reducing whisky with...whisky?

@lucadanna1985 Sure, vatting your drams would be no different than what master blenders do but on a much smaller and intimate scale. I'm sure @Victor will offer some great advise on this subject. He's in the know.

Yes, Lucadanna, the sky's the limit with what you can do with your own whisky creativity,vatting like with like, or like with something different. It is all a great enjoyable experiment, like life itself! And who will know better than you the exact combination that will taste the best in your own mouth?

I will lwt you know if connemara cs + connemara 40% is better than connemara cs + water :)

@lucadanna1985 just what is it that prevents you from adding water? Hopefully something more than machismo?! My own preference, particularly with cask strength whiskies, is to enjoy the first half of the glass without and the second with a few drops of water. The difference varies but can be huge. My opinion at that moment will dictate how I have my second glass. As for this discussion's topic, experimentation is all well and good and this small scale vatting sounds fun, but I tend to be a bit more conventional minded. I'll give the master blender his dues and taste the product as he intended - my limited experience in blending - mainly with cocktails - has taught me it's better left to the experts.

I'm not fond of this idea. Besides, toning down a cask strength whisky with a 40% whisky doesn't seem to make a lot of sense. Diluting is done with clear water to have the best effect and to be able to say something sensible about the whisky - if dilution is your goal (as stated in the title of this thread). If you want to experiment with tastes and go microvatting or microblending: knock yourself out!

@dougwatts no no no machismo at all of course! :) it's just that the few times I tried the result was disappointing and I particurarly dislike the sensation of a watery dram...

@markjedi1 what I thought was that, since adding water seems (to me) to flatten the stuff, using a reduced version of the same dram to dilute the cask strength could diminish the impact of water on the final result...but obviously I meant only with same age/same distillery whiskies, though I'm aware of batch variation...

@lucadanna1985 It kinda sounds as tho you are adding to much water when you water down a whisky. How do you add water, and how much do you add? As an example, I personaly would almost never add more than 2-3 ml of water to a standard 30ml dram. For a cask strength whisky that is bottled in the high 50% or above range I use a teaspoon. For any whisky weaker than that I use a straw and add the water literaly one drop at a time. The right amount of water in a cask strength whisky should open it up, rather than flattening it, but you tend to be working with very fine tolerances. I do not think that you would get that same "opening" of nose and taste by reducing whisky with whisky.

@Peatpete I think that is the main issue after all, this evening I tried again with water and the result was better than the other times...

@lucadanna1985 Just as an additional note, based totaly on personal preferance and very limited personal experience... I have found that ANYTHING that is bottled at 40% has already had about as much water as it can stand added to it at the bottlers. I have not (so far) found a single whisky at that %abv that benefits from having even a drop of water added, and generaly the second drop "drowns" them.

@Peatpete I totally agree, I use water only with high cask strength editions, let's say those above 55 %...I generally find a 50% bottling still drinkable neat...

This website will be useful when reducing the alcohol in whisky: homedistiller.org/dilute.htm

@AboutChoice That is an interesting read, but I gotta say it will be a cold day in hell when I water my cask strength scotches down to 40%!

@lucadanna1985 Watering down your cask strength whisky with 40% whisky is in fact the same as watering it down with (less) water. After all, the 40% whisky is a cask strength whisky diluted with... water! See what I mean?

@markjedi1 yes friend, that was more or less what I meant, being gentler with the cask strength dram, provided that I'm not so goot at pouring small measures of water...and if we want to be veeeery punctilious, I would be reducing it with the same water used by the distillery ( but that's a bit ridiculous, I know) :)

I sometimes reduce the cast strength "concentrate" down to the same level of a bottle that i want to compare to ... for example it was interesting to compare A'bunadh (reduced to 46%) to Glendronach 15 Revival.

You can also experiment drinking a cask strength "concentrate" at a lower abv ... depending on your mood ... or your tolerance for the fire of the high abv. And, this is a way to make the bottle last a lot longer as well :) A'bunadh diluted to 46% is actually quite a good price, and quite a good dram.

The webpage I referenced will show you exactly how much water to add ... assuming you have accurate measuring devices.