Bits and Bobs

We have a round-up of Bits and Pieces for you.

We start off with the Rantandwhisky Tasting journal, now back in limited stock ready for Dramfest.

There’s a whisky (Glayva) sauce recipe to brighten up your eating, some tasting notes from Pat, and a bit of a laugh to finish.

RantandWhisky Tasting Journal

With Dramfest 2023 just around the corner (less than six drinking weeks to go!), rantandwhiky.com has released the latest version of its Whisky Tasting Journal.  The Journal proved very popular at the last Dramfest (if you can remember back that far!)

 

The A5-sized journal is designed to fit conveniently into your carry bag at the event.  Good space is there to record all the details you could ever want about what you’ve tasted.

There is provision for the usual Nose, Palette and Finish notes.  We also have place for details of ABV, Age, Year Distilled and Year Bottled, the Colour, whether it’s been filtered or not, and your score.

Each journal has space to record 20 whiskies – about a day’s tasting for the average whisky fan, two days’ tasting for some, and half a day for the truly dedicated!

But no matter how many whiskies you taste, the Journal has one great added extra advantage – it will help you to recall your tastings in the days and weeks after the event.

A limited run of the Whisky Tasting Journal will be available, so it will pay to be in quick if you want to score a couple.

You can order the Journal via the form on the Contact Me tab on this website.  Just tell me your name and address and how many copies you would like.  Alternatively, if you know my details, please phone or text me.  Or ask me, if we pass on the street!

There is no asking price for the Tasting Journal, although a koha would be greatly appreciated.  Please note that I will have to charge you cartage if you need me to post them around the country or elsewhere.

Geoff’s Sauce

My mate, Geoff, is a dab hand in the kitchen.  He’s also an export from Glasgow with a taste for things whisky.

He was telling me the other day about spicing up his Whisky Sauce with a smidge of Glayva.

It sounded so good I just had to pass his recipe on …..

Things you’ll need to make Whisky Sauce
  • A frying pan or large pot
  • A lighter (ideally the kind with a long handle) or a long match
Ingredients for Whisky Sauce

The recipe serves two.  Increase the ingredients proportionally if you need to make for greater numbers.

  • 3-4 tbsp whisky
  • 100ml Double cream
  • 50ml stock – you can use a quarter of an OXO cube dissolved in hot water (veggie but chicken works just as well).
  • Knob of butter
  • 1 tsp dijon mustard
  • Salt and pepper to taste
Construction

Heat the fry pan/pot to medium, add the knob of butter and melt.

Add 3 tbsp of your choice of whisky then light the whisky with the lighter and allow it to burn off the alcohol. This makes the sauce less bitter. Be careful at this stage, the flame can be quite aggressive but will burn out quickly.

Add the cream, stock, and mustard to the pan once the flame is out.

Allow to thicken and reduce on a low heat while continuing to stir then add salt and pepper to taste

If you like a stronger whisky taste then add another tablespoon of whisky or Glayva at the end!  As this won’t have the alcohol burned off it will be a much stronger taste.

IT Takes about 10 minutes to make (possibly longer, depending on your consumption of the ingredients during the construction process!)

Tastings from Pat

Sadly, I’m still not able to taste whiskies (please let this be over before Dramfest!), so I have substituted some sent from Pat.  These are his words ….

Well, I finally got through the samples that I was given at the Best of the Best.  Here are the results, and many thanks to all who made my tasting at home amazing

Jack Daniels single Barrel Rye 47% (from Matt)

Nose: smooth, vegetal.
Palette: smooth as silk, caramel and chocolate.
Comment: very fine Rye almost gave it a 9, even compared to a SMWS.

Score: 8.7

Dalmore 2011 SWMS 13.91 62.5% (from Richard)

Nose: Golden Syrup, Sherry ?, cocoa,
Palette: mouthfeel, oily, high alcohol.
Comment: I reduced it, but still alcohol driven got citrus

Score: 7.5

Regards, Pat

It’s a viewpoint

I know it’s a bit naughty to copy stuff off the interweb without attribution, but I came across this the other day.

I thought it was rather good but I don’t know who made it originally, so I’m going to share it and hope that whoever built it in the first place recognises and accepts my thanks for it!

Looking greatly to seeing you in Christchurch at Dramfest!

Slainte

John

 

 

 

Whisky Stoppage – Stoppers to delight

By Pat

Note: To avoid creating any panic-buying, this article is not about whisky stocks!

However, it is about the things that stop your whisky from unexpectedly falling out of the bottle.

We all know about letting the Genie out of the Bottle, but have you taken a close look at what stops the Genie from getting out?

in the joy and rush to open that new bottle of whisky you probably haven’t noticed the effort that some of the distillers go to produce some very intricate designs on the bottle stoppers.

