Contained within these pages is all the information on the whiskies tasted by the Society at its Tasting Meetings. Tastings are listed starting with the most recent. All tastings are blind tastings unless otherwise noted. Scroll down to the bottom of the page for the link to our first year of tastings. Rating System Used for Tastings starting 10-20-14 to present. The scores shown for each tasting represent the average of the individual members' scores given each whisky. Individual member scores are not reported. In an attempt to better assess each whisky, our club recently voted to adopt a revised rating system. The Ones to Avoid Range 0 - 49 Nothing short of absolutely vile. 50 - 64 Nasty and worth avoiding. The Disappointing/Ho-Hum Range 65 - 69 Thoroughly unimpressive 70 - 74 Drinkable, but that's about it The OK/Good Range 75 - 79 Average, pleasant, but not without some flaws/negatives 80 - 84 Good whisky - pleasant, enjoyable, and worth buying The Great Ones Range 85 - 89 Very good 90 - 93 Excellent The Off-the-Chart-Bottles Range 94-97 Superstar whisky 98 - 100 Hall of Famer - One of the best I've ever tasted! 59th Tasting (6-28-20) Theme - Wood Nymphs Drink to the Maiden Quercus Host: Mike For our second tasting under COVID protocols we went into the woods, not literally, but we did explore single malts aged in virgin oak casks. With so many single malts being in aged in previously used casks containing bourbon, sherry, port, cognac, red wine, it's less common to find single malts that have been aged exclusively in virgin oak casks. And while I love having all the different wood expressions available, virgin oak casks drive home just how important the cask is to the flavor and nuances of a whisky. As you will see from our notes and ratings, there were some exceptional whiskies in the bottles we tasted. It's interesting that even without all the lovely notes that previously used casks are able to add to a whisky, these virgin oak casked whiskies were bursting with all kinds of aromas, flavors, and richness. Of course, special expressions, like virgin oak, don't come cheap as you can see from the prices for most of the whiskies tasted. Whiskies Tasted:
58th Tasting (5-24-20) Theme - St. Paddy's Day in May Host: Mark The COVID-19 stay-at-home order in Ohio meant no traditional St. Paddy celebrations and postponing our April tasting to May. So, once the stay-at-home was lifted we scheduled our 58th tasting for May and instituted COVID-19 social distancing and other precautions. Since we didn't get to celebrate St. Paddy's Day in March, we decided to do it in May and feature an all Irish single malt whisky tasting. Admittedly, there was no wearing of the green, no green beer, no corn beef, and no one turning green, but there were six delicious Irish malts to try with one another in 3D rather than 2D FaceTime or Zoom. Irish whisky, like Scotch and Bourbon, is booming right now, with new distilleries opening and new expressions coming out on a regular basis. The whiskies were exceptional and can foresee us possibly revisiting a different group of Irish single malts next year. Whiskies Tasted:
57th Tasting (2-16-20) Theme - Weird Wide World of Whisky Host: Tim We went traveling for our 57th tasting without the hassle of passports, TSA, airports, or customs! As usual our tasting was a blind tasting so speculation was high as to what exactly would we be tasting and from where. Our host Tim assembled a range of single malts from Scotland, the U.S., France, Japan, and India. We definitely accumulated some frequent flyer miles. Not only did we taste their different countries' prowess in single malts but got to experience some scientific experimentation in distilling as we tasted whisky using a new speeded up methodology for aging whisky from Lost Spirits Distillery of California. As you might imagine as serious single malt fanatics/connoisseurs (sometimes verging on single malt snobs perhaps in some people's opinions), had we not done a blind tasting, I'm quite sure we would have gone into the evening seriously prejudiced in advance of even tasting the Lost Spirits bottling. However, as the evening results clearly show, our members thought the Lost Spirits bottling was exceptional (I liked it so much I outbid everyone for the bottle at the end of the evening). Our other American single malt from Tenth Street Distillery was also a surprise to most us as well. Given the rise of craft/boutique distilleries in the U.S., there's clearly lots of great whiskies that will need further exploration. And that being said, the rise of great single malts coming from all parts of the world means we'll be probably traveling again in future tastings. Whiskies Tasted:
