Paul John Brilliance (with a little help from Jason!)

A bit of an experiment with this blog entry! Can you believe what those vloggers spout on YouTube (or those bloggers on Blogger or Wordpress for that matter!)

So what I've done here is follow along a tasting which Jason has put on to YouTube - you can watch the whole review here or I've embed the more relevant parts here and added my taste-along comments below!

Please let me know what you think!

So tonight's dram in Paul John Brilliance

Intro to Paul John Brilliance

Glance

I agree with Jason on this one it's a lovely non-coloured Amber, in the glass it has very fast legs perhaps showing it's young age.

Nose

For me the vanilla hits you straight away with some creamy butter - similar to Jason, I also get a winey aroma, like a good red wine. There is a sweetness like what you get from biting into a piece of dried pineapple that's juicy in the middle then there is some green apple skin - my Grandma used to peel apples and throw the skin to the birds - I used to love eating it - it's very similar on the nose. Jason also got tropical fruits - Mango, papaya and sultanas - so a little different! We both got nuts - him almonds and pistachio but I get Christmas walnuts. There is a lovely spice which develops from the glass - Jason mentioned cinnamon and citrus marmalade, I was getting nutmeg.

Palate

Both of us loved the smooth buttery mouth coating honey from this dram, I got immediate spice like fresh ground black pepper followed by some chocolate flavours. Jason also got the pepper but instead of the chocolate he got spiced fudge (sounds yummy!), candied citrus and some barley.

Finish

We both agreed on a long warm spicy finish - definitely a winter warmer dram! I detected vanilla with some spicy Allspice and a sweetness left in the mouth. Jason also got sweetness with his honey and creamy vanilla.

Conclusion

Well first of all the whisky - it has taken a while for my appreciation of the Brilliance to grow, I think from all the 'hype' I read I was expecting a brilliant dram, but you have to remember that this is Paul John's entry level dram and when you think of it that way it is very good. I'm not about half way down the bottle and it has become a favourite - definitely a winter dram so sip around a real fire.

Finally other people's views - bloggers and vloggers! There's a simple answer to this - everyone's nose and palate is different and yes we might detect some of the same aromas and flavours they won't be identical. If I'd compared my thoughts to someone else we may have day different differences! So by all means read and watch what other people are saying about a dram but there's no subsistute for sticking your own nose in the glass and taking some of the beautiful liquid into your own mouth! Then you can compare and discuss with the rest of us!


Thanks to Jason for letting me 'borrow' his clips!