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single malt whisky thread

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ATTN NYC KIDS

Go to Char No. 4 in Brooklyn if you haven't already. Order the Bowmore Voyage neat and the lamb pastrami. They are both absolutely incredible.

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Was given a bottle of Glenmorangie Original (10) for my birthday, really enjoying it.

I haven't been a big single malt drinker in the past but this has definitely brought the drink to my attention... Reading this thread has inspired me to try some more. :D

Having enjoyed the Glenmorangie, what would someone recommend me as a next bottle to purchase?
 
I replied to you in the Aust thread, but my current bottle is still the lagauvulin and it's mindblowingly good.

Going to move onto the 10 yr Ardbeg or Laphroaig next.
 
BanShunsaku said:
Was given a bottle of Glenmorangie Original (10) for my birthday, really enjoying it.

I haven't been a big single malt drinker in the past but this has definitely brought the drink to my attention... Reading this thread has inspired me to try some more. :D

Having enjoyed the Glenmorangie, what would someone recommend me as a next bottle to purchase?
That Glenmorangie was also my first single malt, it's really a great start.

I went straight to Lagavulin 16 and it was almost a bit too much, just almost ;)

Your next purchase? That's a tricky one. Highland Park if you like smoke. Lagavulin, Ardbeg, Laphroaig, etc for Islay's peaty heavy weight fun. The smoother less heavy stuff: Macallan, Balvenie, anCnoc, Glenlivet, Springbank, etc

My next one is going to be the anCnoc 12, my collection got a bit too peaty :P
 
My latest single malt,

anCnoc 12
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I've received it quite a few days ago and already enjoyed a couple three glasses. Nose with a whiff of oak, fruity sourness, hint of phenol and some sweetness. The body isn't too heavy, a tiny bit of oaky smoke, honey like sweetness and yet some peppery tingling. Its pale color is misleading, surprisingly rich flavors. I've got the 1l bottle for 30eur and a 0,7l one would have been 23eur. Feeling like I struck gold. Amazing value, such an overlooked gem.
 
DeathNote said:
Tried Glenlivet 12 a few moths ago after reading this thread. :/ Didn't enjoy it.


+1

tried that a few months back, and didn't care for it much either. Not sweet enough for me.
 
Friend of mine had the Glenlivet 12 kicking around and it was pretty okay for being so inexpensive, that said I properly wouldn't pick it up myself.
 
Played a show the other week and the venue had Laphroaig, Oban & Talisker so I asked if I could drink them on our rider, and we could!

Suffice to say, I got to know them pretty well... Well, 2 of them... Laphroaig is a definite buy for me, the Oban was nice but a bit thin, and the Talisker I didn't get to coz I kept going back to the Laphroaig. Great stuff!
 
Just got a bottle of Lagavulin. Looking forward to opening this one up.
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For any craft beer drinkers I highly recommend the J.W. Lees Harvest Ale aged in various casks (including Lagavulin:D). Great stuff.
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highly de-recommend JW Craft Ales. highly over priced and shitty tasting, specially the Lagavulin cask aged one. cost me about $16 a bottle IIRC, sugary sweet and vomit inducing.


Do Not Get.
 
well even though it doesn't really belong in here I was just given a bottle of Johnny walker blue label.

NOT BAD

but it's a blend, not single malt. It was a gift and I always look at it, I have bottle number 234235. Not sure what it costs, but I know it's a LOT.

Very tasty, but I had a bottle of Laphroaig 18 year when I last went through duty free at the border. Now there is a delicious smoky whisky. MMMMMMM>

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mmmmmmm

and

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Johnnie Walker Blue is absurdly overpriced. It's very smooth and palatable, but incredibly uninteresting and denuded of any distinctive character.

The fact that it normally sells for over $150 is crazy.
 
Johnnie blue is overpriced but it's one of those bottles you should at least try once. :D

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Bought my cousin a bottle of this for letting me crash at his pad in LA. Drank most of the bottle myself. Delicious. :lol
 
catfish said:


+1

on the Blue Label


didn't want to drop that much on a bottle($179 :o )

so I tried some the other night at a bar($30 a shot:lol )

but DAMN!!!! very impressed, drank it next to a Glenlevet and was blown away on how smooth it was. Very little bite or burn and it goes down like water(which some may hate), which I loved. Highly recommend every Scotch/Whiskey drinker give it a try.
 
no matter how nice the bottle looks, they all taste like a mix of gas and rubbing alcohol.

