Recently I ran a couple of Irish Whiskey tasting events. So what I've done here is to combine all of my the tasting notes into one super blog post. The events were both to the same brief but I tried to feature different whiskeys in both. To add another twist I also did an Irish Whiskey Tasting in the same venue a year ago (and so had to display completely different whiskies from the previous year).
Here's the brief:
For an Irish tasting I'm looking at covering the four separate styles made: single malt, single grain, blend and pot still. Combined with that I want to show the three main distilleries: Bushmills, Middleton and Cooley (I've got little chance of putting anything actually distilled at Kilbeggan unless I physically go there - just wanted to point that out) . So I've got five drinks in which to do that. And, as always, try and throw a couple of things in that people might not have had before, something that would be less likely to be seen in a bar that features over 100 different whiskies, and to get the whole lot in under £250.
And here's the ride:
Tasting One - Sheaf View April 2012
1. Bushmills 1608 400th Anniversary Edition (Blend - Bushmills)
2. Dun Leire 8 YO (Single Malt - Cooley)
3. Greenore 18 YO (Single Grain - Cooley)
4. GreenSpot [New Presentation] (Pot Still - Middleton)
5. Redbreast 12YO Cask Strength (Pot Still - Middleton)
Tasting Two - Blake Hotel May 2012
1. Greenore 18YO (Single Grain - Cooley)
2. GreenSpot [New Presentation] (Pot Still - Middleton)
4. Bushmills 16 YO (Single Malt - Bushmills)
5. Connemara Turf Mor (Single Malt - Cooley)
Original Tasting - Blake Hotel May 2011
Greenore 8 Yo (Single Grain - Cooley)
Bushmills Black Bush (Blend - Bushmills)
Dun Leire 8 (Single Malt - Cooley)
GreenSpot [Old Presentation] (Single Pot Still - Middleton)
Tyrconnol Port Cask (Single Malt - Cooley)
A few clarifications - why the Dun Leire, well it was a fave from Jim Murray a couple of years back, also the Connemara I ordered failed to show (that was my "Irish do peat" card). Also it's a great bottle of booze and it went very well with the narrative of Cooley and how supermarket bottles helped the cash flow of the business and kept them on their feet and how now, with the sale to Beam Global in Decemeber 2011, the supermarket own brands that Cooley make will be disappearing from the shelves. It's also a pleasure to pop people's preconceptions too - that is, ask them if they like it and see the reaction when they're told it's a bought off the supermarket shelf.
Pretty much every bar has Bushmills blend, 10 Single Malt or Black Bush on the bar - the 1608 was a good deal from a leading whisky specialist at the time.
Greenore 18. Well personally I love this stuff and it showed really well. Again there is a snobbery that people have about grain - about it being the cheap component in blends and so must be cheap itself. But why the heck should the raw materials be discriminated in this way? It's all about the distillate, the cask and how it's aged.
Finally Middleton and Pot-Still. Well Pot-still is the DNA of Irish whisky. It's unique to Ireland and so pretty much unique to Middleton (I've heard there may have been Pot-still experiments at Kilbeggan but there is no way I can know for sure). It's the combination of roughly 60% unmalted and 40% malted barley (historically for skimping on the tax that malted barley drew) that gives it it's uniqueness. I said in the show, taste un-malted barley - hard, starchy, fibrous, and then taste malted barley - that classic malt, sweet taste we know (remember Ovaltine surely!). Scotch may be all about single malt (malted barley) but Ireland is all about Pot Still.
Finally Middleton and Pot-Still. Well Pot-still is the DNA of Irish whisky. It's unique to Ireland and so pretty much unique to Middleton (I've heard there may have been Pot-still experiments at Kilbeggan but there is no way I can know for sure). It's the combination of roughly 60% unmalted and 40% malted barley (historically for skimping on the tax that malted barley drew) that gives it it's uniqueness. I said in the show, taste un-malted barley - hard, starchy, fibrous, and then taste malted barley - that classic malt, sweet taste we know (remember Ovaltine surely!). Scotch may be all about single malt (malted barley) but Ireland is all about Pot Still.
