#BTC53 #BlindDrams Tasting Notes

These are my tasting notes and results from the Blind Tasting Consortium's 53rd #BlindDrams evening.

These drams were picked by Andrew @whiskypad.bsky.social

DrivenByDrams Speyside Tour - Benromach

The first day of the DrivenByDrams gang Speyside trip had us heading for Benromach.

We passed a few distilleries on the way!

#BTC16 #BlindDrams Tasting Notes

These are my tasting notes from the Blind Tasting Consortium's 16th #BlindDrams evening.

These drams were picked by Ben @WhiskyWithMolly

Whisky 'machinery' - the Malt Mill

A new series looking at some of the 'machinery' used in a distillery to create whisky - this time the Malt Mill.

Glen Moray's Porteus Malt Mill

I've covered the basic process of creating whisky here, but I'm going to explore the machinery a little more in this series.

BTC2 #BlindDrams Tasting Notes

These are my tasting notes from the Blind Tasting Consortium's 2nd #BlindDrams evening.

These drams were picked by John @jwbassman_

Side by side: Three Speyside Single Cask 60's

Unfortunately not 60yo (but if you have any I'm more than happy to do a side by side) instead these are all 60%+ ABV.

They are all Speyside Single Casks, two distillery bottlings and one from the now sadly defunct Creative Whisky Company.

Review of my whisky year - 2018

First of all thank you to all the people who have read my blog (c29,000 up from 16,500 last year) and followed me on Twitter (c1,680 up from 900 last year).

My highlights of 2018 were:

Mini-review: It's all a matter of proof...

Benromach 10/100° 10yo 57%

Sample: swap from @SpiritAndWood

Nose: sherry, stewed orchard fruit, hints of icing sugar

Palate: honey with a chilli edge, fruit & nut chocolate with a hint of juicy orange

Finish: warming, spicy chilli

With water:
Nose: sherry, vanilla, hint of peat?
Palate: the honey fades, replaced by a chewy milk chocolate toffee
Finish: spicy ginger / chilli is slightly more intense but with a peat smoke note coming through

Notes: lovely dram, up there with the Sassicaia which is my favourite Benromach! Love the way the water adds a peat note to the dram

Benromach 20th Anniversary @TweetTastings

This week I was pleased to be included in the @TweetTasting to celebrate the 20th Anniversary of the restart of production at @Benromach after the distillery was taken over in 1993 by  Gordon & MacPhail, refurbished and re-opened in 1998.

As is usual with these things a few days before the tasting a parcel arrived...

Three samples were enclosed including the Benromach 10yo, 15yo and newly launched 20th Anniversary Bottling.

Review of my whisky year - 2017

First of all thank you to all the people who have read my blog (c16,500) and followed me on Twitter (c900) since I started back in January with my first whisky post.

Benromach New Releases @TweetTastings

Tonight I was lucky enough to be picked by Steve to take part in his latest @TweetTastings, this time is was to try two new @Benromach drams - and they were quite different!

As usual the Post Office were under performing and my samples arrived just in time, some of the other tasters didn't get their's...... Note to distilleries : send them out with plenty of time to take into account our overworked Post Office!

Tonight's drams were two whiskies which are to be released later this month - the Triple Distilled and the red wine cask finished Chateau Cissac. Now I'm a big fan of Benromach so I added my Sassicaia into the mix as an extra comparison!

So first up was the Triple Distilled, the first of it's kind by Benromach and limited to just under 16,000 bottles.

Whisky : Triple Distilled
Characteristics : 700ml, 50% ABV. Not Coloured, NCF
Distillery's info : "Light straw coloured malt, matured in First Fill Bourbon casks, tripe distilled the first of it's kind for Benromach"
Price : £45
Colour : Pale Gold
Nose : Pears and marzipan with a little smoke initially then developed with a little lemon and some ginger spice.
Palate : Smooth, slightly oily vanilla butter. A hint of smoke and a little kick from the alcohol but not as much as you'd expect.
Finish : Quite long, drying and spicy with a little smoke.
Overall : A really lovely dram, easily the best of the two Benromach send tonight! It had just the right balance of smoke and vanilla from the first fill casks.

Some thoughts from some of the other TweetTasters:

Next up was the 2009 vintage of the popular Chateau Cissac wine finish whisky limited to 4,200 bottles.

Whisky : Chateau Cissac
Characteristics : 700ml, 45% ABV. Not Coloured, NCF
Distillery's info : "Matured in First Fill Bourbon casks and finished for 25 months in hand-selected casks from the illustrious Chateau Cissac within the Appellation Haut-Medoc Controlee in South-Western France."
Price : £40
Colour : Gold
Nose : Winey, smoke - smoked cheese (Applewood or Bavarian)
Palate : Smooth and  oily again but with the alcohol kick missing from the Triple. Red fruit in a bowl of porridge (but it needed some sugar - there was no real sweetness). A little more smoke than the Triple.
Finish : Again drying and lip tingling - showing the strength mor ethan the Triple did.
Overall : This one was OK, I tried it side by side with my bottle of Sassicaia - another of Benromach's Red Wine Finished drams - but from Italy this time; there was no comparison - the Sassicaia was in a different league - more fruity and balancing the smoke a lot better.

Some thoughts from some of the other TweetTasters:

Many thanks to Benromach for the drams and Steve for organising, his 110th Tweet Tasting, and to everyone who joined in a really enjoyable evening!

#BlindTasting - Review

If you're reading this post you must have read my previous posts on our recent Series of #BlindTasting sessions Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3 where @jwbassman_, @SpiritAndWood, @GentlemanGrimm and @WhiskyWings swapped some samples and blind tasted them!