So, what are you drinking now?

@Victor Funny you should say that... about the 57N. My first bottle I purchased at DF in Israel, but the second one (bought as a result of some some 30% evaporation in one night - haven't had that person over since) was purchased online and sent to the hotel in London where my sister in law (through whom @nosebleed is my brother in law) was staying on a layover (funnily enough) between Iceland and Calgary. I later either received it when they visited or brought it back in my usual trip in December.

I agree, the networks are key, but there can be complications. I have 3 bottles of OGD 114 that have been stuck in Seattle for 3 years (2 will likely make it here in December), and some in Florida though my mule has moved twice since living there.

@Victor Yes, you are absolutely right! I'm doing quite ok with friends traveling within Europe allowing me to tap into the best places, but it's a bit thin on the US end. That said a good friend of mind does travel to NY regularly, so I suppose I could always have stuff delivered to his hotel for 'transport back' :)

Does Amazon in the US sell whisky? Or, what would be the best buy&deliver online shopping?

@RikS others can give you more up to date information on online vendors in the US than I can. Because it is a felony crime in my state of Maryland to receive shipments of spirits by mail I do not have much reason to keep up my knowledge of online vendors. Shipment legality in the US is state by state, so it is always necessary to inquire as to whether the vendor legally can and will ship to a given jurisdiction. So I cannot legally accept a shipment of whisky in Maryland, but my wife can legally accept a shipment of whisky at her place of employment in Washington, DC, 30 minutes away.

And, @RikS, speaking of rye dominant whiskies, do your best to get a bottle of Wiser's Legacy before it potentially becomes extinct. It is in Canada, and some of it is now also in the US. It is getting hard to find. Wiser's Legacy is most definitely a rye "greatest hit".

@Victor Oh, all these wonderful regulations... I am aware of some of the peculiarities of the US sales system: end of last year I had some meetings in NY and decided to pop out for some shopping and ended up picking up two suits. Back at the hotel, it struck me that something was odd as the price was somewhere in the range $200 more than I had anticipated... and that's how I learned about the wonders of "sales tax" (which is apparently never referred to on the actual price tag, but only appears when you get to the cashiers! :-)).

@Nozinan Funny you should mention OGD 114...My parents spend their winters in Green Acres, Florida (near West Palm Beach), and I’ve put my mother on the hunt specifically for OGD 114. Now my parents aren’t much for whisky hunting, and they stick mainly to Total Wines in Wellington. My mother was shocked that the top 3 on my “please find” list were bourbons (OGD 114, Forester 1920s Prohibition Style, and Jefferson’s Ocean Aged at Sea Cask Strength), but the scotch prices at TW aren’t always that much better when you factor in the exchange rate. If she comes across a scotch I can’t get here, I may have her grab that, but I’d love any of the aforementioned bourbons.

@Hewie - It was a bit of a cult film for me and my friends. I used to like (still do sometimes) gore/B movies and that fit the bill perfectly. I can still remember the vhs copy I had used to go all fuzzy at the end when the guy 'wears him'

@Victor - That's interesting. Most all ryes I've tried have had some eucalyptus/menthol notes in there. Bulleit very much so - the JD definitely less. I'd assumed it was from the grain but apparently not then!

@cricklewood - I reckon I'd like most any food combo but fried chicken, waffles and syrup?! hmmm . . . give me some sloppy brown gravy and corn with the chicken any day though!

@RianC well, the distilleries vary, the yeasts vary, the strains of rye vary, and our taste buds vary. It is not always easy to sort all of these variables out.

To all of you, Please, please, keep the maple out of my whisky. Most maple flavor in whisky have an artificial side that displease me and when it is more « natural », it could be too dominant. That being said, I would really like to know what is the whisky with the best maple flavor.

@Robert99, the whisky with the worst maple flavour is Collingwood, YECCCHHH!

@RianC, it is the yeast. @Victor can confirm that Alberta Distillers has no eucalyptus/menthol notes....WhistlePig, Hochstadter, Masterson's, Jefferson's, Pendleton, all from Alberta and none with any mint, menthol, or eucalyptus.

@paddockjudge And yet I didn’t find the Bearface 7 Year Old Triple Oak overwhelmingly Maple-tinged...and I’m fairly certain it’s sourced from Collingwood/Canadian Mist.

@OdysseusUnbound, it wasn't maple-tinged because it wasn't maple treated. Collingwood drops actual maple in the holding tanks to influence the standard Collingwood....YUCK! The bear juice most likely escaped the maple treatment.

Jim Beam White Label, 40% ABV, assumed to be 4 years old.

My wife is cooking a pear compote with bourbon today for Thursday's US Thanksgiving Day dinner. I decided I should monitor what this bottle tastes like. @paddockjudge gave me this bottle. I have purchased maybe 2 bottles of Beam White for myself, the last one more than 10 years ago.

