The Malt Cask

  A new Vintage Bottlers release today with the 3rd instalment of their Secret Series! This is a 32 year-old single cask from an undisclosed Islay distillery (the one beginning with Laphr…) distilled in 1990 and bottled at 52.1% Despite not being an expert in old Laphroaig, I cannot wait to try this one! My tasting notes: Nose: Fruity & gently peated, tropical fruit, pineapple, dried papaya, yellow fruit, peach, apricot, spicy pear, lemon, slight bacon and iodine, quite oily (linseed oil) hints of orange & slightly mineral too. What a start!!! Palate: Sweet & tropical, mango, dried pineapple, orange, slight toffee, honey and vanilla, salty notes too, faint peat smoke and a little black tea. Well balanced and absolutely delicious! Finish: Gentle & warming, salty peat smoke with vanilla & honey sweetness, dried oak, mossy, seaweed and fudge. With water: Sweeter nose with more toffee and more yellow fruit. The palate is slightly smokier and loses some citrus no...

I have realised I have not posted anything on the blog for a month now, so it is about time I do something about it. As I attended a tasting session yesterday evening, I thought that would be a good way to get back into it. As usual, the tasting took place at the Whisky Shop Manchester and the theme for the night was "Peated whisky". Now for people who say they don't like peated whisky, they should really say they don't like noticeably peated whisky as pretty much every single whisky is peated to a certain extend (unless clearly labelled "unpeated" on the bottle) Of course in lots of single malts, it is barely noticeable. We had 6 bottles on the line up and tasted them as follow: 1.   Inchgower 2008 , single cask bottled in 2016 by Hunter Laing, First Editions series, 46%. Nose and palate were very spirit driven in my mind, I could really tell it was quite a young whisky, lots of fresh citrus, spices and biscuit notes. Not my favourite o...

My last post made me realised that despite having mentioned the Quarter Cask (QC) a few times in different posts, I had not actually reviewed it on its own, hence tonight's review. The QC was the first Laphroaig I bought and properly tried. I have actually not even really tasted the standard 10 years old, something I will have to remedy soon. I remember when I bought the bottle. I had experienced the Bowmore Small Batch followed by the Caol Ila 12 and thought it was time to go further in my 'peat journey'. Laphroaig, Ardbeg and Lagavulin therefore seemed to be obvious contenders. Ardbeg and Lagavulin being more expensive I decided to opt for Laphroaig and as the QC was on offer for around £30, I picked one up.  I was also intrigued by that quarter cask business. I googled it to get more information, and found that after maturing their whisky in standard ex-bourbon barrels, Laphroaig transferred the spirit into quarter casks for a further period of maturation. The quarter...

A second food post on the blog today, and yes the whisky involved is a favourite of mine, as per my first post: the Laphroaig Quarter Cask. And it does involve fish again, this time a cod fillet. I do tend to use the Quarter Cask when I am cooking with fish as I think it imparts a really nice flavour onto the dish. I know I have not reviewed it yet as a dram on its own, but I can pick up the traditional Laphroaig medicinal peat flavour as well as a decent amount of malty cereal and fruity notes, which are, in my mind, perfect for cooking with.  If you thought my Quarter Cask Salmon Spaghetti dish was quite easy to make, today's dish is even simpler, and probably much healthier too. The main idea is to cook the cod fillet en papillote, which means you just have to put the fish on a piece of foil and wrap it in like a parcel. The fish will then cook in the oven in its own juice and steam. So let's have a look at what I actually did: -cut a large piece of foil and lay it flat...

I had not been to a tasting session for a couple of months so when I realised there was a blind tasting on in Manchester, I had to sign up for it. It is actually the second blind tasting I attended at the Whisky Shop. The first one was in February and revealed some interesting whiskies, in a positive way for the cheaper Cutty Sark Storm, which I genuinely believed was a single malt, or in a less positive way such as the Glenfarclas 2000 vintage bottled for the Whisky Shop, which I found rather disappointing. The added twist on Saturday's session however was that Phil, who conducted the tasting, didn't know either what had been decanted.  I think that once who've got a bit more into whisky and have tried a few different bottles coming from different regions (or countries), a blind tasting session is a great way to test your nose and palate, taking your knowledge out of the equation. No previous checks on the region, the distillery, the ABV, the fact it is a blend, grain, ...