Rum, on the other hand :D
 
Pretty interesting impressions on the Blue Label. I was given a bottle of blue recently and maybe because I generally drink cheap shit I thought there was quite a bit to think about on the tongue. It seemed more complex than what I normally drink. I wouldn’t characterize it as smooth either. But like I said, I drink cheap shit so what do I know?
 
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Two new pick ups, never tried either before.

Sipping on the Knob Creek now, and its really tasty(even though its not a single malt scotch)
recommended for anyone that likes a sweet tasting bourbon :)
 
Just got a bottle of Laphroaig 10 and some nice glasses for my birthday, and it's a peaty, smokey treat! So good! Smooth, deep & crisp. Love it!

Tried Ardbeg a few weeks ago, and thought it was a bit thin and 'turpsy'. I do like my peaty Islay malts though, going to try Laphroaig Quarter cask next I think.
 
catfish said:
Very tasty, but I had a bottle of Laphroaig 18 year when I last went through duty free at the border. Now there is a delicious smoky whisky. MMMMMMM>

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Man I am envious of that! How does it compare to the 10 yo, the cask strenght and the quarter cask?
 
Bought myself a bottle of this for my birthday:

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Fucking amazing!

Then I got a bottle of Laphroaig 10, some Highland Park and a Dewers (..ew :P) :D

Great birthday but my liver is not pleased.
 
I really need some more Scotch. Last bottle was McCallan 12, I'll probably just stick to that one for now, unless someone has some other, better suggestions.
 
RbBrdMan said:
I really need some more Scotch. Last bottle was McCallan 12, I'll probably just stick to that one for now, unless someone has some other, better suggestions.

Try something different! If you go to a good liquor store they should have no problem suggesting something that is similar but slightly different.

Even if you end up with a bottle that you don't really care for it will at least still get you drunk :lol win/win.
 
OK single malt GAF. Headed here this weekend and need a few recommendations of what to try. I'm open to anything, but would probably keep them under ~$15/pg. Need to find what I like so I can add to my lonely bottle of Glenlivet. I will also ask the bartender, but it is a bar/grill and I'm not sure if there is always someone who knows a lot about Scotch on hand.
 
sharkmuncher said:
OK single malt GAF. Headed here this weekend and need a few recommendations of what to try. I'm open to anything, but would probably keep them under ~$15/pg. Need to find what I like so I can add to my lonely bottle of Glenlivet. I will also ask the bartender, but it is a bar/grill and I'm not sure if there is always someone who knows a lot about Scotch on hand.

Can't help on the recommendations, but that's a fun place. Good fish/chips.
 
sharkmuncher said:
OK single malt GAF. Headed here this weekend and need a few recommendations of what to try. I'm open to anything, but would probably keep them under ~$15/pg. Need to find what I like so I can add to my lonely bottle of Glenlivet. I will also ask the bartender, but it is a bar/grill and I'm not sure if there is always someone who knows a lot about Scotch on hand.

Here are a few choices I'd have:

-Highland Park 18yo. It tastes like a whisky significantly more expensive than it is. I've had a couple of real whisky nuts recommend it on its quality/value proposition.

-Laphoaig 10yo/15yo. Heavy whisky, but it's a well-known classic.

-The Macallan 15yo/18yo. Very interesting distillery; they use a specific kind of barley (golden promise), they malt some of it in-house and they use fire-heated stills. Also know to be very high-quality. It's sherried a bit to fill it out.

-Talisker 13yo/18yo. Very very heavy whisky from the Isle of Skye.

-Blair Athol 27yo. Great stuff.

-Glenkinchie 14yo. Solid highland whisky, very light, spiced and citrusy.

EDIT: I'd try a ton of those whiskies if I had the chance though, that's just a rondom list of decent/different ones that are reasonably priced.
 
Flo_Evans said:
Bought myself a bottle of this for my birthday:

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Fucking amazing!

Then I got a bottle of Laphroaig 10, some Highland Park and a Dewers (..ew :P) :D

Great birthday but my liver is not pleased.

My Dad got me one of those from their last holiday.

It is good!
 
So, it's been a few months since I started tasting different whiskys and I've managed to try a few more.

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I bought a bottle of Talisker 10 just as I left uni to go home for the summer and it became my trusted fireside companion in the small cottage I spent most of my holiday. It's really strong and heavy, almost weighing down your mouth. There's a lot of fire, smoke, pepper and seaside in it. Delicious and very warming.

