Closing the Whisky Experiment

It's been a bit more than a month since I started my Double Blind Whisky Taste Test, and I've decided it's time to call it. I've drunk a scarily large amount of the whisky, but science is a harsh mistress and she will not be denied. Those of you who are sitting at home complaining that I haven't fixed your bug, it's because I was drunk from too much experimentation.

I've posting my reviews to Twitter, which in some ways adds a third blindness: I didn't know how I reviewed a given Scotch previously.

I'm writing this having not yet looked at the key that will tell me which Scotch is which. Here are my reviews so far (using my arbitrary decanter names). I'm actually taking a small drink of each as I write, just to remind myself and do one last review. These reviews are in order of perceived strength, so that I'm going from weakest to strongest.

My comments will also try to mention what I would do with these whiskies; this is because I've still got decanters with a lot of whisky in them, and really, I probably won't drink them all straight, which is all I would normally do with a single malt.

My primary goal in this review was to find that single peaty Scotch that I could put in my liquor cabinet (currently virtual, since the liquor is kind of scattered wherever there is storage).

• Teardrop: Very drinkable and very smooth, but relatively mild. It almost doesn't belong in this review. Once I have closed the experiment, I look forward to comparing it to Macallan, which is my old stand-by in terms of smooth Scotch. A little bit of peat, some harshness if you aren't careful, and just a bit of roundness. It's like all the edges are filed off and nothing really stands out. I expect this is a great Scotch if you're not drinking it near anything else, but near the others, it seems weak. It's almost a Scotch for people who don't drink Scotch.

  I like it, but it's not peaty enough to be considered a great peaty whisky.

• Oval: This one definitely has some peat in it, but it's got a hint of sourness that I don't really like (that's sour as in "something went sour" as opposed to "puckery"). This is apparently a consistent review, since I've mentioned that in my twitter microreviews, too. I expect that this would make a great whisky sour, but you would always want to hide the whisky's own sour, rather than focusing on it. Hopefully it would meld with the citrus, rather than having some sort of weird sour harmonic.

  At least this one's peaty, and it's got an overall good flavour. I wouldn't recommend it to most people, though, because of the sour note. I do remember drinking this multiple times without really noticing the sour, for what it's worth.

• The D: [1] This is definitely my favorite. It's got peat, a bit of spice, no real harshness unless you snort it, and none of the sourness of the oval. It has an almost mustiness to it, like a good blue cheese. It's really an even, peaty whisky; drinkable neat, but strong. It should mix well if you wanted to, given how much flavour it has, and go well in soda or with ice, but it deserves to be neat, or maybe on ice to keep the fumes down.

• Square: Very spicy, almost with a Bourbon spice, but quite harsh, also. Strangely, there isn't a lot of other flavour to it. There's some peat to it (I expect that's what adds the spice), but the harshness stands out so much that I'm not real fond of this whisky. I'm not even convinced it would taste that good with soda (which is often how I drink my bourbon), since it doesn't have much depth.

Okay, so now we know what I think about each of the whiskies, it's time to get the key out and see what is what. First, though, I will give my guesses as to what is what. Here's my estimate:

• Laphroaig: Square
• Teardrop: Caol Ila
• Ardbeg: Oval
• Lagavulin: The D

And now, without further ado, here's the real key:

• Laphroaig: Oval
• Teardrop: Caol Ila
• Ardbeg: Square
• Lagavulin: The D

So, I got two correct but mixed two of them. The clear winner in the "best peaty Islay malt" category is Lagavulin, which is unfortunate, since it's about $20 more per bottle than any of the others (assuming you can find Caol Ila, which I had to buy at the Duty Free in Melbourne). The Caol Ila gets an honorable mention as the easiest to drink.

Looks like I've been harshing on the Ardbeg this whole time, and it's the Laphroaig that has the sourness I didn't particularly like.

And with that, the experiment closes. Now I can finally drink some of the Caol Ila 18yr I have -- I couldn't drink it while the experiment was on, since it would likely have clued me into which decanter had the 12yr.

In the name of Science (and great whisky), Luke

[1]

This decanter has a square bottom and a kind of oval top, so it looks kind of like a D sitting on its back. Really, though, it gets its name from the movie 8 Mile -- I have a friend from Detroit who said it was an accurate portrayal of Detroit, and ever since I've harassed him about how Eminem calls the city "The D".

Sun, 13 Apr 2008 | Tags: whisky, science