I was recently taking a look at some of my open bottles of Whisk(e)y.  Then I noticed something – the amazing range and variety of design  printed or etched into  corks and metal screw tops, or embossed into plastic tops attached to the cork.

The Glenlivet’s stopper design in particular stood out.  Then I noticed that almost every bottling I had from them was adorned with a different pattern.  Each one is a sort of variation to a theme: a marketing fetish or made for collectors?

Markings

On bottles with corks, the markings are usually covered by the bottle seal and the pattern only becomes visible once you open the whisky.

I have noticed that the distillers usually put screw caps on blends. But even there they still go all out to print company branding on the caps.

Single malts have corks aimed at a different market and the stoppers tend to be fancier.

If you collect these little gems, over time you will soon get a lot of different patterns.  The marketing boffins seem not to like to stick with a particular bottle shape or stopper for more than a few years.  This maybe to prevent consumers getting used to seeing the same thing.   A case in point is Glenfiddich, which delights in coming up with a new variation on their triangular bottle every few years.

Having (as it were) opened this bottle of worms, I started to pull out the array of partly-consumed bottles from my whisky cabinet and take a longer look.  To my joy, most stoppers had a different pattern on them.

Making a Cork Board

This led to a light-bulb moment and a dash to the Bat-cave (read “workshop”) and a “Here we go again” look from my wife.

I have a decent stock of old rimu off cuts in the cave.  I set about designing and making a whisky cork board  to put in my covered courtyard (when you get older it is ok and maybe even expected to become slightly eccentric.

In case you are interested in making a whisky stopper board I have found that there seem to be two size corks.  One is an 18mm hole (the majority) and the other a 22mm one for the larger size ones.  I kept the centre tp centre gap between the holes to either a 45mm or 50mm for a nice balanced effect.

The Cork Board

As you can see in the photo, I have left room for future corks.  The board looks very arty and is a great way of repurposing old wood offcuts.

Any wood would do and you can either polyurethane it or paint for the desired finish before fitting the stoppers and mounting the board.

So, if you have time, want to save the planet, feel arty and have an excuse to consume more whisky think about making yourself a cork board.

Cheers

Pat

Notes from around the world

“Light” whiskies

Picking up on an article on the Irish Westmeath site, I came across the phenomenon of “light” whisky.

Westmeath are reporting that Scottish blenders Whyte & MacKay and Ballentines look to have joined the Irish Dromberg in West Cork in producing a “lighter spirit drink”, running an abv in the early 20% area.

The producers seem a little coy on the target market.  I would not want to speculate.

Minimum Unit Pricing of Alcohol (MUP)

Again, from Westmeath comes the interesting new Government-driven pricing regime of MUP, imposed in Ireland on 4th January 2022.

Under the (quite reasonable) banner of social harm reduction, the idea is to reduce the availability of cheap booze.   The legislation sets a minimum pricing on a unit of alcohol, and the unit cannot be sold for less than that price – regardless of whether in a bottle store, a high-end restaurant or anywhere in between.

A standard drink contains 10 grams of alcohol, and the minimum price for a standard drink (in Ireland) has now been set at 1 Euro (NZ$1.73).  As such, that is not a problem really, as most drinks in a bar are well above that price.

But a bottle of 12.5% wine has 7.4 stand drinks, and therefore cannot be sold for less than 7.4 Euro (NZ$12.80).  Plus, of course, all the other production, distribution and profit costs that are present in pricing of wine.

A bottle of whisky has 22 standard drinks, so the MUP will be NZ$38.28, plus the ancillary costs mentioned about.

So, if the NZ MUPpets get a hold of this idea, expect an impact on low-priced whiskies here.

Just as well we are holding good stocks, isn’t it!

Slainte

John

Some Christmas Holiday Internetting

I thought you might be stuck for things to do over the summer holidays.

So I have been feverishly scouring the interweb to  ferret out some things that I found interesting for you to pass some time with.

Well, not feverishly, exactly – a glass of whisky, a keyboard and a mouse and following links to see what entertainment they led me to.

And not just me, either, really.  Some good friends helped out by sending great links they had discovered.  I am grateful!  And please keep sending them.

One interesting by-product of the internet is that you can search for something worthwhile – and seven hours later you’re watching videos of owls riding unicycles.

I don’t think you’ll find a lot of owl videos here unless you really get off-track, but who knows (pun intended).

So, in no particular order, here some interesting internet places that I hope you will enjoy going to.

Whisky Panorama

Sent to me by Martyn is the brilliant Whisky Panorama:  1,200 magnificent bottles of whisky in one photo.

Zoom in on any particular bottle/  Then click on the “Show more Info, notes and Whiskybase” at the bottom of the screen – you will get taken to all the details about that bottle.  Including tasting notes.

