Robbie Burns 2005 – only 10 months late!
No-one can remember why it got delayed and delayed and delayed, but Andy, (another) Paul, Andy’s school-friend Chris, and I finally got together for a scotch evening. We started about 2pm, took a short break to go to the local LCBO to pick up a couple of extra bottles, and finally called it a night just after 11pm!
I threw together a very simple tasting sheet and we all kept our own notes – some were full of adjectives but mine was mostly a series of scores, so I’d be able to pick favourite. (Well, that and I’m not very good at describing the characteristics.)
We also tried adding a few drops of water to each one, following the advice we’d be given at the recent Spirit of Toronto show, so I recorded my notes for each whisky both neat and with water. We were all surprised when the first few scotches really benefitted from the addition of the water, but we soon discovered that it wasn’t true across the board (especially for the Islays).
Here’s my list, favourites first:
- Ardbeg 17yo with water
- Ardbeg 17yo neat
- Springbank 21yo neat
- Springbank 21yo with water
- Cragganmore Distillers Edition 14yo with water
- Bowmore Mariner 15yo neat
- Auchroisk Cask Strength (56.8%) 28yo with water
- Bowmore Dawn (port cask) with water
- Glenmorangie Port wood with water
- Bowmore Darkest (sherry cask) neat
- Caol Ila 18yo with water
- Glenmorangie Port wood neat
- Glenmorangie Burgundy wood neat
- Bowmore Dawn (port cask) neat
- Cragganmore Distillers Edition 14yo neat
- Las Vegas (*) 31yo with water
- Macallan 25yo with water
- Bowmore Darkest (sherry cask) with water
- Caol Ila 18yo neat
- Las Vegas (*) 31yo neat
- Glenmorangie Burgundy wood with water
- Bowmore Mariner 15yo with water
- Macallan 25yo neat
- Auchroisk Cask Strength (56.8%) 28yo neat
*The “Las Vegas” scotch is a bottle which Andy got in (wait for it) Las Vegas, which is labelled as a special batch for the hotel, but with no indication of the original distillery.
[...] Paul, Kerri and The Boys All the catchy taglines were taken « Feed me Robbie Burns 2005 – only 10 months late! » [...]
Andy thinks the Vegas scotch is from Craigellachie (sp?) – I’ll have to see what I can find out about it.
http://www.awa.dk/whisky/craigell.htm
http://www.whisky-distilleries.info/Craigellachie_EN.shtml
http://www.scotchwhisky.net/distilleries/craigellachie.htm
[...] I was thinking about doing a Top Ten Scotch list but Sunday’s tasting session has made me realise I need to revisit everything I’ve ever tried, now that I’ve discovered that adding water can actually be a good thing! [...]