Bushmills 1608 400th Anniversary Edition.
n - cereal, spice, paste, cocoa powder. mint, dry, dusty cereal after it opens up - a sharp, pointed attack. all trianglular at the the front
t - whoa that's nails. hard and unforgiving - like running into a concrete lamp post. the spice opens up quite quickly - like a airplane taking off and then banks it's way to a sharp bitter conclusion.
f - there's bitterness, but it's rock solid all the way. functional and direct.
this is not a soft dram - this is letting you know it's there. the barley and spice are intense. This bittle is made from Crystal Malt, which is slightly more expensive than Pale Malt and used in brewery to give a sweeter, toffee finish. there's nothing on the back palate it's all front loading all the way. the spice is sharp and unforgiving. it's like being told off, told to walk straight - fold your hands child you look like a peasant!!
Dun Leire 8 YO
n - sweet and dusty. broken orange. clean and homage. furniture polish, wax mr sheen. cheap cortina seats.
t - sweet, off kilter spice
bitter, burnt orange, burnt malt,
spice and tingle on lips and sides. nithing in centre of tounge.
clean, but one dimensional - it's a great riff just
finish is better, tangy spice, savoury fruity edge,
GreenOre 18 YO
Grain Whisky.
Beautiful depth. Enriching on the nose. It just keeps giving and giving. So much depth. You just want to drown in it. You can smell the years in the cask. They just slowly dissolve upon each sniff. It continues on the palate. That beautiful pooling of grain, melting spice. Simply gorgeous. Like early Jill Scot or Erykha Badu. Confident, assured, soft, funk and groove.
GreenSpot
Ok, this is in the new fancy packaging. So I was expecting it to be the same whisky but with a moderrn look. Nah. As soon as I sniffed it, this is different. The old version was all menthol and Fox's Glacier Mints. Ultra smooth, crisp and clean. This one is a bit more noisy. There's a bigger spice presence. It's instantly spikeier and hotter. Maybe a touch of younger whiskies at play. But the easiness has gone and been replaced with something a little more modern. The difference between trousers and distressed jeans. Maybe this is a better whisky but it was not the whisky I was expecting.
Redbreast 12 Cask Strength.
Not any old Redbreast but a cask strength at 57.7%. This is the first time, I reckon, a pot still has been issued at cask strength. I know it's limited. But hopefully some will still be kicking around.
The nose takes a minute to open up. Don't rush it. And then it becomes a garden of aromas. Layers of herbs, spices and sugars. Thick and viscous. So warm and inviting. A gentle waltz between sweet and savoury elements but everything complementary and gracefully in balance. Both masculine, in it's assured delivery and feminine in its pungency and a breathtaking array of heady bouquet.
The delivery on the mouth is nothing short of huge. It's titanic! The spice is aggressively forward, especially at full strength. You can feel the weight of the cask roll over onto your tongue. It reminds me of bagels on Brick Lane in London smothered in mustard - the kick when you first bite in with your senses being beautifully assaulted - a slight pain but enveloping synapse pleasure. After it settles there's a slight burnt or charred note, a wee touch of natural caramel propping that up to create a bit of harmony - to keep it all in check.
Even in the glass you can tell it's huge, the tears on the glass thick. The finish layers a little touch of woody bitterness, a slight tangy vibe at the edges of the tongue. Everso slightly fizzy. This whiskey is a beast. And perhaps one of the finest in the world. It's like Oblivion at Towers, in the queue the build up is intense, the complete fear as it sends you to the edge, and then the drop is nothing short of spectacular. Coming up for air. One of the most thrilling whisky rides this year - and a Jim Murray contender I'll wager.
Jamesons Select Reserve
Not expecting it to be that colour - had to check I hadn't tainted the glass. No it's deffo got a lovely orange hue to it. Unsurprising when you know that this particular version of Jameos is a blend of a fair whack of 12 year old Pot Still - 75% to be roughly exact and of that 75%, a quarter of it (that's 25%) has been matured in Sherry casks - which is a bit more than usual for a Jamesons release. Added to this is the rest of the blend (25%) is a special 5 year old grain whiskey that Middleton only cook up once a year over a few days. According to sources it's never been used or released before in a blend. What they do to it I do not know but I bet it involves a bit of knob tweeking and wash re-routing or something similar in the complexity of those giant Middleton stills. Anyway, is it any good? Well the South Africans reckon as it has been released over there in mid to late 2011 before hitting these shores in May (Which means when we did the tasting it was only a few weeks available).
