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Single Malt Scotch!

#501
Thunderitter said:
The Horseshoe Bar in Glasgow (it was Europe's longest bar) would be ideal!
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My Dad grew up at the Horseshoe and I finally had a chance to go there a couple of years ago. Unfortunately, Dad could not travel at that time so I could not be there with him. It's a great room, lots of history. Funny story. There was a rugby game in town and the place was packed. I did get a spot at the bar and had my pie, chips and a pint. I was close to finishing as a group of were trying to find a seat. There were a few seats around me but not enough for the whole group. A giant in a rugby shirt and kilt looked at me and said, with a strong Scottish accent, "He'll move". If you go to the Horseshoe, its a Rangers bar so don't wear green and white.

Cheers
 
#503
Thought I'd post some shots of my current 'collection' for those that are interested. There are a few 'stock' items, a few ‘interesting’ ones and certainly some 'boutique' even 'vintage' ones!

I've arranged them into regions and as you'll see some have been almost completely ‘relic'd and are in need of replacement pretty soon!

I’ve listed them below each picture, left to right.

So, here they are starting with the Islands Malts:

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12 yr old Highland Park (Orkney)
10 yr old Arran (Arran)
8 yr old Arran (Arran)
15 yr old Laphroig (Islay)
16 yr old Lagavulin (Islay)
12 yr old Bowmore (Islay)
10 yr old Isle of Jura (Jura)

And now for some Campbeltowns:

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17 yr old Springbank (port finish, Springbank Society bottling)
15 yr old Springbank
10 yr old Springbank (new label)
10 yr old Springbank (old label)
12 year old Springbank (175 anniversary bottling)

Followed by some ‘special’ Campbeltowns:

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21 yr old Springbank (very rare: the Ritter of whisky IMHO!)
8 yr old Hazelburn (first bottling, triple distilled, no peat)
10 yr old Longrow
14 yr old Longrow


Highlands next:

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12 yr old Glenlivet
18 yr old Glenmorangie
30 yr old Glenmorangie (malaga finish)
12 yr old Cragganmore
12 yr old Balvenie Double Wood
10 yrd old Glenfarclas "Beinn A’ Cheò" (single cask)

What you get as if you want soda with your whisky in my house:

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And finally what you get if you want coke as your mixer:

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...and before you ask you I do share! PM me if you're in VA with a designated driver!
 
#507
Here's my (very) modest collection. The most notable ones IMHO are the Bowmore 69 (been nursing that one for a while now), the Glendronach '68 (A-FRIGGIN'-MAZING... I even have a backup bottle of this stuff, and it was particularly expensive by my standards), and the Dalmore Stillman's Dram 30 (recommended to me by Mike Tobias, DAMN hard to find a year ago, prolly impossible now).

I love my Macs, with my first bottle of 18 a while back being my entry into single malts. I also have some really nice bourbons and even a couple Chivas blendeds, but these single malts are my "treats". :)

Caveats...

Also, yeah, I know the Bush Malts aren't scotches, but, I really like them a lot, and you don't have to pay the jack for the 21. IMHO the 16, at 1/2 the money is 90% the drink. Smooth and tasty.

Those three bottles with the screw-off caps probably suffer in the picture from perspective... they're actually very small sample bottles. I don't know how they rate with the experts, but I like them. Not sure if I'll get real bottles of any of them for "official stock", but thinkin' about it.

Isle of Jura is on my list, as well as always more others too :). Just hard to find around here, and haven't gotten around to doing the internet purchase yet. I'd really like to try it first if possible, but it might not be.

Anyway...

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#509
i got a bottle of the lagavulan 16 not too long ago... a very impressive bottle indeed. im young and somewhat new to the world of single malts, but the oban 14 is next on my list to try.

also recently did a vertical of 10 15 and 18's of a brand i cant recall at the moment, will get back to you shortly. i think im going to create a wine specific spinoff of this thread soon.
 
#513
Vic said:
Here's my (very) modest collection.
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Modest?!?!? Yours and Thunderitter's collections are the most impressive ones I've ever seen.

