News: Scotch Whisky Tasting Notes

What better way to start off a blog about Scotch whiskies than to write about our first impressions of some of our favorites? These notes are from a Scotch tasting party we threw a while back. It was fairly simple: we made meat, we asked people to bring individual bottles, and we drank. And drank. 

Let's begin, shall we?

We started off with a Balvenie 12 Year Double Wood. We found hints of sea salts and spices. A great way to start off the party. 

The Highland Park 18 Year had a very peaty finish and was very smooth. There was a nice vanilla smell. 

I cannot pronounce this one. The Lagavulin 16 Year was also quit peaty, and had a smooth, long finish. Strangely enough, we all thought it had a bit of an oily texture. 

This one is an outlier. One of our friends flew in from Portland, and decided to bring us a local batch of whiskey. The Clear Creek Distillery 3 Year Single Malt Whiskey was not a winner with anyone. We thought it was smooth, but there wasn't much flavor there. We also thought it smelled like urine, which was definitely not a good sign. Maybe a few more years in the cask would add some flavor.

The Talisker didn't really seem to do well with us. We thought the Talisker 10 Year had a peaty smell, but not a lot of taste. The Talisker 13 Year was smooth, but we couldn't really find anything else to say about it. The Talisker 18 year had a nice vanilla smell, but didn't have much else going on. 

The Ardberg 10 Year had a strong peat smell, and a very harsh finish. 

The Bowmore 17 had a very fruity smell. I think we lost track of the notes at this point. The more single malts you taste, the drunker you get. 

Chivas Regal 18 - Okay, I am not sure why we bothered to include this one. We all thought it was smooth and didn't have much character.

Aberlour is one of our favorite distilleries. I don't what year this one was, but from our notes, I concluded that it was one of the best ones. It was cask strength, and still pretty smooth. It had a very nice smell, and was a little sweet.