week’s “Rick’s Mystery Dram” post along with what the answer was, click here.

All You Need Is Love, Arran, Autumn, Cold Winter, Master of Malt, Need To Bundle Up, Springtime

Master of Malt – Drinks by the Drams plus one review – The Master of Malt 12yr Arran Single Cask

Master of Malt

In case you are not familiar, Master of Malt is a spirits shop based in East Sussex, UK.  “MoM” (as may people lovingly refer to them as) specializes in the sales of malt whisky (be it Scotch, Irish, American, Japanese, Swedish, Australian and Kiwi, Welsh, Indian or Canadian) – they do it all.  They’re also getting into other fine spirits such as Rums, Gin, Vodka, etc…

These men and women are true Masters!

Something new for Master of Malt, and the wide world of whisky sales in general, is their innovation of selling 3cl sized samples of many of their whiskies!  They now offer, not just for the distillery owned bottles, but samples of their exclusive bottlings as well.  Very smart on their part if’n you ask me.  The program is called “Drinks by the Dram” and they have many whisky expression available for you to try (for a small fee) before you buy the full bottle.  Click here to check out their offering.

I got my hands on some of their samples (mainly of their exclusive expressions) and… do these samples look cool or what?  Even my wife thought they were “cute”.

Being that I have about 10 or 12 of these samples sitting at home, I thought that I should start opening, tasting and reviewing these cuties.  So I will get them into my regular rotation and see if I can review a new Master of Malt expression every Tuesday (for the next 10-12 weeks).

Just a note here: when I refer to the “Master of Malt expressions”, I want you to know that these are not simply whisky blends that they concoct.  No, these (or, at least many of them) are single cask, cask strength whiskies.  So when they come out with a new bottle, chances are there’s 200-400 bottles per chosen cask, and once those bottles are gone, you’ll never see them again.  These MoM bottlings are truly unique.

Here is a review of their 26yr Bowmore I did a short while back – amazing stuff!

With regards to the samples in question, and in the “spirit” of full disclosure, I will tell you that these 3cl sweeties were gifted to me by Master of Malt for analytical and reviewing purposes.  My guess is that most of these whiskies are going to be quite nice but, if I find one I don’t care for, I will say so (heck, just look at the first Bruichladdich review I did).  These are unbiased and independent reviews.

Master of Malt Arran 12yr

Without further ado, I now begin my weekly review of the Master of Malt exclusive bottlings (or the samples thereof):

Islands region – Master of Malt Exclusive Single Cask Arran 12yr – 54.7%ABV –  700ml bottle – £45 (as stated above, you can also get a 3cl sample of this one)

On the nose — Big nose, soapy (not like Bowmore but soapy still, castile?), apples, sandalwood and ocean breeze, tamarind juice and a touch of smoke (my imagination?)


On the mouth — Big chewy caramels!  A touch of chocolate (milk), orange, fantastic.

Can’t get past the caramels; I don’t want to actually (this reminds me as to why I seek out the caramel squares in a box of chocolates).

Finish — Decent length, the milky caramel goodness remains, you’d never know this is a cask strength Arran, warming but not burning in any way.

In sum –– The palate and finish are delectably delicious, the balance is slightly off (from the nose to the palate/finish) but the palate and finish by themselves make up for it in ways you would not believe!

This would be a nice springtime whisky but could also warm you up in the Autumn and winter seasons.

A World of Discovery, Autumn, Blind Tastings, Cold Winter, Parker's Heritage

Rick’s Mystery Dram series – Week 1 of 10 – Sample #1

A couple of weeks ago, Gal Granov of Whisky Israel and I shared in a “Mystery Dram” joint posting.  What is that you may ask?  I sent him an unmarked sample of whisky and he did the same.  The purpose?  To see if we could figure out what in the “H.E. Double Hockey Sticks” we sent to one another.

With the Whisky Israel/Jewish Single Malt Whisky Society swap, the rules for sample type were easy: it had to be Scotch whisky and it had to be a sample that we thought the other person never had.  When trying to decode the “mystery dram”, each of us could use nothing more than our eyes,  nose and tongue – a true blind tasting with NO HINTS.

