bkmarcus is on a roll at lowercase liberty http://www.bkmarcus.com/blog/2005/11/whiskey-patriotic-spirit.html#comments where, inter alia, he posts about whiskey. This is a subject close to my heart.
For me, autumn is the season for brown liquor. Dreary fall days lend themselves to sitting around and sipping Bourbon or Scotch. Actually, there is never a bad time for brown liquor, but the present season demands such libations more than the other seasons. Brown liquor is a contemplative beverage. You think deep thoughts and say profound things when you're holding a glass of the old water of life.
Scotch, single malt if you can afford it, is the king of whisk(e)ys. It is unparallelled in its complexity, and the potential for scotch snobbery is unlimited. We visited a distillery in Scotland, Royal Lochnagar by Balmoral, where we learned about the "flavor wheel", a chart that listed various characteristics of varieties of scotch in a circle. Some of the flavors were what one might expect- oaken, peaty, etc. Others were quite funny- scotch tape, manure. I doubt that the distillery that made the manure or tape tasting whiskey used the same chart. Some scotch from the seaside has a bid of an iodine taste from ancient seaweed in the peat used to distill the stuff.
Good single malt scotch is about the best gift one could ever give me. I rarely buy it, because the less expensive single malts are apt to be inferior, and I have trouble shelling out $50 for a bottle of booze even though it is worth it. (Mrs Vache Folle is parsimonious and would harangue me no end.)
Good bourbon is almost as wonderful as good scotch. And don't forget Tennessee sour mash. Tennessee whiskey isn't bourbon because bourbon has to be made in Kentucky in the confines of the former Bourbon County. In Seattle, check out FX McRory's and its bar of a zillion bourbons. Seriously, they have every kind of bourbon behind the bar, and it is a joy to sample them. I never made it through the whole inventory, but my favorite was "Booker Noe".
Brown liquor should be taken neat or, if you must, on the rocks. Water or seltzer is the only permissible mixer and should be used only with inferior product. Never mix the really good stuff with anything.
A woman who enjoys brown liquor is a catch.
Canadian whisky bites in my experience, and I have never learned to appreciate the Irish stuff. Southern Comfort is an abomination to be drunk only by children as cough medicine or by frat boys who are already drunk.
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2 comments:
My dark liquor of choice is dark rum. Yummy.
I don't dislike whiskey, but I drank too much of it in high school and my enthusiasm for it is just not the same as it was then.
You're right about Southern Comfort. Nasty stuff.
Rum is a whole other animal. I like Mt Gay Barbados rum and learned to drink it straight when I lived in Barbados.
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