Item: Whisk(e)y » Scotch single malt whisky

Macallan Fine Oak 12 yo Single Malt Scotch Whisky

My next whisky review is about another well-known and inexpensive Scotch single malt whisky, Macallan Fine Oak 12 years old by name. According to official website, that’s a starting point in Fine Oak series which includes whiskies matured up to 25 years.

The main point of Fine Oak series is to use ex-bourbon casks side by side with traditional for Macallan sherry casks. And so spirits for 12-years aged  Macallan Fine Oak whisky were matured in ex-bourbon casks and in sherry casks made of American and Spanish oak.

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Albannach Renaissance

This is another cocktail based on Scotch single malt whisky. Scotch blended whisky isn’t classic cocktail component because of many reasons. Single malt whisky has much more reasons not to be widely used in cocktails. It remains as exotic tool for innovative bartenders and mixologists, something like bitters. I’ve learnt about  Albannach Renaissance at Gin, Not Vodka. The cocktail based on combination of peaty Scotch whisky and Italian aperitif Aperol. As I understand, the  title for the cocktail has been taken from the name of the restaurant where the author Vytautas Jurkus works. At first I was in a hurry and flippantly substituted Campari for Aperol and Bowmore Legend for Ardbeg Renaissance. I don’t think that my first Albannach Renaissance cocktail was good. But it was the thing which I remembered as something special and exotic.

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Talisker Single Malt Scotch 10-years-old Whisky

Well-known Talisker distillery is located at the island of Skye in the north part of Inner Hebrides. Now it’s  owned by Diageo and is a part of Diageo’s «Classic Malts» series.

10 years old single malt whisky is most affordable Talisker bottling and, at the same time, most peated whisky produced at Talisker distillery. It can’t match against Islay heavy peated whisky but definitely has sharp peat notes in the taste.

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The Remaining Balance

Here is the document I started almost a year ago. That became something like a ritual. When buying new single malt whisky, I eventually ended up using the whisky in this magnificent cocktail.

Now I told myself to stop and to write this post. I’m continuing with buying and drinking Scotch whisky but  I need to comprehend all my emotions and experience. And for me, the best way to do it is to write about it.

All that started when I was browsing Imbibe website. I’ve took many ideas from there, and The Remaining Balance cocktail recipe by Jason Littrell was one of them.

Imagine a mixture of Grand Marnier, two single malt whiskies, amaro and two bitters. Sophisticated bizarre mix? Not for me! My love to Scotch whisky and experimenter ‘s itch gave me no chances to leave the cocktail unnoticed.

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Borden Chase

I’m continuing with my Scotch whisky experiments. Now I’m about to learn Borden Chase, one more cocktail based on wonderful combination of Italian vermouth and Scotch whisky.

This cocktail should be called Rob Roy variation but if it were not for pastis. With pastis and orange bitters, this cocktail turns to something unique. Yes, there are Rob Roy Holiday Style and Bobby Burns with lightly anise-flavoured Drambuie and Benedictine, respectively. And there is almost identical Robert Burns Cocktail. But at first I’ve known it as Borden Chase at David Wondrich’s Esquire drinks database.

Both Drambuie and Benedictine work perfectly with whisky so I thought that pastis’ strong anise note could be nice addition to Scotch whisky flavour.

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The Smoking Gun

Here is one more cocktail with single malt scotch whisky. That looks unusual but personally I love this trend.

The Smoking Gun was created by bartender Mark Allen, Red Feather Lounge, Boise, Idaho.

In this recipe Fernet combines with peaty scotch – unusual and a bit audacious decision at first sight. Both spirits ain’t components in general use. Quite the reverse, they look like very unfriendly when mixing with other spirits. But here is the case when first sight is absolutely wrong.

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Bruichladdich Islay Single Malt Scotch Whisky 12 yo

Bruichladdich Distillery is the one of three «B» (Bowmore, Bruichladdich, Bunnahabhain) Islay distilliries which produce lightly peated whisky. That’s why whiskies from these distilliries are often regarded as «not typical Islay single malt whisky».

By the way, Bruichladdich  is very old distillery, on of the oldest  at Islay. For a long period of time it has its  owners keeping changed each other so quickly and constantly that no one of them could set things going.. Invergordon Distillers и JBB / Whyte & Mackay , last two ex-owners were at the helm sequentially from  1968. They‘ve managed to stabilize situation.

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Auchentoshan Classic Single Malt Scotch Whisky

Auchentoshan Classic Single Malt Whisky is another attempt to release a single malt whisky for beginners at a reasonable price. Such whiskies are very attractive because of their extremely low prices but some doubts about their quality are present though.

I had have the experience testing similar Bowmore Distillery product, and the result of that test encourages me to taste another young single malt scotch.

Auchentoshan Classic is produced at Auchentoshan Distillery, one of only three distilleries located in the Lowland region.

It’s known that Lowland whiskies are smooth and delicate. Auchentoshan Distillery traditionally uses triple distillation and unpeated malt so accordingly press release spirits produced there have especially mild flavour.

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The Forty-Five

There are a lot of alcohol combinations which now became classic. These combinations are so good that you’re always reverting to it and think that you do need any others.

Whiskey (and whisky too) with sweet vermouth create such combination, a wonderful duet, an exceptional base for further experiments. Well-known Manhattan (with bourbon or rye) or Rob Roy and Bobby Burns Cocktail (with scotch), it all are just three great cocktails among dozens of other good ones in which whiskey mixes with sweet vermouth.

The Forty-Five recipe has been found at Drambuie American promo-website. Another place where the cocktail was mentioned is The Intoxicologist blog. The article about cocktails based on Drambuie liqueur is awesome as well as most of other posts there.

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Penicillin

As I previously said, I love whisky very much. I prefer it to all other alcohols when I want something to drink straight.

Also I’m keen on modern cocktail recipes with whisky – blended as well as single malt. Sometimes they look very complex and require expensive or handmade ingredients but it just increases my desire to make them.

Lately I take my time to look for new recipes with whisky, and Penicillin by Sam Ross became the first one I was interested in.

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