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Just bought a bottle of Bruichladdich 10 to celebrate a promotion--not realizing at the time that it is totally different than the Bruichladdich 12 I've enjoyed several glasses of over the last year! At first, expecting the 12, it was a real disappointment, but I think I've started to enjoy it on its own terms after a while. Some reviews said it benefited from a drop of water, so I tried that even though one of my complaints was that it seemed thin and almost dusty. It opened up significantly, and gave me more of the honeyed, salty flavors I wanted. Curious to hear anyone else's thoughts.
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Jan 31, 2012 03:55
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So I used to love Bruichladdich 12, and I find that I like the new Bruichladdich "The Laddie Ten" significantly less. What other malts are similar to the old 12, so I can try them in search of a replacement?
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Apr 7, 2012 00:42
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Does anyone know of a good resource that lists which bourbons are made with the same mashbill? I started compiling my own today and then realized that someone has probably put something together somewhere...
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May 18, 2013 04:04
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Mellow Corn makes a great highball.
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Aug 16, 2019 03:09
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Bape Culture posted:My wife got me some suntory “torys extra” for Christmas. It’s absolutely dogshit and the picture on the side seems to show it being mixed with soda. What can I do with it to make it more appealing!? The soda does nothing. Torys is Suntory’s retro budget label and as far as I know is Japan only, so yeah, it’s not good, you’re supposed to buy it at the convenience store and make highballs with it. In Japan that means soda, but with a little lemon juice too. Add a lot of ice, and you’re supposed to have like six of them and get smashed. I’d try doing that.
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Dec 28, 2019 04:29
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It's true that usually you shouldn't mix a single malt, but occasionally they're great. I think Highland Park 12 makes an excellent Rob Roy or Bobby Burns. Otherwise, yeah, good scotches neat, cheap blends on a big rock or Japanese highball style (1:2 scotch to carbonated water, ice, lemon twist).
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Mar 16, 2020 02:38
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Lewis bags and solid, thick rolling pins work great, no machine needed.
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Jun 6, 2020 04:06
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I've been making a lot of highballs with Cutty Sark Prohibition this summer (not regular Cutty Sark, which is awful; Prohibition is 50% abv and actually good). Usually somewhere around a 1:2 ratio with soda and a lemon peel garnish.
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Jul 17, 2020 06:54
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The "best mixing Bourbons/ryes/American whiskeys generally are BIB or close" is 100% the right take. (Most spirits seem to mix better when they're overproof--get an overproof gin or brandy and try out some cocktails.) Regarding bitters: beyond Angostura, orange and Peychaud's are the next most important/traditional. I say get some Peychaud's and make sazeracs. I like the recs in this Punch article on this topic, also.
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Oct 13, 2020 02:19
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Casu Marzu posted:Edit: I know it's just me yelling at clouds but goddamn the bourbon market is straight up dumb these days. I wish I appreciated it more when I was in college and a lot of the stupid expensive bottles were still readily available at MSRP. For real. Speaking of Weller, I used to keep Antique 107 around as my everyday bottle in college and grad school, I swear it wasn't more than $20. I just saw it in-store for $129.
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Oct 21, 2020 19:43
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I just bought a Makers Cask Strength because of this thread, forgot that resale value might be a thing and opened it (it was cheaper than Makers 101 in the store and I wanted an overproof wheater to drink). It's delicious. I assume I'm going to have a hard time finding it in the future--is there any overproof wheater that's actually easy to find anymore?
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Dec 23, 2020 04:49
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Any recommended/favorite blended scotches (at any price point, just good values)? I've been making more cocktails and drinking highballs and whiskey on the rocks more lately. I'd list current favorites but I haven't discovered any super strong preferences (other than poo poo that's too cheap is awful, and that it seems like diminishing returns set in around the $50 mark [in NYC]) and don't want to bias the thread. I'm really just looking for an all-rounder to keep in stock and want to make sure I've explored most/all reasonable options before I settle.