An outstanding piece of work by Stefan Maier!

Richard Mayston photography

Richard really does take magnificent photos.  I had a wander through his beautiful Great Barrier Island album just now, recognising some of the shot venues from a recent holiday my wife and I took there while the world wasn’t shut.

With his permission, of course. I have fairly shamelessly borrowed from Richard’s work previously.

A great highlight of looking through the albums is Richard’s photography from various whisky events.  He has covered Best of the Bests, Dramfests and other tastings.  It is great to look back over the years, remembering the events and looking at all the smiley people.

However, it does feel a little bit voyeuristic trawling through other people’s (sometimes personal) photo albums.  That is especially so when they are not looking over my shoulder providing guidance.   I guess that if the photographer puts pretty much all their output on Flikr where it is readily available to be looked at ….

Otherwordly

And talking about photography, Michael sent me this literally Otherworldy link.

Gorgeous photos here, and there are more if you click on the links below the last photo.

It does sort of beg the question, though, that if the bottom of the whisky glass looks like this what does your stomach look like?  Maybe better not to go into that.

Westermeath

Westermeath Whiskey World.

Westermeath is an Irish blog site I find absolutely fascinating.

Run by Whiskey Nut (complete with a Nut graphic) the site is – from their own description – “A hopefully humorous, informative and enjoyable blog from, but not necessarily about Westmeath.

“Usually themed around whiskey, although other beverages may feature.”

There is a veritable plethora of stuff on the site.  It starts with beer and goes from there.  And where it goes is a simply massive rabbit hole of whiskies and whisk(e)y tastings from all around the globe.

It is a huge site, with a huge amount of well-presented information about pretty much any dram you could imagine (I even found a note on the Icelandic Floki whisky – that was a scary discovery!

Enjoy yourselves.  Please stay safe during the break.  Have a good Christmas and a very Happy New Year, and I will look forward to seeing you all again in 2022.

Slainte.

John

 

Under the Influencers

Uisge Beath

Not the usual title destined to attract attention.

But Uisge (pronounced “oosh-gae”) Beath was the original Scottish name for whisky.  It is the Scottish Gaelic translation of “acqua vitae” – the Latin phrase meaning Water of Life.

 

Looking back over influences and influencers, my interest in whisky seems almost to have had a pre-determination for interaction with the water of life.

I interest in whisky didn’t really start until my later life, but the influences go back a long way.  So here’s some observations about the influencers.

Aunty

My maiden great-aunt was one of those people generally described as “larger than life”.

To my 10-year-old self she was a tall and imposing woman, of strong opinion and will.  She was also equipped with a booming, authoritarian voice that shook the crockery and brooked no argument.

But she was always very welcoming, of a positive disposition and always happy to see you.

Aunty played golf quite well and drank whisky – also quite well.

Aunty was in the habit of ending a round of golf with rounds of whisky in the 19th hole, then driving home some ten miles in her green Austin A40 Countryman with the wooden trim along the sides and around the rear doors.

This was the “olden” days, when driving under the influence was not as antisocial as it is today.

Austin A40 Shooting Brake

But Aunty’s whisky habit eventually was the demise of the Austin.

One wet & dark evening, after the golf and the whiskies, she and the car met a telephone pole that had interfered with her intended line of travel.  The pole, having previously been the victim of other similar attacks, had been reinforced by strapping a spare length of railway track to it.

Aunty and the Austin hit the pole smack on the car’s hood ornament.

The pole snapped.  Then lowered itself none too gently along the length of the Austin’s geometric centre, starting at the bonnet and ending at the back doors.

Neither the Austin nor Aunty were improved by the experience.  The Austin sadly was terminal.  Aunty was appreciably damaged but fortunately survived, possibly as a result of having been more relaxed.

shortly after she recovered, she had a house built on the eastern side of Waikanae, looking down over the Main Trunk railway line.

My father offered to help her with the interior painting of cupboards and the like, taking me along as “helper” for the lower bits.  My enduring memory of Aunty was arriving, paint-brush in hand, at her house at about 9am on a Sunday morning to be greeted by the booming voice enquiring whether my father would care for a whisky and milk, as she had just finished her first one!

My father declined.

Those of you who know of the brand will know that it was not of a quality to be giving as a gift to anyone who knows anything about whisky.

Grandad

Not my granddad.  Another grandad.

This gentleman was odd.  I don’t remember ever meeting him, but I knew him from photos and the most interesting reputation- some parts of which have gone into family folklore and will likely remain there for years to come.

Grandad was born somewhere around the late 1800s, when things were slightly more rustic than they are now.  His rural lifestyle required that he purchase diesel oil in 44-gallon drums and whisky in cases of two dozen bottles.