Double anyway, it's soft and orangey on the nose and totally unlike Jameson. So I cracked open a standard bottle as a comparison (and smashed my nosing glass in the process which is why the photo shows the standard Jameson in a glass from Rum Fest - yes I could have put them both in a Glencairn but I couldn't be bothered - you can see the difference in colour though yeah? Good. Job done.)
Nose - Mealy, very soft, orange, gentle, luxourious. strawberry, chocolate banana (almost banana in a rum way), raisin, fudge. Toffee. Evaporated milk in those little tins. A nip of hot cake and custard.
Taste/Finish - oily, very oily. Skidding all over the mouth, a hunk of bitterness, but soft as well. The spice comes in very late indeed, you almost forget it should be there and it slowly makes it's presence known. Ambling in like the popular host at a party. There's a peppery catch to it which I find unusual - a bit like salt and pepper with a slight vegetal note at the back of the palate. Possibly like tempura battered salt and pepper bean curd with a slight chilli seasoning - or am I taking it too far here? It might make a food match if nothing else - especially working on the finish. Although a peanut satay may also be a winning food match move.
It's a hotter product than the normal Jameson - there's more bit, a bit more swerve. Possibly a bit more machismo and at the same time wider and less one-direction than the standard blend. I can, maybe, see why this was intended for a hotter climate - the whiskey would certainly cut through with a mixer and make it's presence known.
Jameson
Nose - hard, keen spice, plateau power chord or circular riff - motorik even, alcohol making it's way present.
Taste - oily and smooth, slight acidity, spice making a little shuffle apperance. still hard - like dancing in a straight jacket. You're not going to mess with Jameson - it's such a contender for all everything that it may as well be water. It's like a kitten, impossible not to love. The layering is so, so lovely. And subtle, the grain creating a little flashes of sweetness.
The finish is superb, it's still there, right at the end nagging you. C'mon we're not done yet. Perfectly drinkable with a straw out of the bottle, perhaps more-so than Jacky D. Overall, it's too drinkable a whiskey. I just noticed that whilst writing the introduction to this piece, and with both bottles equidistant from each other, that I unconsciously kept topping my glass up with the standard blend. Probably says it all right there.
Bushmills 16
This little baby is matured in the usual Bourbon/Sherry combo for 16 years before being finished in a Port pipe for a triple wood vibe. The deeper colour reflects the finish. Honestly, I'm not sure if the finish adds or detracts from the whiskey. The spice is tempered but that could do with age. It's comfortable, in a pipe and slippers way. Easy like a Sunday morning. Indeed this would probably be a great whiskey-in-bed. I reckon it would work really well a bit of bacon and touch of red sauce. (Note: I prefer bacon and brown but I'm not sure the whiskey would).
Vivid on the nose. Vivid. With a lot of depth and multiple layers. Big fruity kick. Melon. Figs and dates. A peek-a-boo hint of bitterness that darts in and shies out amongst the fruit salad. A subtle dose of wine. Stewed fruit. A banana. But it doesn't hang around. They kind of gang up, then scuttle away. There's a coconut. Coconut macaroon. Cakey. Dough mixture. Warm doughnut. Barley sugars.
The delivery is softer than I thought. The nose is all fruity and coy. It doesn't directly translate to the palate. There's not much spice present. It hints at being there but pretty much does a runner before it's cue. There's an odd bitter note that was hinted at in the nose but kind of rumbles in a luckluster way, neither offensive or sharp, surprisingly in balance and in check with the lack of spice. Oils pool. A certain sweetness. It's not as full bodied as expected. But in a good way. That bitterness is almost sardine like - oily fish. And bones. It finishes savoury and oil pooling. Smooth, like candy.
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