My (very very very very very very very very) modest collection is:

Balvenie DoubleWood 12
Caol Ila 12
Glenlivet 12

Whisky is expensive stuff... I don't know how you can afford such collections. I definitely do not. :(
 
#514
edbutler3 said:
Very nice collection, Thunderitter.

I've never had (or even heard of) the Campbeltown style before. I gather that Springbank is the prime example? Can you give any "tasting notes" to explain how it differs from other Scotch styles?
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...apart from it tastes really good?:D

Springbank is lightly-peated (60:40 from memory) and distilled two-and-a-half-times, which is claimed to give the whisky a unique character. It is very smooth, particularly the 15 and 21 year olds.

The Longrow is all heavily peated. They only make one batch a year and I was told that they do that just before the sweep the chimney! It's Mitchell's answer to Islay and a wonderful answer it is too! I remember being blown away by my first dram, which I shared with a mate who is far more an aficionado than I am. We both couldn't believe what we were tasting. I can only describe it as having floral and honey like overtones - wonderful stuff and one to snag if you ever see it on a shelf!

Hazelburn is a far lighter whisky - triple distilled in a fashion similar to most of the Japanese whisky. It is 100% oil dried and light and fruity in flavor.
 
#515
Deacon_Blues said:
Whisky is expensive stuff... I don't know how you can afford such collections. I definitely do not. :(
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I pick up a bottle every time I'm home in Scotland - usually 2 - 3 times a year and most Scottish visitors to my home will bring me a bottle so that's another 2 or 3 annually.

I'd estimate I spend $300-$400 a year (not including room and board for my friends!), which is a lot less than I'd spend if I had a packet a day cigarette habit and certainly a lot less than my wife spends buying here grande-whippy-frippy-skim-master-bate-os in Starbucks! (Not that there's anything wrong with a good 2oz espresso, just she doesn't buy that stuff!)
 
#516
Deacon_Blues said:
Modest?!?!? Yours and Thunderitter's collections are the most impressive ones I've ever seen.
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Trust me... it's modest amongst scotch fanatics. I've seen collections that would blow your mind. Shelves full of bottles, backup bottles of lots of it and even 3 bottles of the stuff they really love... especially if it's a limited production. Trust me, scotch fanatics are FREAKS! ...umm... except me of course... ;) :D

Whisky is expensive stuff... I don't know how you can afford such collections. I definitely do not. :(
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Simple... 'cause I don't drink much, but when I do, I drink well. :) Plus, this isn't the stuff you get out at big parties and just set on the counter. This is the stuff you share with close friends or enjoy yourself.

It literally takes me years to get through a lot of this stuff. Especially since I have a few choices, it may take me one or more years to get through a bottle of something, so I just rotate stuff in as I sip it away. I figure I probably spend anywhere from 200-500 per year on scotch.

If I were to get into a routine where I was drinking enough to really put a dent in something, I'd just stay on top of a "regular drinker" of some kind, which wouldn't be as expensive as a lot of this stuff, and it'd be fine. For example, the Mac 10 fine oak is typically around 30/bottle and the Mac 12/sherry is about 40/bottle. Unless you're really hitting the stuff a lot (in which case I think you have bigger problems) anyone can afford to make regular drinkers of those, and those are (IMHO) really nice scotches, and there are plenty of other really good scotches in that price range, too.
 
#517
Whisky 101!

Reading my previous post back made me think that some folks might appreciate a quick explanation, from my fairly rudimentary knowledge, of the whisky making process and in particular what makes a peated whisky.

All Scottish malt whisky (notice I don't call it Scotch - that's an American things!!) is produced from the same basic raw materials: water and barley.

The barley is malted by laying it out, ankle deep, on large floors until there is a sign of germination - a wee green shoot! Campbeltown is one the last (if not only) to still do their own malting. Most malting is done in central locations these days to make it more cost efficient. In Campbeltown there are two malting floors, which they use for all their brands (Springbank, Hazleburn, Longrow and Kilkerran, which has not yet been released - 2014!) and they use a very sophisticated way of controlling the temperature and humidity of the malting process: they open or close the windows!