Disposing of the empty whisky bottles involved putting them into the empty 44-gallon drums and returning the drum to the supplier.

The Piper

James was a gentleman.

He was a lawyer by profession.  He was exceptionally mild-mannered, and extremely proud of his Scottish and Roman Catholic background.  Apart from the lawyering, he was also very knowledgeable in matters single malt.

Knowing of his interest in whisky, a grateful – if slightly mis-guided – client expressed gratitude by presenting James with a carton of a whisky that was produced in the South Island in the 1960s and 70s.

Those of you who know of the brand will know that it was not of a quality to be giving as a gift to anyone who knows anything about whisky.  It was more of a quality that would encourage anyone interested in taking up whisky drinking to switch to gin.

James’ problem with this gift was several-fold.

He couldn’t return it, as that would be insulting to the donor.

He couldn’t offer it to guests: he knew that you could only offer your best whisky to guests, and this stuff certainly was not in that class!

He couldn’t give it away, as that would be insulting to the recipient.

His very elegant solution?

He drank it.

For Lent.

Footnote:  Aunty’s house in Waikanae had an unrestricted view of a lengthy section of the Main Trunk Railway Line.  From her concrete deck you could see the smoke from the steam trains from the Waikanae River to Peka Peka, and the whole train for the best part of a mile.

I could sit there for hours.

And possibly for days, if I’d been old enough to have whisky.

Slainte.

Going Down The Rabbit Hole

I am a bit concerned.

I started this blog-site just over two years ago.

Now there are a lot of people who think my life revolves around things whisky.  Which it does quite a bit, I suppose, but by no means to the exclusion of other things.

From non-whisky friends (yes, I do have them) I receive emails with links to whisky-related items and articles.  The link is often accompanied by a comment along the lines of “as soon as I saw this, I thought of you.”

It is great to know that they think of me, and I would not want to discourage them sending me stuff!  Some of the items I get links to are absolutely fascinating.  They can send me down the biggest, deepest, most convoluted rabbit holes imaginable.

One such link came recently from Michael.  Michael strikes me as a learned person.  I suspect he reads a lot, and absorbs all he reads.  He has an extremely fine, extremely broad, extremely dry and straight-faced sense of humour coupled with a well-developed sense of irony.

Detecting Fake Whiskies

But the article Michael referred me to is neither funny or ironic.

The implications it raises are most unfunny and could be potentially expensive for someone.

It is a fascinating look at scientific developments around an increasing ability (and, sadly, a need) to identify counterfeit whiskies.

Not so much a rabbit hole as an entire industrial-strength warren!

The article is extremely interesting, given the prices people can pay for “collectables”.

One really attention-grabbing line in the article notes “a 2018 study subjected 55 randomly selected bottles from auctions, private collectors, and retailers to radiocarbon dating and found that 21 of them were either outright fakes or not distilled in the year claimed on the label”.

That is one-third of the bottles tested!

… an increasing ability (and, sadly, a need) to identify counterfeit whiskies.

The article  has been written by Jennifer Ouellette, a senior writer on the ARS Technica website, a website for technical news.  Ms Ouellette has very kindly given me permission to link to it from rantandwhisky.com.

And her article is the start of the rabbit warren.

The Artificial Tongue

From Ms Ouellette’s article there is a plethora of hyperlinks to such interesting things as the development at the University of Glasgow of an artificial tongue.  The tongue is reportedly capable of distinguishing between different brands of whisky.

I can do that, but I suspect that the artificial tongue may be a bit more reliable!

As this second article notes, apart from identifying whiskies, the uses of the artificial tongue are potentially immense.  For example, overseeing the quality control of industrially produced food and beverages, or for monitoring water supplies.

On the subject of rabbit holes, it is interesting to recall that the Source Of Truth in my youth was a thumb-breaking set of encyclopaediae (yes, that is the plural of encyclopaedia – I looked it up!).

I was talking to Kevin this morning and he claimed to have had a 24-volume set.  Boy, did he ever know stuff!

But the limit of knowledge was always the back cover of volume 24.

Today’s rabbit holes are way better!

With the benefit of the internet and the hyperlink, knowledge today goes on for ever to the seventh son of the seventh son.

Admittedly not all of it is necessarily strictly accurate or good for you, but a little discernment can sort wheat from chaff.

More Fun Links

So here is another interesting link well worthy of note, sent to me recently by Geoff:

https://www.bbc.com/news/av/uk-england-somerset-54062223

And if you follow the links on the right of that article, you can learn about the effects of Brexit on whisky, a new Yorkshire whisky,  and a £1 million bottle of MacAllan featuring Charles MacLean.

I’m not too sure about whisky that has been aged for 24 hours, and I did have to look up what “minging” means.   Thank you, Uncle Google: that would never have been in a 24-set encyclopaedia!