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Jan 8, 2021 17:29
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Vox Nihili posted:First casualties: Nikka has added notes on their website acknowledging a number of their products do not meet the new standards. Wow, more than I expected. Glad Taketsuru is OK; From The Barrel is really surprising to me, since I always thought of that as premium stuff, but if that's got non-Japanese ingredients it's not surprising that Days, The Nikka, and Super all also do. This made me wonder about their Japan-only cheap brands, since you can get Nikka Black Clear in like any convenience store for like $5, so if From The Barrel has non-Japanese ingredients, there's no way Black Clear is all-Japanese. So I went to the Japanese-language site; my Japanese isn't really good enough to be sure, but it doesn't seem like their Japanese-language site includes any of the notices that the English-language one has. If I'm reading the regulation properly, it is saying that you may use "Japanese whisky" on your labeling if you meet the criteria, and that you may not if you don't, but it doesn't say that you must call your whisky "Japanese whisky". Generally (from what I can tell via photos, and what I remember from my last trip) Japanese packaging in Japan just says ウイスキー which is literally just "whisky", not 日本のウイスキー or any other way of explicitly saying "Japanese whisky". I wonder if cheap whiskies in Japan will just not label themselves Japanese so they can just keep including non-Japanese ingredients, and "Japanese whisky" will be for premium brands only, even in Japan. Either that or the Japanese side of Nikka is just being a bit slower to react.
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Feb 19, 2021 15:41
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zmcnulty posted:The legal definition of whisky in Japan is still the same. That's going to be a much harder nut to crack. I spoke to Tsuchiya-san about this last year. Super interesting, thanks for this.
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Feb 22, 2021 15:10
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The main problem with those silicone things is that silicone loves to soak up smells of anything else in your freezer, which it then passes onto the ice. Rubber and plastic are slightly less bad at this, but with silicone you’re going to have ice that smells like chicken stock or tomato sauce or whatever unless your freezer is just ice and glassware. I’m thinking about just getting a big rectangular Tupperware (like gallon ice cream sized) and an ice pick, and freezing a huge block then cutting big cubes to order (and discarding the cloudy bottom). Can’t decide if it’s too much effort though.
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Feb 23, 2021 19:18
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Bourbon can be incredibly good. The best bourbons are world-class spirits, without question. That said, with regards to its flavor, bourbon is significantly more restrictive a category than scotch is. Widen "bourbon" to "American whiskey" so you can include rye, wheat whiskey, corn whiskey, etc. and you can start to compete with scotch on the range of flavors available, but even then I'm not sure as a category I'd take it over the whole world of scotch. I think the fact that pretty much all American whiskey styles (and in particular all bourbons) are required to be aged only in new American oak barrels restricts their flavors significantly more than the mashbill restrictions scotch is produced under. Pretty much everything tastes first and foremost of vanilla and wood, and then you get into the details.
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Mar 6, 2021 04:43
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Josh Lyman posted:Bought a bottle of Old Grand Dad BiB since it was $19. This is the “worst” whiskey I’ve ever bought—the closest would be Bulleit Rye or Rittenhouse. If OGD BIB and Rittenhouse are in your top 3 all-time worst whiskeys, I want your life and/or liquor budget.
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Mar 14, 2021 23:50
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Josh Lyman posted:I was actually thinking about this when I made the post. Until September, I basically never bought any whiskey for home consumption and would only drink it at bars. In grad school, I might have a bottle of Johnny Walker Black sitting around for Scotch and cigars, and I've certainly purchased things like Jack Daniels Green Label and Old Overholt for house parties. And of course I've had "whiskey and diet" at dive bars. But in terms of personal consumption at home? The cheapest bottles would probably be Old Grand Dad BiB and Rittenhouse. Yeah, I get this. I also generally buy nicer whiskey by the bottle to drink at home than I do at a bar. (And, I never stepped all the way up to Black Label in grad school! Though, as I think I recently posted in here, I used to drink Weller Antique 107 for under $20/bottle at around then, so American always won out over scotch in terms of value.) It's still funny though, because I think Rittenhouse is the best price/performance rye bar none, and I've kept a bottle in my house pretty much continuously for like 15 years at this point (mostly for manhattans and sazeracs). I haven't had an OGD BIB in a long while, even though I remember loving it at the time. It's probably worth finding one of those for old times' sake.