To arrest the germination process the whisky maker dry's the grain. This is done in a hopper/dryer with a heat source below. Depending what you burn imparts 'character' on the grain. Burn peat and you get very peaty smoke, burn oil you get a very 'clean' smoke. A 60:40 will have 60% of the time with a peat fire, 40% with oil. From memory drying time is usually a couple of hours per loaded hopper.

My reference to Longrow only being produced once a year and before the distillery sweeps their chimney is a reference to the fact that peat produces an awful lot of sooty smoke when it's burned and too much soot residue in a chimney produces a very combustable/explosive mixture.

Islay malts are reknown for there peaty-ness. In Campbeltown in response to a question on a distillery tour of "will they ever run out of peat". The answer was only if the Island of Islay sinks below the waves! Islay being the main source of peat for the Campbeltown distillery.

So there you have it. How you get peaty-ness into a whisky!

After the grain is dry it is milled added to water and then it goes into the mash tanks - very like beer production up to this point! It is heated,which starts the fermentation process and the liquid is then distilled in the stills. Each distillery has it's own distinctive copper still/s, the shape of which imparts additional 'character' on the spirit produced.

Most whisky is distilled twice and some three times. The more you distill the purer the spirit, which is not always a good thing as you lose some of the 'character' that way!

To distill twice you put the fermented mash into the still and heat, producing the first distillation. You then take the spirit that has been produced from this distillation and put it back through the process. To triple distill you repeat the process again. Fairly simple stuff!

Now, to distill 2.5 times as per Springbank, you take the remains from the first distillation (not all the liquid will come off as spirit or low wines at the fraction) and distill that with the low wines from the first distillation to get your half! You distill one more time to get your 2.5! So there you have it!

From there the spiriti goes into storage tanks and then into casks/barrels. The cask's are usually made of oak and are used 3 - 4 times. So some of these casks are 40 or 50 years old! This is unlike American whiskey, which, due to post-prohibition laws, only can use a cask once and have to destroy the casks after that first use to prevent anybody 'sweating' them for spirit!

These 'interesting' laws are a good thing for Scottish whisky though as many of the bourbon casks find there way to Scotland and are re-used! What was in the cask before the Scotch imparts color and a little flavour into what to this point is a clear spirit. Sherry is traditional other barrels/casks used include with Madera, Malaga (brandy), Rum or Port.

In Scotland for a spirit to be called Whisky it must be stored in a cask for at least 3 years. Most single Malts are stored for at least 8-10 years. Note a single Malt means it comes from one distillery, but it may contain several whiskys. The age of the whisky denotes the youngest malt in the mix. So a 10 year old whisky may also contain some 12 yr old malt or older. Not many folks realise whisky can and is mixed like wine and the final flavour is down to the skill of the whisky maker! Now, don't confuse this with blended whisky, which can be made from malt and/or grain whisky and will be the product of several distilleries.

The casks are then stored in large warehouses for varying lengths of time. The barrels naturally lose some spirit through evaporation - by law I think it is about 2-3% per year and anymore than that is going to attract the interest of the tax and excise man! The smell in one of these warehouses is positively giddy and needs to be smelled to be believed! Campbeltown is the only distillery I've come across that allows visitors in to smell what is called 'the angels' share'! The evaporation is one reason why older whisky is rarer and more expensive!

Once the whisky is deemed 'mature' - again the whisky maker's decision. It is bottled and then it's off to market. Some distilleries chill filter the whisky before bottling to extract impurities and others add colour as well! These processes are frowned upon by aficionados, but it does make producing a constant, repeatable product easier.

In Campbeltown they are proud not only to do there own bottling (most others do it off site these days; partly cost partly tax and excise issues!) but they also are proud not to chill filter or add colour. It is therefore one of the most natural Scottish whiskies you can buy!

