Alberta Premium is known in Canada for their high rye content. In fact, the "stock" Alberta Premium is made from 100% rye. Dark Horse was available in the United States under the name "Dark Batch" for awhile, though I'm unsure if it still is. Dark Horse is a unique whisky. While some whiskies (and rums) are aged in ex-sherry casks for added fruity sweetness, Dark Horse has sherry added direclty into the mix. Why would Alberta Premium do this? Why to save money, of course ! What do you think happens when a single malt scotch is aged in ex-sherry casks? The sherry that had infused the wood is "re-released" into the whisky. So it's just 99% rye and 1 % sherry? Well, not exactly. According to canadianwhisky.org, Dark Horse is a "mingling of 12-year-old rye whisky and 6-year-old small pot rye, Dark Horse has an 8% dollop of well-aged corn whisky added to flesh out the body. The whisky is aged in heavily charred American white oak barrels, and is bottled at 45% alc/vol." Dark Horse also contains 0.5%-1.0% sherry wine by volume. Rumour has it that the 8% corn whiskey is in fact Old Grand-Dad's Bourbon.
- Nose (undiluted): fruity, brown sugar, vanilla, toffee, raisins, rye, herbal notes
- Palate (undiluted): medium to light-bodied, a very bourbon-like arrival of vanilla and toffee, developing to brown sugar, maple, peppery rye, dark fruits (dates? dark cherries?) I would have liked it to be a bit "thicker" in the body.
- Finish: medium-short finish, rye spiciness, developing to an almost Dr. Pepper/Cherry-Coke flavour (in a pleasant way)
Adding water did NOT improve this whisky at all. In fact, with water most of the subtlety was lost and Dark Horse simply tasted like watered-down rye. I do NOT recommend drinking this with water. I found it a bit thin neat and adding water made it even thinner. Others, including Dave Broom, disagree. In his book, Mr. Broom gets more cherry-type fruitiness by adding water to Dark Horse. Perhaps our palates are different, or maybe mine is simply not as developed as Mr. Broom's. Probably the latter. Dark Horse does very well neat, or perhaps in a rye and coke. I'm just guessing about the latter since I don't drink rye and coke, but Dark Horse's finish leads me to believe it would work.
I think I payed $30 CAD for my bottle of Dark Horse. It's better than any bourbon I've had at that price point and it can compete with most budget blended scotches, especially for those who don't like smoke or peat. Definitely a winner.
@Victor That's because they've never had a Torontonian explain to them that Toronto is the Center of the Known Universe. So Barrie and Midland are within Toronto's gravitational field....ergo, Central.
@OdysseusUnbound, I mention the rye cocktail with soft drink only because you mentiioned the 'rye and coke'. I consider the Dr. Pepper a better alternative than Coke for rye whisk(e)y, despite that fact that I am not a cocktail guy either.
If you read the old archives of Connosr you will find multiple conversations about how best to do numerical scoring of whiskies for reviews and ratings. It always boils down to making yourself clearly understood by the persons reading the scores. A range in the choice for preferred scoring scales remains, and the opportunity for confusion will never completely go away. With your completely credible and understandable choice of scales for grading, @OdysseusUnbound, only some will be able to relate. Probably 70% of readers will completely disregard your calling the whisky "a winner" and not go near it because it was given an 80. The choice you have is whether to stay true to your pedagogical instincts or to have greater influence over the readers of your reviews. In the several times I have commented on this same issue over the last 6 years I have expressed that the scale I would choose for myself absent the social context is a much lower one than either your pedagogical scale, or the one which I now use. I reluctantly (grudgingly, you might say) have chosen to compromise in order to be understood clearly and to have people interested in reading my reviews.