Eat your heart out, Alice in Wonderland.  Today’s rabbit holes are way better!

Collecting Whisky Miniatures

By Pat Phipps

The original purpose of miniature bottles (“minis”) – be they a whisky, a rum, or even a liqueur – was to allow the customer the chance to try an inexpensive sample before buying the full-sized bottle.

Too often overlooked on the shelf in the bottle store, collecting whisky miniatures has been one of my passions for over 30 years.

During my big OE in 1989, among other countries my brother and I ventured to Scotland where we visited Glenturret, Scotland’s oldest working distillery.

A tour of the distillery and a tasting afterwards was the start of my love affair with whisky.

At the distillery shop I bought my first minis – the full range.  I still have them, unopened.

The Glenturret Miniatures

At the time, I thought to myself that surely there can’t be many miniatures around.

How wrong can you be?

The great thing about collecting miniatures is that they don’t take up that much physical space.  Unless of course, like me, you let them!

I recently found a Macallan 1824 series of four miniatures for a cool $2,000 – at $500 for a 50cl bottle, well past my tipping point!   

Over time I have accumulated over 1,000 examples, laid out in display cases to show them off.  Each case is complete with felt backing and a clear poly-carbonate front so that the contents won’t succumb to a passing earthquake.

Pricing

When I first started collecting minis the price was about $2 – 3 each.  But, like just about everything, inflation has got to that and now a mini price is generally north of $10 a unit.  The price of some gems that I’ve bought, I admit, have made me wince and I’ve had to remind myself of their rarity – such as a 40-year-old Glenfarclas at $150.

These days, miniatures are not really provided as samples.  They are aimed squarely at marketing and at collectors.

Minis come in widely varied shapes.  Wild Turkey produce 50cl ceramic turkeys in different poses filled with Bourbon.  St Andrews did ceramic golf bags clad in different tartans; some with gold-plated golf balls to celebrate famous players.

I recently found a Macallan 1824 series of four miniatures for a cool $2,000 – at $500 for a 50cl bottle, well past my tipping point!    Obviously, some distilleries put out these sets purely to go straight for the collectors’ jugular, which I don’t think really meets the original purpose of the miniature.

Collector “Specials”

In my collection I have golf balls, golf bags, barrels, stills and ceramic jugs.  When times were not so Politically Correct, even cigarette companies had offerings made for them: I have a Dunhill Cigarette Company scotch whisky mini in a pot still-shaped bottle.

Another is a Balvenie whisky in a cognac bottle shape which I picked up on a Pacific Island trip.  This bottling shape, sadly, is long gone.

I take great pleasure in finding a mini that comes with a tube or box.  Putting the bottle next to the tube adds a delightful extra dimension to the display.

An entire distillery core bottling range of minis, displayed in line, really makes the labels stand out in a way that you might not notice if you only had one or two.

We know that distilleries change their core range labels from time to time.  A selection of minis of the same bottlings, but with labels from different times, becomes an excellent reference library.

As time goes on and you add new bottlings to existing lines you get a history of how the marketers have tried to get their offerings to stand out. As miniatures usually don’t get opened and consumed, the result is acquiring historical significance as an archive

There is an amazing website for miniature collectors as well.   The site has thousands of images from people who have sent in pictures of their unique collections and once you get past the wow factor – enjoy.

FAKES

Believe it or not, another collecting line are fakes minis.  These come from all sources.

Fake Minis

The first two I purchased from Vanuatu about 20 years ago.  One was a rum, the other a whisky in the loosest of terms.  It was more like neutral spirit with flavouring and imaginative labels such as Captain Cooks No. 1 rum and McBrewsters fine old whisky.

Another source of fakes is Egypt.  Whisky Magazine did an article on fake miniatures a few years ago with mainly Johnnie Walker bottlings being produced.  The writer, possibly wisely, was not anxious at all to taste the products, but was very interested in collecting them.

The labels were badly misspelt so it was easy to spot them as fakes.  Labelling such as John Warder, John Whler and Chefas Rijal were a big clue, although the bottle shapes and label quality were good judging by the photos.

A Minis Display in an Edinburgh Whisky Shop

Next time you are in your favourite spirits shop take a moment to look at the miniatures they have.  There might be something to try for a fraction of the price of a full size one!

The Edinburgh Whisky Academy – knowing your Quercus Alba from your elbow

I PASSED!! 

YAY, I PASSED!!!

BRILLIANT!

That’s the first exam I’ve passed for 30 years!

It’s also the first exam I’ve sat in 30 years.  To quote baseball statisticians, I’m Batting a Hundred.

One of the “things” my generation (the Boomers) was taught was not to be boastful.  Hide your light under the biblical bushel.  “Pride cometh before a fall” and congratulations should come to you from others, rather than from within.