Here’s how Gal’s tasting went.

Here’ how mine went.

Interestingly enough, right around this time I came in contact with a regular JMSWS blog reader who challenged me in a similar way.  Rick initially responded to a general request I sent out for a sample swap of different version of the Ardbeg Airigh Nam Beist.  After sharing in a few emails with Rick I found out that he lives near to where I go on occasion for business purposes.  I suggested we meet for a dram and swap some whisky.  Rick agreed.  What started off as a simple whisk(e)y swap turned into me meeting a very cool guy with a passion for wines, motorcycles, the NASA space program, bourbon and philanthropy.

Before we met, Rick suggested that perhaps his samples could simply be numbered (1 – 11) and I would have to guess what they were.  I could then see if I were able to figure out what it was and then post about it.  I’m always up to a challenge so I, of course, said yes.  What makes this Mystery Dram series different (and this is my assumption here) is that most of Rick’s samples are Bourbons/American whiskey which is newer territory for me.

I suggested to Rick that I taste and review the dram on Mondays, let people chime in via the comments on this blog with what they thought the stuff was and on Friday of that same week, Rick would then comment to let everyone know exactly was the drink was.

Sounds fun right?  I think so.

So, here’s sample number 1 (of 10) – note: sample #6 was the Ardbeg Airigh Nam Beist I mentioned above so while you may see bottle numbers going up to 11, only 10 of them are a mystery to me:

I know nothing about this or the other 9 blind samples.  They could be bourbon, rye, scotch, who knows what else.  Rick gave me basically no clues.  The only thing I know is that he is a big bourbon fan so I can only expect that many of these are American whiskey – this is nothing more than an assumption and, you know what you get when you assume…

So, I begin now with what I feel will be a truly fun experience and I want to thank Rick for his loyal readership and for this cool and very fun challenge:

Color — Deep mahogany (a color like this I’d usually associate with a bourbon or rye)

On the nose — Oh yeah, this is an American whiskey alright! Strong nose, tickling the hairs a bit, woody (again with the pencil shavings I find in American Whiskeys), some blueberry jam and very spicy (some rye influence but this  can’t a full rye whiskey; just part of the mashbill for sure).

A touch if cinnamon, some plastic bags and fresh baked bread (very subtle bread notes) and peanut brittle.

On the mouth — Oh man, this is a hot one!  It’s got to be a high ABV/Cask Strength whiskey.  Vanilla pudding, too-hot-blueberry-pie, Sweet-sweet corn and some nice spicy notes.  I feel like a dog that was just given a spoonful of peanut butter (not because of the flavor, but because I can’t stop licking my chops).

Finish — Long spicy and full of burn.  The vanilla notes come raging back as does something like a sugar daddy.

In sum — The balance is awesome, well done.  This whiskey demands your attention!  It’s not an easy sippin’ type whiskey.  It’s an “I won my first golf tournament” type bourbon.  Celebrate with this.  For the Scotch devotees out there, you may have a tough time getting past the sweetness (as I’ve heard many Scotchees say).  I too am “getting over” the sweetness but am so happy to be doing so!

OK people.  Can you guess what it is?  My input: It’s a cask strength bourbon with some good rye influence (spice and blueberry notes), corn influence, for sure, and a fair amount of vanilla.  You have until Thursday night (May 27, 2010) to cast your vote.  Heck, if you get enough of these right, there may be a prize in it for you!!

Cold Winter, Glenfarclas, Need To Bundle Up, Takin' It Easy

Glenfarclas 105

Highlands – 60%ABV – 750ml – $60-80 | £37 | €43

Ah, the Glenfarclas 105.  This is a big, high-octaine sherry bomb coming in a 60% ABV.  Before tasting this one, the only other Glenfarclas I had ever had was the ‘farclas 15yr – which was an absolutely killer dram! After that one, I could not wait to taste more.  This being said, I waited.