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Mar 15, 2021 02:37
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Quiet Feet posted:Yeah Mellow Corn makes a semi-regular appearance in my liquor cabinet though it's $17 up here. Still decent compared to a lot of bottles at the price though. Yep, I think it's somewhere north of $15 but less than $20 for me, but worth it compared to everything else at that price point. Makes a great highball.
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Aug 6, 2021 04:15
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For cheaper Penicillins you want Compass Box Artist's Blend and Glasgow Blend, they're designed to mimic Asyla and Peat Monster at a cheaper price point, which were the original scotches for the drink when it was created in the 00s. That said, of course whatever blended you like normally works for the body of the drink, and you might as well just get a standard big-name Islay for the peat float, because even if it's $50 it'll make you literally 100 Penicillins if you only use it for that, so it's only costing you $.50 additional per drink.
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Aug 31, 2021 17:13
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Cracked a bottle of Nikka From The Barrel that I randomly found at a shop in my neighborhood last week for a really good deal. It’s been years since I had this and it’s outstanding. What a whisky. Edit, to provide any content: if you like big, strong, sweet American whiskeys, and also a nice, sherried scotch with a touch of smoke, why not both at once? Double edit: I don’t even care that it doesn’t fit into the new Japanese whisky law. Scythe fucked around with this message at 05:12 on Sep 2, 2021 |
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Sep 2, 2021 05:08
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My real answer here is WT as you said, but I wouldn’t be mad at an OGD BIB or 114. I know you said you don’t want overproof, but add a little water yourself (like 10-25% as much as your whiskey) and boom, you now have an 80-90 proof whiskey in your glass. So if you’re drinking 2oz pours and you have something up in the 114 range, do 1.5oz and a tablespoon of water. Or if you’ve got a bonded, do like 1.75 and a half tablespoon. The higher proof stuff is so much better (especially value wise if you’re stretching it like that) that it’s counterproductive to limit yourself to low-proof bottles, I think. Scythe fucked around with this message at 04:31 on Sep 7, 2021 |
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Sep 7, 2021 04:29
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Lawlicaust posted:Agree with this whole list but especially the Willett 4, WT Rare Breed, and High West especially if you can find a good double rye barrel pick. Willett 4 is my regular sipper. I loaded up on a stupid amount of bottles when I was passing through KY recently just so I could get it at retail and not runout for a year or two. Agreeing with this agreement! And, I agree about Sazerac assuming you're talking about Sazerac 6 (which also makes great manhattans and... sazeracs...) but Saz 18 is outstanding (and impossible to find, being part of BTAC). Edit: Also WT Rye is great, as is everything else WT sells above 90 proof.
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Sep 16, 2021 03:31
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Yeah, 101 makes a great OF, and I don't notice anything charred about it. Also, "improved" cocktails are great, but a "fancy" cocktail is also a good digestif and underutilized. (Sub part/all of your simple with orange liqueur [I like Grand Marnier here] but otherwise keep your standard cocktail/OF approach. Obviously if you're using orange bitters it's kinda pointless so in that case switch to ango or another aromatic.) Don't see any reason 101 wouldn't respond well to that, so I might make one tonight. Re: whiskey chat: My local found a case of dusty Johnnie Green Label and put it out for relatively cheap; it's such a nice whisky. Would be a great "intro to scotch" since it's such a good all-rounder.
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Sep 28, 2021 18:04
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Found a bottle of Weller Special Reserve for what looked like a solid price so went for it. Good lord it’s delicious; it’s been a few years since I had any Weller and I forgot how caramel-vanilla it is. I happen to also have a Makers 101 open too so did a wheater comparison; no contest.
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Dec 29, 2021 03:29
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What I especially love is that it’s not even resealable at all. Here’s 12oz of 40% booze you have to drink in one sitting! That said, last time I was in Japan some of the canned highballs you can get in convenience stores were very decent for the like $2 they cost. And I did enjoy that they came in high and low abv versions (usually like 7% and 12% I think) so you can choose what kind of night you’re having!
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Mar 2, 2022 01:10
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I mean, I think barrel aging cocktails in those is ideal; it takes longer to age than you think and you could always transfer to glass bottles if you need to stop something overaging. Otherwise yeah I mean get (or make) some moonshine. Alternatively I’d be really tempted to age some gin and make ersatz genever.