Which is all very fine and dandy if others know that you’ve done it.  They don’t, but I do!

In the last 15 years I have spent a lot of my time on whisky – looking at it, reading about it, tasting it, writing about it and even, on occasions, drinking it.

I have been at the far right-hand end of the whisky “chain”.

I knew a little bit about whisky.  The difference between a single malt and a blend, between sherried and peated, between a Bowmore and an Auchentoshen.  I know that this whisky will taste different to that whisky, sometimes just a bit and sometimes a whole lot.

I’ve listened to learned people talk about whisky, people whose opinion I respect.

I’ve been on distillery tours and visited visitor centres: I have the souvenir caps, etched glasses, and tee-shirts to prove it.

And I did have some samples of their whiskies as well, but those seem to have mysteriously disappeared.

However, when all is said and done, I have been at the far right-hand end of the whisky “chain”.

I know a good drop when I taste one, but when I’ve finished the bottle it goes out in the recycling without too much thought as to how the genie got into it in the first place.

It may sound pretentious or big-headed but, as I mature in the world of whisky, I would like to be taken seriously.  But it was growing on me that the more I got “into” whisky, the less I really knew about it.

Thought process:

  • How did the genie get into the bottle?
  • Why can one whisky taste so utterly different from another whisky?
  • Who invented the stuff in the first place? (the ‘Why” is pretty self-evident!)

Enter the Edinburgh Whisky Academy.

The Academy has been on my radar for a couple of years as an interesting learning centre.  Their cause is helped by testimonial from the respected Charles MacLean.

The first thing I saw was a course entitled Diploma in the Art of Tasting Whisky.

Now there’s an interesting idea – get a diploma for doing what I’ve been doing for 15 years!

Realistically though (and sadly), flitting over to Edinburgh for a one-day whisky tasting is not in the budget (yet), regardless of how esoteric the drams may be.

So let’s see what else is available.

There’s a Diploma in Single Malt Whisky.  That sounds fun!  Two-day course, including a private distillery tour, a breakfast of bacon rolls, classes on the sensory aspects of whisky (look, nose, taste) and a formal assessment.  The course requires me to go to Edinburgh, too.  Sad Face.

An Introduction to Whisky Certificate (On-line).  Now that sounds more like me!

It is certified by the Scottish Qualification Authority (SQA), so it’s obviously got some cred.  And it’s an on-line course, so I can do it from the comfort of my own laptop.

The Academy’s website http://www.edinburghwhiskyacademy.com tells me that is a “fun … on-line course exploring the fundamentals of whisky”.

It goes on to say that the course covers whisky from history, business and raw materials to production and maturation.

Well, having just passed it, I can confirm that it certainly does all that.  And then some!

I have learned in-depth things about stuff I knew just a little about (worts, the mash tun, the rules around minimum ABV and age statements), enlarged on condensers and how they work (stuff that I dimly remember picking up by osmosis in college days in those brief periods between chasing girls), and got introduced to things I never knew existed (the 1784 Wash Act and the Illicit Distillation Act of 1822, Analysers and Rectifiers).

Worts and Mash Tuns and Lyne Arms are not just words anymore.  They have meaning in themselves now.  I know where they fit into the process and what effect they have on the outcome of production.

And, while it may not be feasible to go to Edinburgh for the tasting course, the things the Introduction Course has given me on the effects of cask and reflux and malt and grain and blending are already having a big impact on my nosing and tasting of whiskies.

The cost of the on-line course is 120 British quid (about NZ$200) and finishes with a self-assessment module.  There is another 80 quid if you want to sit the official SQA Certificate.

And there is also the Time investment.  I didn’t have the stopwatch going but I would estimate my time at around 15 hours (I was hand-writing copious notes as I went).

But whatever time it took I certainly do not regret one second of it!

Would I recommend the course to you?  Whole-heartedly, especially if you’re like me and know just enough to be dangerous.

Would I do it again?  No, I don’t need to.

I PASSED!

Would I go on any of the other courses?  If the opportunity presented itself, stand out of the way!!!!

PS: after I wrote this article I was looking through an old Whisky Magazine.  I came across an article on charring.

In the past, I would have turned the page over quickly, thinking “that’s too esoteric for me”.

Not now.  I stopped and read it.  And understood it!

Story Three – The Winemaker

This story is about wine.

And silverfish.

And the perils of drinking unidentified wine.

The story starts with Uncle Les.  Not the same Les in the first story; that’s just a coincidence that appeared as I started writing.  But it makes you wonder if good stories have a Les in them somewhere, doesn’t it?

This Uncle Les was a pretty interesting bloke.

