The Taste of Disgrace?

Both the Malt Maniacs (as an e-pistle) and Master of Malt have published the results of mini-experiments with E-150a and whether or not you can actually taste it. I don't have the links readily available, but if you google "E-150a in whisky" or "caramel colouring in whisky" you should be able to find both.

I'm in the middle of an E150a experiment being run by a blogger out east; I'll link results when they're up. I do have some pure E150a that I may add to something too...lol

@cpstecroix Look forward to the verdict..

It comes down to deception and manipulating the customer in my book. Many people feel that darker whisky means better whisky. Distilleries such as Dalmore are some of the worst offenders when it comes to adding E150a. If the Scottish Whisky Association was so concerned about the integrity of Scotch they would make a rule that distilleries would have to declare on the label whether a whisky has coloring or whether it is chill filtered or not.

I've had the pure E150 and it is FOUL! I believe Cowfish commented on a blog post that I did on it stating that hm and the boys at TWE had done a tasting on E150 and here was a comment that he made

"If you get a chance to try spirit caramel again don't try it neat - put a tiny dot in a glass of water and stir it around, it'll change colour a worrying amount. They don't stick all that much in whisky - I suspect you won't be able to taste it, but it will mess with the mouth feel of a glass of water, and will potentially obscure flavours in a whisky. Yes caramel isn't a great thing, but it's not as bad a thing as dipping it neat might suggest."

So personally I highly doubt that I'm able to detect it in a whisky, but I do believe I've seen it's muddying aspects in a few whiskies I've had.

I'd be really curious as to what your results are though @cpstecroix!

@SquidgyAsh Yeah I've had it mixed into water at an SMWS Australia tasting.. must say that when the water was sufficiently "brown" in colour (as per, say a Dalmore) it wasn't really noticeable in and of itself, but I agree that it will have other side effects when mixed with whisky in terms of impact on taste and mouthfeel.

They say the legendary loch Dhu was black due to a caramel mistake...

Here is an interesting find! A Swedish company that has a monopoly to sell liquor in Sweden, so by law they must declare if anything artificial has been added to the whisky. Here is their list:

Whisky E150 Aberlour 10 YO no Ardbeg Ten no Auchentoshan 10 YO yes Balvenie 10 YO no Bowmore 12 YO yes Bowmore Darkest no Bunnahabhain 12 YO no Cragganmore 12 YO yes Dalwhinnie 15 YO yes Drumguish yes The Famous Grouse yes General 12 YO yes Glen Grant no Glen Moray 12 YO no Glenandrew 10 YO yes Glenfarclas 10 YO no Glenfiddich 12 YO yes Glengoyne 10 YO no The Glenlivet 12 YO no Glenmorangie 10 YO no Highland Park 12 YO no Isle of Jura 10 YO yes Lagavulin 16 YO yes Laphroaig 10 YO no The Macallan 12 YO no Oban yes Talisker 10 YO yes

www.whiskymag.com/forum/viewtopic.php

@MaltyMike - also, this link to a forum in which they provide a list of distillers which DO NOT USE E150a: scotchmaltwhisky.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php/…

@MaltyMike - also, by law, whisky sold in Germany must indicate whether it contains E150a - sometimes bottles exported to Germany end up in other places, like Canada...I found a Bowmore 12 50ml mini in Calgary that had come from Germany...and sure enough, it stated that it was "with colouring" (in German, of course).

My general opinion is that you should ignore whether a whisky has E150 in or not and see whether you like it. If you don't, then start looking for why and see if E150 is to blame. If you do like it, then be happy whether it has colouring in or not :)

Most companies (I exclude Loch Dhu and Cu Duhb for obvious reasons) don't add much colouring, and if they do it's usually to even out colour between batches rather than massively darken the whisky. There may well be some that colour to 'deceive' to a greater level than that (and the 'may well be' is just me trying to be politic) but in general we have only guesses rather than hard evidence that they do so.

Check the list posted above and note how many whiskies you like that are on it - there's a few that are on most whisky geeks' lists...

@cowfish - I don't think truer words have ever been spoken...some of us can be a bit hypocritical about some things. Personally, I found the Bowmore 12 very satisfying, even if it is an oddly too perfect a colour. Talisker 10, Lagavulin 16, both of which are very well thought of expressions also contain E150a, so...as you said, there may be another reason why a particular whisky isn't your 'cup of tea'.

Had a glass of Glendronach 12 Original, which is natural colour. A short while later I had a glass of Remy Martin VSOP Cognac, after detecting some cognac notes in the Whisky. I believe they use Caramel E150 in that particular cognac and it seemed to me like a burned sugar bitterness, especially on the palate and finish which I had never noticed before trying it side by side. I don't think I have had a whisky with caramel added yet as I try to avoid them, but I think I will know what to look for in the future.

Easy enough to say that if you have a glass of whisky that you know for sure is natural colour, and jump straight into one with caramel the difference should become more obvious. I used Remy Martin Cognac as a reference because I think they use quite a significant amount of caramel, making it really detectable.

I was surprised to learn that the American version of Balvenie 15 has E150a added to it. The UK version does not. The American B15 is noticeably darker in color than its UK counterpart. Wish I had looked at the bottle inside the carton before I bought it. I don't buy E150a-spiked whisky if I can help it. Yes, it does affect what I purchase. I won't knowingly buy whisky with artificial ingredients added.

Ironically, I have no problem with distillers such as Compass Box using natural wood staves inserted into casks. I think that the Scottish regulations in regard to nixing the use of staves and allowing fake caramel coloring is very much backasswards. I say, keep out the fake garbage coloring and flavoring and allow natural wood staves and even staves from pre-used barrels that aged bourbon or sherry, for example. The use of staves seems fine to me.

FYI, here is some info about Spice Tree, a very delicious bottle of whisky, which at one time used flat staves and then switched over to toasted cask heads instead:

The Spice Tree was first bottled and launched in 2005, but in 2006 the Scotch Whisky Association (SWA) forced Compass Box to stop production. What was special about The Spice Tree was the secondary maturation - the malt whiskies were aged with new French oak sourced from 195 year old forests. Compass Box borrowed a technique widely used by winemakers over the last 30 years, and inserted the new oak in the form of flat staves into used whisky barrels, effectively rejuvenating what would otherwise be a useless barrel. The SWA decided that this nontraditional practice was not appropriate for the production of Scotch Whisky, mainly because it had never been done before. Despite its numerous awards and positive reviews, The Spice Tree was discontinued in 2006. However, Compass Box has been working on alternative maturation methods for The Spice Tree. Rather than using flat stave inserts, they have developed a method for creating heavily toasted cask heads which impart a flavor profile similar to the original Spice Tree.

I'm a purist. Screw artificial coloring.

I don't see the need for it. If people are buying whisky based mainly on the colour then I doubt they are going to be spending the kind of money which a lot of top malts cost. For instance if I'm looking for a heavily sherryed whisky I would do my research or at least check on the bottle first, not just make assumptions based on colour