It wasn’t until I received a sample from G.G. of this whisky that I had a chance to ‘sip the ‘farclas’ again.  ‘Sip the ‘farclas’…that sounds sort of bad, right? “Hey you! go sip the ‘farclas!”  I guess it could be good too: “Hey man, let’s sip some ‘farclas!”  Anyway, I digress…  Thank you G!

This “105” expression is supposedly 8-10 years old and was matured in Sherry butts (he-he).  So this is a younger, big & beefy whisky, right?  Let’s find out:

On the nose — BIG nose filled with fresh salty soil, Sherry (of course) and some red apple, malty (I want to chase this nose with a nice chocolate stout), speaking of chocolate, there’s a bit here.  Some water unveils nice english toffee notes (chocolate covered toffee).

On the mouth — Fire!  Oohf, this is a hot one.  Cloves and orange, cinnamon and the slightest touch of anise, bitter caramel (is there such a thing?).  Chewy, chewy sherry.

With a few drops of water nothing happens…no, I take it back, big oak comes charging through.  Watch out!  Was better without the water…

Finish — Big, long, burnt and burly but, nice.

In sum — This is like a big long cigar.  Sit back and enjoy the ride.  Don’t rush it.  Life is short; enjoy every single second.


Autumn, Cold Winter, Kilchoman, Takin' It Easy

Kilchoman 3yr 2009 Autumn Release

Islay region – 46%ABV – 700ml bottle – £45 | €52 (currently not available through US stores)

Kilchoman (which sounds more like a yiddish word than the name of a Scotch whisky…) is a newer distillery on the little island of Islay – it opened in 2005 (the first to open up on Islay in more than 120 years).  While I can go on-and-on about the distillery, other people have already done that and have done a much better job than I could ever do.  Rather, I will focus on the whisky itself – it’s aromas, taste, memories it brought to the forefront of my mind and what the best time/season/mood to drink it in will be.

A big thank you to G.G. for the sample!

On the nose — Bright and clean peat with strong notes of limes and ocean spray, bicycle tires, woody – like church pews.

You may be asking yourself how I, a shul-going Jew, would know what a church pew smells like.  There’s a great story that goes with that.  This is not something I am very proud of but hey, it’s a great story!

Back when I was 13, me and my buddies Rob and “Froggy” (ah, “Froggy”, you could have played “Froggy” in a broadway revival of The Little Rascals, your voice was that raspy) thought it would be good fun to start pulling fire alarms around our town causing our fire department to send out 2-3 fire trucks (toward different locations) for no good reason.  I would say that in the course of 4 months we pulled a total of 35 alarms.  We were assholes.

One day, a day I decided not to assist those guys in alarm pulling, a knock came to my door.  Mr. & Mr. Police Officer came to my door to “bring me in” (as they say “in the parlance of our times”).  Rob and Froggy were caught and ratted on me.  We were charged with “X” amount of counts; “X” for touching the alarms and “X” for pulling the alarms.  Our punishment?

Among many other things (and not including that ass-whooping I got from my parents), 40 hours of community service which included weekly cleaning of the pews at the local Catholic Church – St. Francis.  At age 15 those “counts” were struck from my record and I’ve not gotten in trouble since.

So yes, I know all too well what Church pews smell like. Back to the nosing…

I like this nose, a lot.

Oh, now I’m getting a scent here that reminds me of a swimming hole I used to frequent with my old buddy Al – so, what is it? Very clean & super-cold water (with a bit of fresh-water vegetal growth – how nice) .  This is when I was learning how to be an upright teenager – this nose is bringing back memories.  I miss Al.

On the mouth — Quite viscous, children’s teething biscuits, canola oil, tannic notes, oily still but drying, some meaty/gamey notes (think lamb chops), figs – where’s that cleanliness I got from the nose?  Some slight lemons pop up.

Finish — Long, honey taffy, peat bite (not warmth).

In sum — I think the age of this whisky is fairly apropos of the memories it’s pinging in my head – Youth and Young Manhood.  There’s some nice complexity here but the balance is a touch off.  I can see this Islay whisky evolving into an extraordinary dram.  I can wait for the 10yr expression!