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I also got my hands on some Glenfiddich 12 which felt quite summery to me. Compared to Talisker, Glenfiddich is much lighter and delivers slowly but surely. A good, gentle first timer. :D I remember tasting sweet, but not overly sweet, pear and apricot with vanilla and oak in the background. Surprisingly great and warm finish. Nothing spectacular, but a high quality whisky.

Finally, I bought my first blend: Black Bottle!

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For only £15 this is absolutely great. Somehow, I didn't like it that much when I tried it at the start of summer, but for some reason I completely changed my mind when I tasted it again tonight. It supposedly contains malts from every single distillery on Islay and it sure tastes like it. It starts off slow with a kind of sweet, treacly taste, but as it develops it turns smoky and salty. After a few seconds more the heat and tingling arrives beautifully and stays for a surprisingly long time. I thought blends were intrinsically rubbish, but this proved me damn wrong and I'm very happy about it.

So, wha'cha been drinkin? :D
 
So I finished my Balvenie Double Wood. Looking back I'd say pretty forgettable, but oh the irony I kept the bottle. Now it's sitting on my desk and I see it all the time ... so much for forgettable. :lol I really dig its look. Pretty shape, simple yet graceful label and a cork with real wood head. :D

Bought also a new one: "Ardmore Traditional Cask". Something peaty from Speyside! First impression was very positive.
 
I just joined my university's malt whisky society and the first meeting was incredible! For £2 you get four drams and they had about 30 different kinds to try. :D I won't go into detail but I tried Old Pultney 12, the standard Glenmorangie, Highland Park 12 and Caol Iila (tasted a bit like smoky bacon!) and I loved them all. In two weeks we have Balvenie coming in to give a presentation and a tasting. Can't wait! :D
 
mr stroke said:
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Two new pick ups, never tried either before.

Sipping on the Knob Creek now, and its really tasty(even though its not a single malt scotch)
recommended for anyone that likes a sweet tasting bourbon :)


I prefer Bookers for sipping. I think it is smoother than Knob Creek. Because of the cost, we only buy it occasionally. But we keep a fifth of Knob around for bourbon and cokes, bourbon balls (during the Holidays), etc.

My wife used our Bookers one time for bourbon balls. I wasn't very happy about that but they were probably the best I'll ever have. (...it won't happen again ;-) )
 
I blame this thread.

I've been slowly building up my collection with a preference to Speyside malts (Macallan 12 yr, Balvenie Doublewood, etc) so I thought I'd really change my game and picked up Lagavulin 16 yr.

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I generally like the honey, oak, and vanilla notes in my Speysides and a prior 'test' with Talisker didn't work out, so I was a little apprehensive branching out.

Wow. Just wow. It's amazing how the nose can make you want to turn and run and then the first sip is... wow. So many new and interesting smells and tastes - so good!
 
I was talking with a mate about how much water people add to whisky to bring the flavours out. Obviously it's down to your own taste but he liked his neat while I usually follow the 8 and 1 rule.

Anyway, after a few measures terms like 8 and 1 got confusing to explain let alone understand. I kept saying "just a wee splash" but that wasn't helping. So I made a visual aid! Well, scratched a scale into a glass :D

Apologies for the crappy pics
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Each wee mark is 10ml, with the lower arrow at 80ml and the upper arrow at 90. And yes, I know the glass is a bit full, but why not? :D

Result: A convert! And a good night was had by all. The only downside was that I had to try his peaty stuff neat to make things fair. And that wasn't much of a downside at all :lol
 
Not a single malt or scotch, but sipping on Paddy's irish whiskey right now. Used to be super hard to get in the US, but now is much more available. Light and not terribly smooth, but good nonetrheless.

My next thing is gonna the to try and replicate the bourbon/rye blend like the brooklyn distiller stuff sold at Park Avenue Liquor in NYC. The sweetness of the bourbon really balanced out the coarseness of the rye. Wonderful stuff, but they ask too much for it at the shop.
 
some online shop here had 20Euro off 45Euro promo going here so i ordered a bunch of quality booze including these two babies

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:D :D :D
 
Aulatori said:

This is what I ended up going with. Haven't tried it yet, it'll be my first taste of the Islay.

I went looking for a different bottle of the Macallan since I'm enjoying the 18 so much. Couldn't really find much though. I have decided that the next time I see 30/yo on the shelf anywhere I'm grabbing a bottle.
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