Observations on this bottle of the JIm Beam White Label: 1) this is expectedly thin at 40% ABV; 2) this bottle is rather sweet, accompanied by some bitter tannin: 3) vanilla and caramel are the main flavours along with; 4) too much tannin is present in this bottle for me to have much enjoyment; 5) despite the heavy tannic wood influence, there is a deficiency in depth of the wood flavours, especially lacking in bass pitched wood flavours. Is this a sipping bourbon? No, not to me, and not to most people I know. Certainly not to most connoisseurs.

Greater Perspective Observations: as I drink this Jim Beam White Label I think of how much shit JIm Beam White Label gets from malt drinkers. Malt drinkers say bullshit like: "Single Malt from almost every Scottish distillery is obviously much superior to bourbon."...with Jim Beam White Label often being quietly taken to be representative of "bourbon". This is not merely something like an "apples compared to oranges" comparison. This is more like an apples compared to alpacas comparison.

It cannot be said too often that Scottish distillers and American distillers both have the need to monetize all of the barrels of whisk(e)y which they produce. They go about monetizing the lesser quality barrels in entirely different ways. That over 90% of Scotch Whisky at which Scottish Malt snobs sneer is where the bottom, maybe 70% of barrels of Scottish Single Malt Whisky go. This is a place of disguise, of blending, a place seen as cheap and unseemly to malt lovers. These are the rejected unloved step-children, the crazy uncles in the attic. Malt snobs prefer to pretend that this low(er) quality 70% of malt production not only is not reflective of malt production in Scotland, they more or less pretend that it does not exist, because they do not want to go anywhere near it, or even to acknowledge its existence. Scottish Malt Whisky for sale to the public is not typical of Scottish Malt Whisky Production. This is already the top 30% of quality of malt production. The vast majority gets disguised and sold "on the cheap" in blends.

For an "apples to apples" comparison to bourbon, what is bottled as Scottish Malt can only realistically be compared to the premium and super-premium US whiskeys, which also reflect the top 30% or so of the barrels produced, by quality level. US products bottled at 40% ABV are almost always from the lesser 70% of barrels.

I like the better quality whiskies of every style. I am frequently bemused by those who think that I am predominately a bourbon lover, just because I like a lot bourbons. Actually most of my top favourites are not bourbons, but are rye whiskeys and malt whiskies. Ignorance is never bliss. Get a good multiple taste trial of 40 or 50 bourbons, including at least a dozen of the top tier products, before you form an opinion about the quality of "bourbon". Considering Jim Beam White Label to be representative of the quality of "bourbon" is just like considering Johnnie Walker Red Label to be representative of the quality of "Scotch".

@Victor

@fiddich1980, thank you!

@Victor - well said and great perspective! I appreciate your continued education of my whisky world! Thank you!

Forgot to post last night, I had a dram of Glenmorangie 10.

@Victor I really liked your post! And most of all - that it's written by you; someone who could really be a "whisky snob" if you wanted, given the wealth of knowledge you possess. I recall joining here some time ago, maybe a bit apprehensive about how people would react to my humble and 'beginner ramblings' and I was so pleased with the total lack of snobbery and instead the great help and constructive guidance I received from many - you not least (!) as well as many others, and still recall @paddockjudge concocting a 'special vatting' for me :)

I too tend(ed) to say that "I don't really like bourbon", but I'm becoming increasingly aware that I say this based on experience limited to the cheapest supermarket bourbons available in Europe like four roses and JD black. Maybe I will always 'prefer' scotch over bourbon, who knows... but I now believe I should only take a firm opinion on that once I have tried the bourbon quality equivalent of Uigeadail, A'bunadh, Redbreast 21, Glenmorangie 18 etc.

@bwmccoy, @RikS, thank you.

Connosr has usually remained a relatively friendly, tolerant, accepting community. That, Connosr's international and pan-world-whisk(e)y orientation, and the subsequent friendships I have made here are why I remain active on Connosr...and did so over that multi-year wait for the upgrade to take place. At this point keeping in touch with friends is the main thing which keeps me here.

If someone were to ask me what I consider the single best piece of whisky advise I could give it is "Get as much experience as you can." This means taste everything you can, think and judge for yourself. There is no substitute for experience. Not experience of reading reviews and hearing other people's opinions about something which you have never tasted. The experience you need is the experience of tasting and smelling each of the whiskies for yourself. This is a subjective realm with many variables affecting all of the experiences we have of it. It is never a good idea to put too much emphasis upon any single experience we have. That single experience was like a single grain of sand on the beach of our cumulative experiences of whisky. It is wise to get a lot of experience before forming strong conclusions. It is always wise to speak from experience, rather than from (to put it in the most polite form) lack of experience.

