So, what are you drinking now?

Happy Anniversary! Great night out with my wife (early if course....kids). Afterward I poured myself (and Nephew) generous drams of Aberlour A'Bunadh batch 44. That was at 830. 3 hours later a few sips of liquid heaven still to go... What a dram!

@bwmccoy Good to know, thanks for sharing your impression of the Port Ruighe.

4th of Septemberye - Alberta Premium and Alberta Premium 25 year-old; 100% rye from where the great prairies spread and lordly rivers flow, Canada.

Tomatin 15 (ex-bourbon casks), followed by Tomatin 12 (Spanish oak casks), then Sringbank 12 Cask Strength and finishing up with Caol Ila 16 year (SMWS 53.173) "Glowing embers on the tongue". This Caol Ila is my personal favorite right now. I'm trying to make it last as long as possible, but tough to do when it's so darn good.

@bwmccoy - *Springbank - typing too fast and didn't proof read before I clicked "Post Now"

Last night saw the penultimate pour of my Nikka Yoichi 10 yo mini bottle (180 mL). Some sharper edges from the relative youth of the whisky have rounded out a bit during its almost two years open. I now will miss this one when it finally goes...

Followed that up with a Redbreast 12 yo. It has been open for almost 18 months and it too has really benefitted from time as an opened bottle. It too has been a while since I had a pour from it...I will be revisiting it more regularly over the next while.

Tonight is a Rye night: Bulleit 95 rye followed by baby Sazerac. Next, I think I will go will a Wellitt (4yo). There really isn't anything as sharp with as much "zing" as rye.

Having some over-aired 14 yo Balvenie Caribbean Cask. It is amazing what 20% addition of Gosling's 151 Rum does to this otherwise a bit sour old bottle. Good. A little potent rum to sweeten up a sour old bottle...I will try this again.

And, to follow, Born to be Mild: think I'll have a little Glen Grant 10 yo.

@Victor that sounds absolutely wild! Whisky and rum! How did that work out, especially with the incredibly high proof Goslings?

@numen, it worked out pretty well vatting the Goslings Rum with the tired old bottle of rum cask Balvenie. My objective was to restore the sweet/dry balance, which had been ruined by secondary fermentation skewing the curve to the sour and acidic side. The whole trick is to get the proportion of rum just right. I finished with about 20% Gosling's 151 in the total volume, or 25% additional rum compared to the amount of malt in the glass, just by eyeball. I would guess the "best" amount to restore a little tang and sweetness for that particular bottle to have been somewhere between 10 and 20% total volume of the rum. 20% was getting a little rum-flavour heavy, relative to the flavours of the whisky. The sour is still there, of course, it just now has some sweet balance, so the total effect is much different. And the fact that this was a rum-cask finished whisky to begin with, made using rum a natural choice.

I can also see experiments of vatting what I will call "unaccentuated straight barley malts" ie those with zero or minimal peat or wine influence, something like Clontarf Single Malt, Hazelburn, Auchentoshan, or even Glengoyne, with just a wee portion of either high proof or aged high-flavour rum. I expect I would tread very carefully and lightly with the rum with these, and use the rum just as a sort of accent.

@Victor

Ralfy Mitchell would be proud to see (or taste) your experiments.

One question though: Why do you think your spirits are undergoing secondary fermentation. At a minimum of 40% I would expect no years would be able to survive, or metabolize. And 60% or hiher approaches bacteriocidal (fungicidal) levels used in handwash (70%).

I suspect what you are experiencing is oxidation, actually the opposite of fermentation given it requires oxygen.

I have noticed this seems to affect the lower strength bottles more quickly. My Aberlour 18 became bitter after a short time (less than a year) despite the fact that I use preserving spray after opening. Boith my Springbank CS (plain and claret wood) appeared to improve under the same conditions and now, 2 years later, finally decanted into smaller bottles, are as good as ever or better.

@Nozinan, unquestionably high abv and high phenol containing spirits are in my experience far more resistant to air-contact degradation than are the bottles without these types and proportions of chemicals in them. Certainly the higher the concentration of alcohol present the greater will be that ethanol's bacteriostatic/fungistatic properties.

My observations are sense observations only, and are not based on chemical analysis. What I see in whiskies which I have observed closely over long periods of time and know intimately, is loss of the sweet component of flavours and addition of a great deal of sourness, which is exactly what happened with the original fermentation in the first place. This is why I believe a re-fermentation is the main event causing these changes. Chemical oxidation alone would not, I believe, lead to an inability to taste the sugars which were present in the whisky at an earlier stage. To my palate, those sugars have just dissappered...or, much more likely, chemically changed into sour fermentation by-products.

