So, what are you drinking now?

Compass Box 'The Peat Monster' @46% Un-coloured, non chill filtered and combining 3 very respectable Whiskies: Ticks all the boxes, however it's not a peat monster and in my opinion inappropiately named! It has peat, there is plenty of it but it is not monsterous, on the contrary it is gentle, sophisticated, pervasive and exceedingly ''well mannered'!

I'm reasonably sure that this is the same batch as one from early last year; it has the brown box with the gold embossing and was gathering dust on an out of reach top shelf at my local Liquor Barn. It hasn't opened as well as my previous bottle so into the big decanter with it. The bottle code is tricky...

L. 11 02 13

3 15:28:09

Slainte1

@paddockjudge I heartily agree. Never realized before what I was missing. "Start the car" indeed!

Talisker Distiler Edition 2001 20012. Wonderful bottle of whiskey. Thick Sherry, peat, smoke, pepper, how could you go wrong. I wish I had a backup bottle now that this one is open. Ever feel like that after opening a bottle?

Tasting with @Nock this past Friday and Saturday. We had our usual 20 to 30 whiskies. Ardbeg Day and the purchase of Ardbeg Perpetuum were the reasons for the timing for @Nock to make the trip up here, but he was ready to do some major whisky restocking. We had a higher number of US whiskeys this visit than usual. That, surprisingly, was @Nock's idea, not mine. Of the multitude of new bottles which @Nock brought back home with him, fully half were Ardbegs and Laphroaigs. (A couple of Bruichladdichs, too.)

What we drank:

1-3) Started with Perpetuum, and then later compared it to L 10 151 Ardbeg Uigeadail and L 10 152 Ardbeg Ten

4-7) compared a flight of Elijah Craig Barrel Proof, from batchs # 3, 5, 6, and 7. (66.6%, 67.4%, 70.1%, and 64.0% ABV)

8) Willett 2yo Family Estate Rye

9-11) a flight of Sazerac 18, 2014 release, Willett Family Estsate 7 yo Rye, barrel # 99, and Old Scout 7 yo SINGLE BARREL Rye, 60% abv

12-13) Thomas H. Handy 2012 and 2014

14) Maker's Mark Cask Strength 55.8%

15) Parkers Heritage 13 yo Wheat Whiskey, 63.7%

16-20) Bourbons: Virgin Bourbon 7 yo 50.5%, Old Ezra 7 yo 50.5%, Old Heaven Hill Bottled in Bond 50%, Evan Williams Bottled in Bond 50%, and Abraham Bowman 17 yo 73.75%

21) Aberlour A'bunadh, batch # 45; we were both a little disappointed. I see where you are coming from, @Nozinan

22) Cutty Sark Prohibition 50%

23) Dark Origins, yes, @Nock's bottle, different and much better than the one I first reviewed. I'll review this bottle too

24) George Dickel # 12, a new somewhat unusual batch with lots of bass notes

25) Bruichladdich Scottish Barley, 50%

26) Del Maguey Chichicapa Mezcal, 46%; Young Jas/@OlJas and @numen: I feel for you both that you got stuck with bad batches of Chichicapa. I opened this 2 years stored bottle in trepidation for this reason. I actually tasted @numen's way-worse-than-I-had-previously experienced Chichicapa. I was worried, very worried, especially for a $ 75 bottle. Miraculously I got a very good bottle this time, and very similar to what I had enjoyed tasting about 3 years ago. This was @Nock's first Mezcal. Hopefully if he buys a bottle of it for himself it will also be from a worthy batch

Try as I might, I COULD NOT get @Nock to sample from my bottle of Lambertus 10 yo Single Grain Whisky, given to me from a friend living in Belgium. I think @Nock was missing out, sort of. There's something to be said for trying out the second lowest scoring whisky in Jim Murray's Whisky Bible. @markjedi1 said it well when he said that in Belgium the Lambertus Single Grain is referred to as "the gift of poison".

So, we had a great time, as usual, and didn't "...drink the Kool-Aid".

@Victor That's one heck of a list! A lot of big flavours experienced by You and @Nock. Thumbs up from paddockjudge.

@paddockjudge, @Nock brought lots of premium US whiskey I hadn't tried before. He gave me a bottle of the Virgin 7 yo bourbon, a Heaven Hill brand which I haven't seen for sale around here. That Virgin Bourbon bottle label is absolutely the cheesiest whisky bottle label I've ever seen, but the bourbon is good. Not quite the 96.5 points that Jim Murray gave it, but very solid...and, if you can find it, around $ 15 in the US.

