Scottish Whiskies for a Newbie

[kevin heatherington]

Yeah I don't think it's a hard and fast rule but personally I agree with it as a decent rule of thumb. Especially if you get used to drinking 46% ish, the 40%ers can taste pretty dilute.

Macallan 12 Sherry oak would be great if it cost £40, but the £60+ that it goes for just doesn't represent good value. World of better whisky out there for that money.

It still has one of the best sherried noses around, dates rather than dried fruits.

 

[Max Preston]

Another "beginner" here, but I was wondering, Max, how are you serving the whisky? What kind of glass and how much/what kind of water?

Personally find that glassware is a lot less important than for wine. I mostly use my cheapo ikea tumblers because they fit nicely in my dishwasher. A Glencairn is probably the 'best' shape of glass though.

Re: water I pretty much agree exactly with Kevin in his new thread. Just a few drops can really bring out flavours/aromas, and a bit more for cask strength whiskies as my favourite net abv at drinking is probably about 43-46% so I try and bring them a bit closer to that level. Nothing too scientific though, just eyeball it.

 

[kevin heatherington]

Always a glencairn glass for me. If you don’t have one the next best is a wine tasting glass/sherry copita.

 

[Alex Lake]

Personally find that glassware is a lot less important than for wine. I mostly use my cheapo ikea tumblers because they fit nicely in my dishwasher. A Glencairn is probably the 'best' shape of glass though.

Re: water I pretty much agree exactly with Kevin in his new thread. Just a few drops can really bring out flavours/aromas, and a bit more for cask strength whiskies as my favourite net abv at drinking is probably about 43-46% so I try and bring them a bit closer to that level. Nothing too scientific though, just eyeball it.

Do you spend as long savouring the aromas of whisky as wine? Maybe even more?! I guess the thing about wine glasses is how they (a) focus aromas and (b) control delivery of the wine onto the palate. While only a superficial thing, it's an important element in wine.

I suppose there's also a (c) just the general aesthetic experience of holding an exquisite piece of glassware!

 

[George Marshall]

My first comparative Riedel tasting was at LIWSF at Excel with Peter Brown, showing their spirits glasses range. Changing glass made a massive difference but as with wine, if you only have one glass type/shape how would you know?

The main point I took from the tasting was that although they sell a brandy balloon as people want one, regarded as their worst glass and they wouldn’t recommend.

 

[Tom Worthing]

I did a glass comparison a while back, riedel sweet wine worked really well, but made my look an idiot using it so I rarely do. Because I've got so many and they're a benchmark I generally use a glencairn, but I do like the zalto spirits/sherry one and the riedel very light/thin tumbler.

 

[Graeme Harvie]

I find Glencairns ugly but practical and I use them most despite not particularly liking them.

My favourite glass is my SMWS Sherry Copita which is far superior in quality and feels nice in the hand. Those are in my office and wish I had more of them.

 

[George Marshall]

I got a beautiful hand blown sherry copita from Around Wine back when Daniel Primack was running it. Sadly broken a few years ago, haven’t found anything similar since.