At a nice Italian joint (Luigi's) on the outskirts of Fort Bragg, NC. Came for the magnificent wine list, but I cannot tear myself away from the 9.50 pours of 18 YO Elijah Craig...WTF. I am in heaven. Taking notes ad this stuff is so damn good.

Just opened my first bottle of Wild Turkey. It's the 101. Baseball is on soon. It will be a boring, yet relaxing, Friday night.

Forty Creek Confederation Oak Reserve. I probably have not been back t this for months, if not over a year. I was drinking the Portwood reserve a few months back but then I got too busy (with single malts that took most of my attention).

It must be three years since I picked it up at the Forty Creek distillery, and over two since I first cracked it with the Whisky club. The nose has changed a little. Not the pure butterscotch or caramel from before. It's either more spirity than before, or my nose has changed. The taste is a little rougher than I remember as well, a little hot for a 40% dram.

Still, it tastes a little like the vanilla extract I created using vanilla beans and vodka. I know, rum based vanilla tastes better. But I digress.

Back to work.

@Russ That's a good bourbon for a easy price (in the US anyway)

A little Famous Grouse and/or Rittenhouse Rye with friends.

I'm drinking Tomintoul 16. This is one of my favorite bottle right now. Not the most complex but it it mouth coating, fruity and spicy just enough. Cheers!

Collingwod maple wood, Brown-Foreman and Royal Canadian Small Batch, Sazerac.

Still sipping the small dram of FC confederation oak reserve.....can't rush these things. Opened a little with time in the glass. Better on the palate.

@Nozinan

Sorry for offending whoever thumbed me down. Please be reassured that I've since finished my dram and will try to to drink Forty Creek on Connosr again....

I meant, not to drink FC on Connosr....

Last night, Glenfarclas 12 year (SMWS 1.152) "Jelly Belly Beans Galore" and Bunnahabhain 13 year (1997) Port finish-Murray McDavid bottling.

Tonight, finished off the 100ml bottle of Glenfarclas 12 year (SMWS 1.152) and also finished off the miniature of Tomatin 18.

3 years ago tonight, I was on Isle of Skye, so having some Talisker Port Ruighe (Port finish) while reflecting on our trip.

@Nozinan There, balanced it out! FC Confederation Oak is excellent.

Amrut Fusion,great soft and dangerous,dont know what to think about this one!

Tonight's festivities: we had a couple over for dinner and whisky-tasting. We sampled: Casa Noble Anejo Tequila, Glen Grant 10 yo, Grant's Family Reserve, Ardbeg Galileo, Ardbeg Supernova 2010, Gosling's Family Reserve Rum, followed by Old Rip Van Winkle 10 YO 90 proof bourbon with dinner...then: George Dickel # 12, Sazerac 18 Rye 2012 release, Willett Family Estate 4 yo Rye, 55%, barrel # 2612, and Old Potrero 18th Century Style Whiskey, Batch K, 51.2%. Good times.

Last couple of nights have followed a "getting re-acquainted with bottles in my cabinet" theme. Two nights ago, my wife stumped me with a blind pour of Longrow CV (the only part I got right was the 'peat', I couldn't even decide/figure out what casks the whisky had been aged in!!).

She followed that with a blind pour of Talisker 18. Wow, has this one really opened up in the bottle!!! Some beautiful fruit notes at first, which then transitioned to more subtle (than I would expect from a Talisker) maritime notes of brine and smoked fish (salmon?). The signature Talisker 'pepper' note did not show up until about four sips, and 20 minutes, into tasting. This one has changed so much since I last had it (6+ months I believe) that I had no idea which cabinet bottle it could be. It was so fruit forward (slightly overripe fruit on the initial nose) that the best guess from my cabinet was Sullivan's Cove Double Cask (another one I must pour again soon!).

Last night was a pour of Glenfarclas 15...still very nice, but the bottle (now open 20 months, and currently sitting at 2/3 empty) is showing signs of degrading slightly. Likely will finish this one in the next 3-4 months.

@Victor, that sounds like a heck of a line-up. Was there any particular order that you used? That Casa Noble is dangerous stuff. You brought me 'round on tequila/mezcal.

Karuizawa, The Colors of Four Seasons 12 yo. Just wonderful!

... This is just amazing, chocolate covered cherries... Wow!