As for Perpetuum, I am content with 1 bottle of it, even though I had the opportunity to have bought more. @Nock being the Ardbeg guy he is, he picked up 3.

Lawn is cut now it's scotch 30, with Glenfarclas 12yr old. (:

@Victor, knowing where to plunk down your whisk-e-y dollars is not an easy thing to determine. I enjoy big flavours; however, lately I find myself accumulating a lot of 'delicate' whisky. Recently I've acquired Masterson's Rye, C R Monarch, Highwood Ninety, Danfield's 21, Blanton's Original as well as a few others. Single malts have become too expensive for my meager whisky budget and the recent spread between $C and $US has made Bourbon a pricey prospect. I am fortunate to have some 'cheaper' alternatives and will rely on my 'bunker' to satisfy my cask strength desires. If only there was a portal to Montgomery County, sigh.

@Victor THIS is why I take pictures or I would have also forgot that in addition to your list we also had:

27) Stagg Jr. 66.1% (batch #4). I think each batch is a little better then the last.

28.) Benriach Curiositas 10yo (a good example of this style).

29.) Gerston from The Lost Distillery Company - Blended Malt 46%

30.) Four Roses 2014 Single Barrel Limited Edition 59.5%

31.) The Great Bastard Reserve (my own personal blended malt living bottle)

So there were a full 30 drams in about 24 hours. It is always an education and enjoyment to visit and dram with you @Victor!

That said, I doubt I will be drinking again any time soon. My liver needs to rest.

@Nock, yeah I figured that the odds were good that I might forget a few of them,...and that you would remember.

Some comments:

1) Stagg Jr. actually seems to be succeeding in establishing its own style now, different from the taste of standard Buffalo Trace. It has always been much different from REAL George T. Stagg. And yes, @Nock, as you say, Stagg Jr. does indeed seem to get better with succeeding batches.

2) I could not get excited by the Gerston, not one iota. Why do people keep trying to replicate whiskies which no one ever gets a chance to taste? Don't answer, PLEASE.

3) That 2014 Four Roses Single Barrel Limited Edition 59.5% abv was the weirdest, and least desirable Four Roses Limited Edition I have ever tasted. Poor barrel selection in my opinion. That barrel is crushingly sweet, and sort of cloying, which is difficult to get with natural caramel. Very unbalanced. I think that someone flubbed in selecting that barrel.

re. Compass Box 'The Peat Monster @46%':My notes (haphazzad at best) suggest that this Whisky does not need water, in fact, is... "definately not a swimmer". Sun. 16-3-14. So, had a small nip and it is splendid. I should have remembered that! There are not many Whiskies that reject water entirely and this is one, for me anyway!

Sláinte chuig na fir, agus go mairfidh na mná go deo!

Cutty Prohibition / Laphroaig CS 7:1

I enjoyed the Cutty Sark Prohibition but after a couple of drams it's overly sweet for me. So I added Laphroaig CS to to bottle, 7:1. It's a sweet, Sherried, Salty, slightly peaty. Try it let me know what you think?

I like Prohibition but only one dram at a time.

Just back from Camp Erin...Every year a transformative experience.

Now struggling to rewrite a curriculum with minimal guidance in one night. In order to assist me in the evolution of the curriculum I am sipping FC Evolution. A slightly different dram every time. One interesting thing is that while I can sit with it for hours and pick out smells and tastes, it turns out it's also a sipper that you can pay less attention to, when you want to focus on something else.

@Benancio I find Prohibition too sweet as well. I myself like to mix it with Forty Creek's Confederation Oak. If you want to drink this mix right after mixing, I would go for 40-45% of Confederation but if you go for a vatting in a bottle, I think 35% is enough. The honey is coming out and the peat gets more woody. For me, it comes out like an HP.

@Victor , I'm glad you got a good Chichicapa mezcal. You're right that I complained about the bottle I had last year, but I should discount that quite a bit by pointing out that it was my first-ever bottle (or taste, even!) of mezcal. I was less disappointed by its overall quality, and more by the smoke element's failure to evoke anything peat-like for me.

Also, I admit that I now crave it every once in a while, but alas, my bottle is now long gone, drowned in ice & lemon juice, as a dinner drink to go with tacos and other Mexican meals last summer.