56th Tasting (12-12-19) Theme - Peat on Earth, Goodwill to Men Host: Matt The theme says it all....it was an evening of peat, specifically (but unknown to all during the tasting) it was an all Ardbeg evening of peat as we tasted six Ardbeg expressions, including the new Supernova 2019. The evening was unique for a number of reasons. First, our host even though he knew what the whiskies were because he bought them. He did not know which was which at the tasting because he had someone else wrap the bottles prior to the tasting. Second, because someone else wrapped and numbered the bottles, there was no particular order in terms of strength or age of the bottles which is unlike most of our tastings where the host will often order the bottles in some fashion. Third, we did not reveal the bottles at the end of the tasting like we usually do but waited until they had been auctioned off. It was a revealing tasting from a number of respects as well. Even though our group has a heavy number of Ardbeg lovers and regular consumers of Ardbeg, no one guessed they were all Ardbegs, plus the scores for some of the Ardbegs we previously tasted at one of our other tastings were remarkably close to the previous scores given. Whiskies Tasted:
55th Tasting (10-20-19) Theme - Witness Protection Host: Ben Although all of our tastings are typically blind, our host Ben wanted to make sure the identities of the evenings whiskies were impossible to identify....hence the title for our 55th Tasting - Witness Protection. The tasting saw us revisiting some of The Lost Distillery Company bottlings and tasting a couple of new variations as well. As mentioned in our 43rd Tasting, Lost Distillery is not producing their own unique expressions but attempting to recreate the whiskies from other distilleries that no longer exist and for which there are no remaining bottles. We tasted three of their whiskies that we tasted at our 43rd Tasting and two of those that they labeled Vintage (no age statement given). Interestingly, the prices have gone up since our initial tasting of these whiskies and the prices on the two Vintage versions rivaled the price of many 21 year old single malts by the major distilleries. Whiskies Tasted:
54th Tasting (8-18-19) Theme - Latest Edition Host: Hugh For our 54th tasting we decided to explore Diageo's Classic Malts' Distiller Editions which have received numerous awards since 1997. While Diageo has over the years expanded the Classic Malts range from it's early days of just six distilleries, we decided to focus on five of the original six Classic Malts - Dalwhinnie, Talisker, Oban, Lagavulin, and Glenkinchie (We would have liked to have done all six but unfortunately we were unable to find a bottle of the Cragganmore Distiller's Edition for the tasting). You'll notice in our list of whiskies tasted that we have tasted some of these previously. If you have not had any of the Distiller's Editions, you don't know what you are missing. Basically for the Distiller Editions of these already excellent whiskies, each whisky receives a second maturation in specially prepared casks that have previously held fortified wines (specifically different types of sherries). This second maturation adds another whole level of complexity, flavors, and aromas to each whisky. For the Dalwhinnie the second maturation is done in Oloroso sherry casks, for the Oban, Montilla Fino sherry casks, for the Glenkinchie, Amontillado sherry casks, for the Talisker, Amoroso sherry casks, and for the Lagavulin, Pedro Ximenez sherry casks. Diageo releases Distiller Editions periodically so as you can from our list we tasting different versions from different years. The whiskies are the same age statements as their regular counterpart, the year just refers to when the particular version of the Distiller's Edition of that whisky was bottled. As you can see from our tasting notes, each of the bottles fall into what we consider our Great Ones range and are definitely ones worthy of a space in your whisky collection/tasting. Whiskies Tasted:
53rd Tasting (6-23-19) Theme - When is a Highland not a Highland Host: Mike Our 53rd tasting took us to the Orkney Isles to explore some new and old friends from Highland Park's distillery. The scotch industry is riding a never before level of interest in and consumption of single malts and as a result all kinds of changes are happening from old/closed distilleries being reopened, to numerous new distilleries being built, to the rise of No Age Statements whiskies, and to existing distilleries shaking up their line ups to adding a plethora of new expressions. Highland Park seems to have certainly embraced the latter. Their line up seems to be in such a flux that the old adage "You cant tell the players without a scorecard." seems to apropos. Our tasting included their two new recastings of their 12 and 18 year olds, their standard 15 year old, and one of their NAS bottlings (Dark Origins) that has been dropped from their line-up. For those of us fortunate enough to have had all of their earlier editions, it a particularly revealing evening and for those less fortunate just another great evening of single malts. |