Whisky Advent Calendar

Those great people at Master of Malt sent me an Advent Calendar for the run up to Christmas! For the whisky fans amongst us this makes much more sense than a chocolate one!

Now the idea with an Advent Calendar is that you open 1 door each day from the 1st December through to Christmas Eve... But please enjoy your whisky responsibly! Sometimes it may not possible to open a dram each day, you could share with mates or save a couple to enjoy at the weekend?


First a bit of history - what is Advent?

Advent is the four-week period beginning on the Sunday nearest the feast day of St. Andrew the Apostle (November 30) through the following three Sundays. Historians estimate that Advent, which derives from the Latin word for coming, has been celebrated since the 4th century. Originally, the period was a time for converts to Christianity to prepare for baptism, but it's now more commonly associated with the anticipation of the anniversary of Christ’s birth on December 25. https://www.mentalfloss.com/

Gerhard Lang (my-adventcalendar.com)

What about Advent Calendars?

Although Master of Malt were first company to offer whisky (and other alcoholic) advent calendars, the first advent calendar is thought to have originated in the 19th Century.

The first styles came from the protestant area, religious families made a chalk line for every day in December until Christmas Eve. https://sellmer-verlag.de/history.htm

The calendars that we all remember from our childhood, with the little opening doors, were first created in Germany by Gerhard Lang at the beginning of the 20th century.

By the 1950's advent calendars had spread throughout the world and in 1958 the first chocolate ones started appearing! In the UK Cadbury launched it's first chocolate advent calendar in 1971 but it wasn't until the early 90's that they became the huge success that are today.

Master of Malt launched their first 'Whisky Advent Calendar' as part of their Drinks By The Dram range in October 2012 with the message:

Do you remember as a child, rabidly clawing open Advent Calendar doors to get to the chocolaty goodness within? What if as an adult you could regain that festive excitement? Well, what do you know, you can! We’ve released these two advent calendars - one full of gin (a Ginvent Calendar) and another full of whisky which are perfect for getting you through a busy festive season.

Today have many different ones available to suit every style - Scotch, Bourbon, Japanese, Single Cask, Old & Rare etc. Each year they select 24 different drams for each calendar and each year is different from the previous one.

They also sell some smaller 12 Days of Christmas calendars

I was lucky enough to receive the Scotch calendar which contains 24 different drams from 23 Scottish distilleries. If you look on the Master Of Malt website they will tell you what's in it but not the door order! I'm not looking, I'm going to keep the surprise!

It's not too late to get yourself a calendar, have a look on Master Of Malt's website to see what's available, if you're quick they'll get it sent out to you before 1st December!

So I'm starting out with the intention of one a day and I'll share my tasting notes each evening - lets see how we do!

Here's my tasting notes for the drams in the calendar.