His was a dentist, a collector of artworks and a majorly useful cellist who played in orchestras in the days before playing in orchestras was a “real job”.

And a wine maker.

As a wine maker, he was fortunate to have ready access to a wide range of seasonal fruits and vegetables, all completely suitable for fermentation.

The product of his endeavours was stored for maturing and future attention in screw top jars called “flagons”.

The flagon is a glass jar that holds half a gallon (approximately 1.9 litres).

These days flagons are not easy to come by.  But back when licensing laws required bars to close before the street lights came on, flagons were common for transporting beer and similar refreshing liquids from the hotel bottle store to your place of residence.  Or anywhere else where the refreshing contents might be consumed.

Once emptied of beer, the versatile flagons became containers for other liquids: home-brewed beer, mineral turpentine or kerosene (sometimes difficult to distinguish from home-brewed beer), engine oil (ditto), or lawn mower fuel.

Or wine.

Les’ wine output was decanted into flagons.  Sticky-backed paper labels were attached that advised the year of manufacture and defined the origins – parsnip or nectarine or peach etc.

In the best French tradition, the labelled flagons were then stored in the cool underneath the house while the wine matured.

When Les passed away, the wine stock got sort of forgotten and no-one went to see how it was getting on.

Some years later Les’ wife also died.

Aged now in their mid to late 50s, the children all returned for their mother’s funeral.  Bringing their children with them.

After their grandmother’s funeral service the more adventurous grandchildren went exploring in the cool and spider webs under the house to see what might be there.  And found the stash of wine-containing flagons, which anecdotally had been there for nearly 20 years.

The flagons were brought out into the daylight, and the general consensus was that the contents should be sampled forthwith.

Over time, as well as wine storage and cobwebs, the area under the house had become a habitat for silverfish.  And, as book-lovers know, silverfish have a diet heavily biased towards paper.

Remember the sticky labels?

The flagons had been stored in the silverfishes’ dining room and the silverfish had passed the time by eating all the sticky labels off the flagons.

As a consequence of this silverfish banquet, identifying the contents of the flagons had become a lottery.  The only guide to wine type, age or strength was the colour of the wine, which was not at all a reliable measure!

Restraint is not often included in the psyche of the young, and present company did not disappoint.  Regarding the labeling limitations as mere inconvenience, sampling began.

The word “sample” has different meanings for different people.  In the more cautious, it involves trying just a little tiny bit to test what it’s like; in others, sampling is pouring out a tumblerful and drinking it as quickly as possible to see what the effect might be.

The day was warm and sunny.  Samples from flagons were being poured and consumed with increasing enthusiasm and carefree abandon. There may even have been an informal “guess the wine” competition going on.  The company had become quite vocal. And generous.

About this point, my wife and I arrived at the gathering.  We were greeted effusively and offered our own samples to taste.  Not wishing to appear unfriendly or nervous, we took a little sip of the offerings.

Age and previous bad experiences quickly led us to conclude that it might be wiser not to consume anymore, and that it would be more entertaining to just sit and watch.  And wait.

 

 

A reconvening had been planned for the same venue the next morning.  Most of the previous day’s attendees were present, although some were reported as “missing”.

The enthusiasm for sampling had waned with the night.  A lot.  The noise level and bonhomie was also lower than previously, mostly consisting of low-pitched groans and requests for quiet.

The wine had won!

 

Post-script:

After the event, one of the braver grandchildren had secured a selection of the flagons and taken them home.  He very generously offered me the chance to select one for myself from his haul.  In the interests of science I accepted his kind offer, thinking I might get the opinion of some unsuspecting friends who were knowledgeable about wine.

When we got the unlabelled flagon home, close inspection revealed an appreciable quantity of sediment present in the flagon.

The contents were promptly decanted with the aid of a kitchen funnel, a pair of ladies’ pantyhose (freshly laundered), and four empty bottles with good tops.  They were then laid to rest in a kitchen cupboard.

And there, five years or more later, they still sit.

Unlabelled, untried and untested.

And they will remain so until I pluck up sufficient courage to open one.

Or I die and my grandchildren come exploring.

Story Two

The Pushbike

This story was told to me by Mike.  He recounted it to me as a first-party story, but I have reservations.

It seems, according to Mike, that he’d gone down to the wholesalers on his pushbike.  His intention was to purchase himself a bottle of whisky to take home to rock himself to sleep with.

No reservations so far.  It all seems like a pretty good plan.

When Mike re-emerges from the bottle store he is clutching a bottle of 100 Pipers which he proceeds to careful place in the cane basket attached to the handlebars of his bike.

First reservation right here: it might be my prejudice, but I was envisaging Mike’s bike as a pretty sporty road-racer style that maybe required the wearing of the unfortunate lycra that seems to adorn cyclists these days.  The cane basket came as a bit of a shock, and now I find myself having to adjust my mental imagery to accommodate this unexpected development!