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Apr 6, 2022 22:54
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Professor Shark posted:I’ve been thinking about getting a bottle of Rare Breed. Do you add more water than usual to it or keep it the same? Higher ABV whiskeys will likely want a little bit more water than lower ones, but it’s not like there’s a prescribed ratio or anything. Try a little splash, add if it needs it. I will say that cold water is more effective than room temp or warm water, you can try that too if you haven’t. With a real hot, high ABV whiskey I’ll do like 1 tsp of cold water in a 2oz glass. That’d be much too much for standard proof for me, but it’s all up to your taste anyway.
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Apr 30, 2022 18:11
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Personally I like 100 proof stuff neat but significantly above that, getting up into real barrel proof range, the tsp or half-tsp of cold water changed the game for me.
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May 4, 2022 02:50
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A whole oz of maraschino? I can see this being good but just from the spec I’d cut that in half at least.
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May 23, 2022 01:50
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Any of the Wellers (the higher proof the better) would also be good unless their prices are insane.
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Jul 23, 2022 16:50
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Neat. Hibiki is definitely a sipper (even if you have the NAS).
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Aug 29, 2022 15:25
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What do you mean “get the orange right”? If you’re making a muddled-fruit-style OF and you haven’t tried the original just-bitters-and-sugar style, do that. In a glass, do a couple dashes ango and a tsp or so of simple syrup per oz of whiskey, add a big rock, stir 10 times (just to mix, it’ll chill and dilute more as you drink), twist an orange peel over the top. Angostura is the best-known example of an “aromatic bitters” or an “old fashioned bitters”, most other bitters brands also make one in that category. I wouldn’t say any of them are better, though, just different. Try whichever ones are available to you and see which you like. Good bitters companies: Bittermens, Bitter Truth, Scrappy’s, Bittercube, definitely others; don’t get Fee’s).
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Aug 31, 2022 16:16
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Lily Catts posted:I looked it up and turns out that Platinum was renamed to 18 after all, so it's just the same thing. I have always heard good things about Green Label but it's getting harder and harder to find in stores because it's been discontinued, but I'll keep an eye on it! Green Label should still exist, they just don’t make a lot of it. Malt whisky is whisky made entirely from malted barley. (A “single malt” whisky is a whisky made entirely from malted barley at one single distillery.) Grain whisky is made at least partially from other grains besides malted barley, though malted barley can still be included too. Malts are more expensive to make because malted barley is more expensive than, for example, corn or wheat. So typically malt whiskies are nicer than grain whiskies, but there are excellent grain whiskies and bad malts do exist.
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Oct 1, 2022 14:18
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A Jupiter posted:This might be a stupid question but I just realized I never cleared this up. I could be wrong here but my impression is that the vast majority of blending is done after aging, for exactly the cost reasons you specified, including in the US & UK, whether or not what you're adding in to the malt is neutral grain spirit or something nicer (e.g. a single grain whisky, etc.). Blending after aging saves you money and also enables you to be more consistent in flavor/texture/etc. The effects of aging are somewhat unpredictable even for master distillers, so I believe the earliest blends came about as an attempt to create consistent enough whiskies you could build a brand around (and of course it being cheaper is a nice bonus, from the distiller's perspective).
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Oct 1, 2022 14:58
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Bouillon Rube posted:Can anyone recommend a good rum <$30? What do you like? There are a ton of good rums under or around $30, but rum is a wide category, maybe the widest. Do you want clean or grassy or funky? Do you want clear and light or sweet and amber or woody and aged?
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Oct 14, 2022 04:02
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Nikka Black is garbage tier. In Japan it’s not even full proof IIRC, and there’s no way it’s worth those prices, it should be half those. But still, if you’ve never tried convenience-store-level Japanese whisky it could be fun, and it’s not like they’re undrinkable.
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Nov 16, 2022 14:49
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Wild Turkey 101. Also, drink some rye if you haven't, you probably like that too.
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Dec 5, 2022 17:17
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Sounds like it. I had a thought: egg nog.
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Dec 6, 2022 00:46
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Yeah it’s proof first and foremost unless you’re drinking total rotgut. Add a splash (a literal splash) of water to stuff you find “too hot,” it’ll mellow right out.
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Jan 20, 2023 18:16
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