At the bottling stage water is added to most whisky to take the alcohol to 42-44% alcohol. Straight out the cask strength is usually about 52-55% alcohol. Hence the difference between cask strength whisky and 'regular' whisky. One more thing you will see single cask whisky this as the name suggest is whisky which has not been mixed with other whisky's and has usually remained in a single cask throughout it's maturation. I understand some single cask is really single batch as it will be moved into a different cask mid-maturation for flavour/color. Balvenie do this but to market the results as Double Cask.

Anyway I think that's enough for now, but feel free to ask questions. I'll answer if I can!
 
#518
Thunderitter said:
Whisky 101!...
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Dude, you rock! I only knew about 20% of this. Great summary. You covered a lot of ground very effectively while maintaining an quick/easy read. :)

BTW, an interesting side note (I'm sure you know, but for the rest of the subscribers) Bowmore is on Islay (actually, I just learned this), but is not near as "peaty" as, for example, Lagavulin and Laphroaig. I'm sure there are many others, but those two are the ones I'm most familiar with, and the Lagavulin is my favorite of the "mega-peats"... I feel it's much smoother yet still has the same richness of flavor and peaty intensity as the Laphroaig (I just had a dram of Lagavulin last night and it really hit the spot! :))

I think this is interesting because until a few days ago, I always associated any "Islay Scottish whisky" with LOTS of peat. Obviously, that's not necessarily the case.

The super smokey/peaty Scottish whiskies are not what I drink most typically, but sometimes I'm just really in the mood for that and its really great. My favorite are the darker sherry cask Scottish whiskies, which is one reason I'm loving that Glendronach 1968 in particular so much.
 
#519
I'm not going to take the time to photograph my scotch collection, as I feel that that is slightly overboard, but here's what I have on-hand at the moment:

Dalwhinnie 15yr (probably my favorite consistent drinker, an "everyday" whisky)
Balvenie Doublewood
MacAllan 12yr
Glenlivet 12yr
Glenlivet 15yr French Oak
Glenfiddich 15yr
Glenmorangie Nectar d'Or
Laphroaig 10yr (don't like this, it's 95% full and probably won't go any farther)
Walker Black (for mixes in other drinks)
Jameson 18 Limited Reserve (so sue me :) )

The super smokey/peaty Scottish whiskeys are not what I drink most typically, but sometimes I'm just really in the mood for that and its really great. My favorite are the darker sherry cask Scottish whiskeys
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+1...any recommendations based on your stash up there (<$100/bottle would be better, too)
 
#520
Vic said:
Dude, you rock! I only knew about 20% of this. Great summary. You covered a lot of ground very effectively while maintaining an quick/easy read. :)

BTW, an interesting side note (I'm sure you know, but for the rest of the subscribers) Bowmore is on Islay (actually, I just learned this), but is not near as "peaty" as, for example, Lagavulin and Laphroaig. I'm sure there are many others, but those two are the ones I'm most familiar with, and the Lagavulin is my favorite of the "mega-peats"... I feel it's much smoother yet still has the same richness of flavor and peaty intensity as the Laphroaig (I just had a dram of Lagavulin last night and it really hit the spot! :))

I think this is interesting because until a few days ago, I always associated any "Islay Scottish whiskey" with LOTS of peat. Obviously, that's not necessarily the case.

The super smokey/peaty Scottish whiskeys are not what I drink most typically, but sometimes I'm just really in the mood for that and its really great. My favorite are the darker sherry cask Scottish whiskeys, which is one reason I'm loving that Glendronach 1968 in particular so much.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the review! I'm glad you enjoyed the read.

I'd really recommend getting hold of some Longrow, especially the 14 if you like an occasional 'peat'. As I said it is quite unique and not anywhere as 'heavy' as a Lagavulin or Laphroig. It's hard to get in the US. My brother-in-law saw a bottle once in his local bottle shop in MN, but I haven't seen any locally to me (I mean ME or DE) forget about anything other than the staples here in State controlled VA!

Either that or visit your head office before my supplies run dry. My next trip to Scotland is currently set for June - AC/DC's final date of their "World" tour - and my current Longrow isn't going to last that long!


On a point of correctness and I'm sure you know Scottish whisky doesn't have the 'e'!
 

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