---

And what am I drinking now? The last of my peaty single malts as I plan to go off peat for the summer, just so I can experience its intensity anew in the fall. In the past week or so I finished off a Longrow "Peated" and a Laphroaig 10 CS. All that's left now is an Ardbeg Ten. (Actually, last night I drank some of my all-Islay solera bottle, but that sounds as the same thing 'cause I'll top it off with some of the Ardbeg.)

@Nock and @Victor What did you think about the Maker's barrel proof?

@Jonathan, I just posted my answer to your question in the form of a review.

Just opened and tasted the Bruichladdich Octomore 6.3. Wow! What a beast! Love it!

@ryhorikawa , I saw somebody elsewhere call the 6.3 one the best Octomores he's had. I'm feeling the Octomore temptation again—$157 at Hi-Time:

hitimewine.net/OCTOMORE-EDITION-06.3-PPM-25…

Right now I'm drinking Johnnie Walker Double Black. Enjoying the smoke and the mouthfeel. Liking it very much but looking for more depth of flavor and a longer finish.

Smooth Ambler Old Scout 7 Year Old Rye made by MPG. Dam this is good stuff. Drink it neat, use a chilled glass if you like. Find me another 7 year old rye for the money. Hope there isn't a run on the stuff.

The Peat Monster and Big Peat Tasting: I'm probably seduced into thinking that there is somethiing extra special in 'Big Peat', deluded into thinking that, just perhaps, I can taste the miniscule amount of 'Port Ellen' therein! I'm pretty sure I can't, however, there is a rather lovely flavor in the makeup of this 'drop'; I thought the 'Monster' rather good, this is better!

I'm going to get a Smokehead and do the trio - 'Should be interesting!

Slainte!

@A'bunadhman

I've had a Peat Monster and been impressed. I have but have not yet tried 1 regular Big Peat and a "winter Holiday" edition that is CS. I'm told that the flavours vary by batch and that the 46% version, surprisingly, is better than the CS. Who would have guessed?

Laphroaig QC to the rescue!

I poured some BLADNOCH 12, the one that was disappointing when opened in Collingwood in April. I've been giving it some air time in the bottle, and some of the objectionable vegetal qualities have receded but are still there. Still not drinkable. So I added some QC and it seems to mask some of the bad, but not the good.

Such a good rescue that even my mother, who has likely never had a malt before, had 4 sips!

Moms love peat. Who knew?

Cutty Sark Prohibition 50% abv blended Scotch. I am trying @Benancio's suggestion of adding some Laphroaig 10 CS. I am using 10 CS Batch # 3, which I particularly like (thanks @MarsViolet for the sample. Don't be a stranger!)

Well, a little CS Laphroaig takes over the Prohibition, both nose and palate. It is a decent way to go, but I still like the Prohibition quite a lot, despite the fact that my bottle has indeed gotten a lot sweeter over time, open now 6 months. I'll just moods more willing to accept sweeter for Prohibition from now on,...or try some more experiments.

I'm about to watch the Belmont Stakes, the third leg of the US triple crown of horse racing. I do think that American Pharoah will be the first US triple crown winner since 1978.

Right now I'm having some James Pepper 1776 rye. It's LDI rye at 50% above without chill filtering. It's about two years old (or so I have read). "Pepper" is a good name for it: it's quite spicy. I like it.

At a liquor store tasting ,I just sampled a cask strength Caol Ila (2002) bottled by Gordon and MacPhail and then compared two pours of Willett 7 yr. old from different barrels (they had four to compare). I was struck by how different the two Willetts were: one was very sweet with a lot of vanilla and mostly floral, fruity notes, and the other was more spicy. I'm now curious to find out how my second bottle of Willett 7yr.will taste, since it comes from a different barrel than the one I have open (Barrels 99 and 100, both at 57.7 above).

meant abv--not "above"@Jonathan

@Victor If you are in the mood, try Prohibition with about 30% of Forty Creek Confederation Oak. It really works for me and lets the honey shine. I also add between 5% and 7 % of Eagle Rare 10 yo to this mix and I had after shave in a glass. Those were two experiments I did with Prohibition that are worth trying. Cheers.

@Victor I'm glad to see that you tried the prohibition/ Laphroaig CS blend. Go 7:1 or even 10:1, LCS can over power, but with the small amount of LCS, the sweetness of prohibition isn't lost. Try mixing a dram or 2 and let them marry for a week, then let me know what you think? I believe you will see prohibition come shining back to to the front of the pallet. I enjoy prohibition, but only the first dram, second is a little too sweet for my taste, IMHO.