Review of my whisky year - 2021

Firstly thanks to all of you who have read my blog (c114,000 up from 78,000 last year) and followed me on Twitter (c3,800 up from 3,570 last year).

This blog has been going for 5 years now and this is the 500th blog post! In that time I've reviewed over 1,300 whiskies! Let's review 2021!

Things started to open up a bit this year and I was able to attend two in-person festivals as well as continuing with loads of zoom and Google Meet virtual tastings. 

#BlindDrams with the Blind Tasting Consortium

In to the 2nd year of the Blind Tasting Consortium and we held a further 10 tastings! As usual this took the format of one member of the group spending our £800 on 10 bottles of whisky (5 sets of 2) bottling them up and sending them to the other 27 people for a Blind Tasting - opinions are then shared before the bottles are revealed!

We've now tried 84 different whiskies from all over the world, some very good, some not so good, the benefits of blind tasting is that we don't get to see the packaging, the bottle or any marketing so there's to pre-conceived ideas as to what the whisky is like - we taste it blind and give honest opinions. We even had some t-shirts, glasses and coins made!

#Zoom tastings

2020 was the year of Zoom and to be honest 2021 followed a similar path - lots of new tasting with different groups including Loch Lomond, Capital Whisky Club, North East Whisky Appreciation Society, Callum & Kate, Damian, Southport Whisky Club, the BlindPack, That Boutique-y Whisky Company, Dingle, Larkfire, Dewar's Very Dull Whisky Club and others.

#Southport Whisky Club - Summer Festival

It seems like years since my last in-person festival, but back in July Southport Whisky Club held their Summer festival. It was brilliant to be able to meet up with friends old and new and the distillery brand ambassadors again. 

#BlindTastingOnTour

Highlight of the year was the #BlindTastingOnTour gang revisiting Campbeltown. We visited Glengyle distillery (which was in production), Cadenhead's Warehouse (twice) and of course Glen Scotia. Read all about it here!

Then just to make a great trip brilliant we met up with an old mate!

#Drample Swaps

I made a determined effort in 2021 to try and reduce the number of sample swaps with friends both on and off Twitter. I have far too many bottles and samples that I probably don't need to buy anymore whisky ever again! But... It's a great way to try drams you either haven't come across before, can't get anymore or aren't sure about and don't want to risk paying for a full bottle - more info here!

#WhiskySpreadsheet

There are now over 100 users of my whisky spreadsheet with new ideas and suggestions being embodies all the time. An updated version will be out soon for 2021 with a few more stats! More info here!

#NewJob

I started a new job in April but my old team said goodbye with a lovely pair of 15yo malts!

#TweetTasting

I've been lucky enough to be selected to take part in a few @TweetTastings organised by the brilliant Steve Rush.

Spirit of Yorkshire Bowmore The Whisky Cellar Clonakilty Lindores Abbey Hinch Bimber Dekanta Jura

DouglasLaing AD Rattray Gladstone Axe LuxRowWhiskey Rebel Whisky Speyside Duncan Taylor JG Thomson Glen Scotia

These have been a brilliant way to try new drams and more importantly share your thoughts about them in real time with others - it's like sitting in a room of 20 people enjoying a dram or two and talking about them - but you can hear what everyone else is saying and join in every conversation!

#Kendal Whisky Festival

A first time festival delivered a brilliant experience, 4 hours of draming with some of my favourite distilleries and great to meet friends old and new!

#Bankhall Distillery Visit

A distillery in Blackpool? Yes and they are distilling a bourbon-style whiskey alongside English Single malt. I visited what turned out to be an unusual little distillery in December - more here!

#Top Tweets for each month of 2021

#My Top Ten Whiskies of the Year

My Whiskybase shelves!

How do you pick your top whiskies? It's really difficult! But as I've said before I use a scoring method from @TomsWhisky But #EveryPalateIsDifferent and whisky is very subjective so my scoring is private - I don't publish any scores. For my top ten list I've picked those which I rated 5.

These are the top ten drams of the 540 I tried for the first time in 2021:

1. Loch Lomond 2017 4yo Single Cask #730 (Peated Single Grain)
2. Caol Ila 2008 13yo Single Cask #362139 [JE] (Palo Cortado)
3. Bunnahabhain 2014 6yo Single Cask #2946 (Canasta Butt)
4. Lindores Abbey 2018 3yo Single Cask #38
5. Glen Scotia 2012 7yo Single Cask #710 (Bourbon) (Robbies)
6. Bunnahabhain 2007 13yo [SMWS] 10.215
7. North British 1959 51yo Single Cask #67876 [SV]
8. Bunnahabhain 2002 18yo [ChWh]
9. Longrow 2021 10yo Red
10. Glendullan 2010 10yo Single Cask #46 [WhB]

3 from Bunnahabhain!

These are the drams which rated a 0 this year:

1. Kilchoman Am Bùrach
2. Oxford Batch 1 3yo [TBWC] Cask #1
3. Blair Athol 1995 23yo Single Cask #15758 [ED]
4. Aber Falls Inaugural Release

Ok, so that's the top scores but which was the whisky I drunk most of in 2021?

That is easily the Loch Lomond 14yo, an Inchmurrin with a 2 year finish in Limousin oak casks - yummy!

#GeekyStuff

• 540 new drams tried this year, total now over 1,780 different whiskies
• now tried whiskies from 26 different counties and 310 different distilleries
• circa 5,500 tweets this year, total now of 43.3k
• just over 240 new followers on twitter, total now of c3,790
• 126 articles published on the blog this year, total now of 500!
• over 114,000 page reads of this blog

Blog stats

Top 10 blog posts in 2021

Visitor locations in 2021

#2022

Well - goodbye to 2021 and hello to 2022 - I'm sure it will be even better - some plans:

• Trip to Islay with the #BlindTastingOnTour gang
• More Blind Tasting Consortium #BlindDrams
• Get to a few more whisky festivals
• More discussions with you!

Sláinte!

Here are some of my GIFs from 2021.....