@Victor to "get as much experience as you can" in trying different things is why I'm off to a wine tasting tonight of some 'old world' wines - which are very different in profile from our 'new world' wines that we produce here.

@Hewie - I totally agree with you. That’s why I go to wine tastings with my wife on occasion, try beers that are not my normal favorites, why I went rum tasting with a buddy recently, it’s why I wanted @Victor to lead me through a tasting of bourbon, rye, tequila and mezcal when I visited him in September. It’s why I sampled a line up of Cognacs from SMWS last year. While I may never become a fan of Cognac, Rum, etc., I think it is important to try other things from time to time in order to reset our nose / palettes and frame of reference. In my opinion, if we only drink what we know and like all of the time, not only do we miss out on new experiences, I think our senses become desensitized and lazy. Not to mention that we may find something new and exciting that we would have otherwise missed out on. It is also why I re-try whiskies that I have had bad experiences with previously. I want to confirm if my previous experience still holds true.

Great post @Victor! @bwmccoy - Totally agree - especially the bit about our senses. As someone who has practiced meditation and mindfulness for most of my adult life (my current drinking habits would bring shame to my former monastery ) I find the enjoyment of a good whisky can be an excellent way to awaken ones senses and become more mindful and thus appreciative of what I'm drinking.

I notice more and more these days how when I have something more familiar there is an urge to idly sip away without giving it my full attention - when that happens I either make more effort or simply put the bottle back. Yes, there's a time and place for that, sure, but trying new things definitely helps me keep my sense of wonder and curiosity high!

Now: Teeling single malt. Now, one of the problems with tasting many different things and developing one's senses and palate, as per the above discussion, is of course... that just as one learns to appreciate the good stuff, one also risks becoming more discerning and intolerant towards the less-good stuff.

I wouldn't say that the Teeling single malt is bad. It just doesn't really hit the / any mark. It's a bit thin with some sweet / bitter notes, dropping off to a semi-dry sweet barley note holding just less than medium length.

@bwmccoy @Victor @RianC It is so true that all our tasting experiences build our knowledge and our palate. Writing a review is also a fantastic experience forcing us to name the flavors we encounter and therefore to create memories. But don't limit your experiences to alcoholic beverage. I, myself, try to identify the herbs and spices used in the meals that are served to me. From time to time, identifying a flavor in a meal give me a better insight of what reviewers are writing. Cumin is a flavor that I now know because I paid attention to it when I was making a BBQ sauce. Chervil is an herb I was able to identify in a meal that was served to me after I used it with chicken. I am now surprised in my day to day life to notice big differences between cola, one presenting spearmint, another wintergreen and a last one exuding cinnamon. All these experiences help me on my whisky journey by enhancing my senses, facilitating the creation of memories and increasing my pleasure.

At the end it also gives me the ability to share my experience with others and to build friendship. Cheers!

@Robert99 Have you noticed a change in your enjoyment of foods since you started studying these flavours?

I've noticed since becoming aware of the complexities of whiskies, and teasing out more flavours, that I find some foods less interesting than I used to in the past.

@Victor as always you have the ability to put your finger on the more salient points one should keep in mind when judging or assessing whisky & spirits.

Experience and an open mind are key, you need to expose yourself to lots of different experience, sometimes you get a valuable lesson even during a bad tasting.

@Robert99 But which cola is ideal to mix with a Wiser’s 35 Year Old, or an Alberta Premium 30 Year Old?

@cricklewood Quite right.

When I was in medical school I was assigned to a paediatric clinic for children with developmental disabilities. I should mention that in fact this was a well-renowned clinic. But a neighbour who was a general paediatrician pointed out "how can you learn about developmental delay if you don't know anything about normal development?" - she offered and I accepted to do my rotation with her instead (I gave the programme the same argument. It would have been different if I were a paediatrics resident or a student planning on going into paeds so I would have done electives.

Same goes for spirits. Once one has tasted 1000 expressions, one does not need to try bad whisky for "education". but this can be much more helpful to someone who is learning. I kindof wish I'd had more exposure to entry level stuff. My first tasting was:

• Glen Breton rare and ice wine cask finish

• Forty Creek COnfederation Oak

• Glenfiddich Solera 15 YO

• Macallan 25 YO

• HP 12

• Aberlour A'Bunadh batch 33

While HP 12 is entry level, it's a GOOD whisky, and the Glen Bretons were forgettable. The others are heavily weighted towards the experienced drinker.

My next tasting included Mac 25, A'Bunadhand 2 excellent Bruichladdichs, and the third had A'Bunadh (again), Mac 25, Springbank 12CS and Claretwood.

Is it any surprise I became a whisky snob?

@OdysseusUnbound @Robert99 that's a trick question!

No cola. clearly only ginger-ale...