Anyway, so now we’ve got the image-adjusted bike with the cane basket containing the bottle of 100 Pipers on the handlebars.

Back to the story.

As Mike is about to get on the bike to pedal himself and the whisky home he is approached by a bystander.

“Excuse me,” says the bystander, “but that’s not a very safe arrangement you’ve got there.”

“Why not?” asks Mike.  “What’s wrong with it?  Me and this consenting bottle of whisky are just going home together.”

“What happens if you fall off?” asks the bystander “The bottle will land on the ground and get broken,” he says. “Very dangerous”, he says.

“Good point,” says Mike.  “What do you suggest?”

“I think the best answer is to drink the whisky now, and then ride home,” says the bystander.  “Then if you fall off there won’t be anything in the basket to get broken.”

“And do you know what?” Mike says to me.  “He was quite right, and possible was a fortune teller too.

“I followed his advice and drank all the whisky before I left.  And on the way home I fell off nine times!

“just as well the bottle wasn’t in the cane basket, eh!”

Three Stories – Story One

Isn’t it interesting, the little snippets and stories that life brings you when you least expect it.

This is the first of three stories that have been relayed to me from the universe.

Like all good stories, two of them are true and verifiable.  The third may well be true.  Or not.  You decide.

In keeping with this website’s title, the first and third stories are whisky-themed: the second will be about wine.  Although the nature of the wine was such that it might just as well have been whisky!

This first story was told to me by Les.

It is a simple story and, in its own way, quite touching.  It doesn’t have a particularly dramatic ending, but then it doesn’t really need one.

However, it does have a moral or two with a demonstration of the inventiveness of man in the face of adversity and the single-minded lengths he is prepared to go to for a quality dram.

Les is a fine, upstanding citizen, the sort of person who would not lead you too far astray.  He is the kind of man upon whose opinion and views I would be happy to abide without question.

On top of that, as empirical evidence, he showed me a photograph on his cell phone of the bottle around which this story revolves.  It is an important point that the photo was taken before the bottle was opened.

The story is about a bottle of Glenfarclas 15yo, a genuine amber delight.   The bottle was apparently in the possession of Les’s friend.  The friend’s name isn’t recorded, but for the sake of simplicity let’s call him Alfred.   Alfred hails from the sunshine state of Queensland in Australia

Alfred apparently had owned this bottle of Glenfarclas for some considerable time and it was unopened when Les was first introduced to it a week or so back.

The back story is that Alfred did not like to drink alone; he may also have been a bit short of friends that he thought suitable enough to share the Glenfarclas with.

Fair enough – his whisky, his call.

Anyway, when Les hove into view Alfred obviously considered him of sufficient calibre to merit the unveiling of the bottle.  And such was done.

The usual opening ritual started, with the bottle’s seal being broken and the cork being removed for the first time to allow access to the amber delight inside.

Now comes the sad part.

The cork suddenly decided to part company with accepted tradition and spontaneously disintegrated, leaving the bulk of itself floating unceremoniously on the top of the aforementioned amber delight.  In the bottle!

Calamity!

Disaster!

“Corked” whisky!

Now, Kiwis and Aussies are generally very resourceful people and have access to a range of rather make-shift solutions to any problem.  And this case is no exception.

Alfred had an electric kettle.  Not an unusual thing in itself – maybe he liked a cup of tea now and again.

But he had noticed previously that the kettle spout had a fine mesh filter in it.  This filter was obviously intended to remove the bigger lumps or smaller creatures that may have been in the local water supply before they made their way to the cup of tea.

Thought process:

  • whisky needs the lumps of cork strained out without losing any of the amber liquid,
  • kettle has strainer inside that takes the lumps out of whatever is being poured from the kettle.

It follows with elegant inevitability that the next stage was to give the kettle a brief but thorough internal cleaning to remove foreign bodies, other interlopers or anything else that might contaminate whisky.  Then give it a thorough rinse and drying (because whisky at 46% generally does not need additional water!)

The next phase was to empty the contents from the corked whisky bottle into the nearly pristine kettle, and rid the now empty Glenfarclas bottle of any residual shards of cork that may have missed being poured into the kettle.

The last stage in this maintenance section was to carefully decant the whisky back from the kettle to the bottle, via the lump filter in the spout.

Result: all the bits of cork remain in the kettle (to be removed sometime, maybe) and the now cork-less whisky is back in the bottle.

And drinking can commence!

PS: as this story moved towards its end you may have noticed that the Glenfarclas bottle that now contains clean, cork-free 15yo whisky no longer has an operational cork to seal the remaining whisky.

Solution?

Simple – finish the bottle!

Slainte.