To some people, peaty whiskies are disgusting and they all taste the same. So tonight I decided to have a closer look at peaty whisky, Islay drams in particular, to see if the peat taste is the same in the many different bottles available. I therefore tasted 5 (small) drams one after the other so see how they compared. I have personally always enjoyed peat but I do tend to take my time with each dram and do not always spend an evening solely with peaty whiskies, hence the idea of sampling several whiskies side by side. I went for 5 bottles which are pretty much the entry dram from each of the 5 distilleries: Bowmore -  12 , 40% Caol Ila -  12 , 43% Kilchoman -  Machir Bay , 46% Lagavulin -  16 , 43% Laphroaig -  Quarter Cask , 48% Here is what I found out after my 5 samples: Bowmore : The peat is quite sweet and fruity with hints of exotic fruit. Caol Ila : The peat is warmer and saltier (the saltiness of the dram is what struck me since ope...

Last day on Islay today with quite a line-up: Ardbeg at 10:00, Lagavulin at 12:30 and Laphroaig at 15:15, and all that on foot! So after a good breakfast of smoked haddock and poached eggs, we set off from Port Ellen, heading towards Ardbeg, the furthest distillery on the southern coast from Port Ellen. We soon found a brand new tarmac path which runs all the way from Port Ellen to Ardbeg so it’s great for walking and perfect if you’ve got a bike on Islay. And to top it all off, the sun was out. Timing-wise, it took us 30 minutes from the B&B to Laphroaig, then 20 more minutes to Lagavulin and 20 minutes again to Ardbeg, walking at a decent pace but stopping here and there for photographs. Good breakfast at Askernish! On the path between Port Ellen and Laphroaig We reached Ardbeg distillery on time for our 10:00 visit. We started from the shop/café (which has really good reviews but we couldn’t verified them as we ran out of time at the end of the visit!) and headed ...

Last November, we decided with a few friends to organise a whisky trip to Islay during the Easter weekend. Even if I will have the two weeks following that weekend off, some of the people I am going with will be back at work on the Tuesday, so we decided to head North on the Thursday afternoon, hop on the ferry Friday morning and head back to Manchester on the Monday. This means our trip will be rather short, and it left me the tricky task of organising our time as best as possible. Looking on several websites and forums, I have found some information about people who have already been, but often, it tended to be answers to specific questions, that is why I thought I would share my experience. Today is therefore going to be about the organisation of the trip and I will update you on the actual visit probably when I am back after Easter. So as I mentioned before, our starting point was as follow: -5 people going to Islay  -leaving Manchester on the Thursday afternoon  ...

Laphroaig (like many other peat power-houses) is like Marmite, either you love it or you hate it! Fortunately for me, I love it. I say fortunately because in my opinion they produce some excellent whisky. The 18 year-old I am about to review is a good example of this. I started with the Quarter Cask, which is still one of my favourite go-to dram (and I need to review it, yes!) before upgrading to the 18 when I realised how much a bottle would cost me if I bought it in France... The 18 replaced the 15 in 2009 in the standard range. The 15 re-appeared in 2015 as a "limited release" for the 200th anniversary but some sites mention that the 18 could potentially be discontinued by the end of 2016*. Other people told me that, in their opinion, Laphroaig might alternate between 15 and 18, which would allow them so preserve their stock for a longer period...  Keep an eye and an ear out and if any of you have any concrete info, let us know in the comment section. Anyway, back to the ...

Being French, wine has always been around as I was growing up, particularly at mealtime and I learnt from my parents a few simple rules regarding the pairing of food and wine: red with meat and cheese, white with fish and seafood and rosé with salades. Obviously, you must go a step further with the type of wine you choose depending on the type of dish you are planning on serving. Wine -both red and white- was also involved in cooking, as well as some spirits, in cakes particularly (Kirsh, Grand Marnier, Cointreau, Cognac are amongst the few names which spring to mind) However whisky has never been part of the list of alcohol I ever associated with cooking or even food in general. The first time I realised it was something that could be done was during my visit of the Dalwhinnie distillery about 9 years ago now. I remember vividly asking our tour guide at the end of the visit, in front of the sign detailing the range of the "Classic Malts", what is your favourite Whisky to dr...