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Every year like clockwork March stumbles in from the cold and delivers Irish Stereotype Reinforcement Day to warm the cockles of your projectile vomiting heart. St Paddy’s Day in North America has as much to do with Ireland as Chinese food in North America has to do with China – as in maybe a immigrant
Another Heaven Hill bourbon to add to the wall – Larceny Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey. You know what’s cool? Crime. Crime is cool. Name things after crimes. This bourbon’s distinction is that it swaps rye for wheat in the mash – bourbon has to be 51% corn but the other 49% can be any other
Continue Reading “Larceny Kentucky Straight Bourbon with Dan”
Another border hop, another duty free… uh, find? Doesn’t seem like the right word here. This is like something out of Dungeons & Dragons, a ceramic jug of curses & concentrated goblin farts. Platte Valley 100% Straight Corn Whiskey. Straight in this case meaning distilled not higher than 80 proof and casked for a minimum
Continue Reading “Platte Valley 3y Straight Corn Whiskey with Dan, Bowick & Ryan”
A border-crossing friend snagged this.. um.. testament to budgetary discretion. Dr James Crow’s Old Crow Kentucky Bourbon is available at Duty Free shops and still manages to only be $8usd. Which is made further amazing when you find out that it’s the same mash as Jim Beam, just aged less. That’s a little shocking. Other
Continue Reading “Dr James Crow’s Old Crow Kentucky Bourbon with Dan”
Ah yes, the great Victoria Day long weekend, known as May 2-4 by people still drinking crap beer by the crate. “We here at iScotch only drink the best!” – a lie, best exemplified by what we did to ourselves for you, loyal reader. We put ourselves back through the Jack Daniel’s product stack to
Happy week after St Patrick’s Day! Hey, either we make it a thing or this review sits on the shelf for a year. And by then, who knows? Maybe Red Bush will refer to brigades of aw shucks volunteers fighting under George W’s Veevay La Revolutseeon banner in the Second American Civil War, battling alongside
Continue Reading “Luck O’ The Irish: Bushmills Red Bush with Dan”
BAM. Perfect timing. Because the key to a good whiskey review is all in your calendar alignments. Paddy Old Irish Whiskey, ON St Paddy’s Day. Could you ask for anything more? Ever? No I think not. …This review was maybe done in November. Here are some “fun” facts: Paddy’s is in the Pernod Ricard stable
Continue Reading “Luck O’ The Irish: Paddy Old Irish Whiskey with Steph”
Aw yiss a new aged Irish whiskey – West Cork 10y! A new one for us, anyway, West Cork has been around for about 15 years. West Cork likes Bourbon casks – the entire range spends some amount of time in used American oak. Even their select sherry, rum and port special 12y expressions all
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Knob Creek, purveyors of fine Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey. This is their Single Barrel Reserve, aged nine years and bottle at 60%. It’s not often a distiller can pull off a high-powered whiskey without a lot of collateral damage in the flavour and face burning departments, but Knob Creek manages to do it and still
Continue Reading “Round 2! Knob Creek 9y Single Barrel Reserve with Virginia”
This week’s bottle is Jim Beam Bonded, courtesy of Dan’s Laura. Thanks, Laura! Bonded is a whiskey term we’ve seen before. To jog your memories, the whiskey meets an external government standard – the product of one distillery in one distilling season, aged 4 years in a government facility, bottled at 100 proof. Why submit
A slightly odd bottle this time. Some Jameson Black Barrel arrived in a covert container on the doorstep, a sample from somebody’s stash. Thanks, generous stranger! Jameson is an Irish whiskey we’re familiar with, having tried the White Label and Select Reserve in the past. The Black Barrel this time refers to the charring of the
Corner Creek Kentucky Bourbon, the first bourbon bottler we’ve sampled. Same as with scotch, some companies distill, some buy and blend, and some buy and bottle. This is the latter. To be more correct, we’ve had bourbon bottled by people other than the distiller – that rash of 90% plus ryes from bourbon makers we
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Stranahan’s Colorado Whiskey. This is essentially an American Highland Malt – clean river water & mountain grown barley make it sound like it could come from a loch as easily as a ranch. Stranahan’s is Colorado’s first craft distiller, coming from a combination of volunteer firefighter, craft beer brewer and barn fire. Colorado in general
A quick Round 2! today for the always excellent Innis & Gunn Irish Whiskey Finish. We first did this expression a little over a year ago, and it only appears to come out around St Paddy’s Day, hence the bare qualification for a “Round 2!” article. But it’s good stuff, and this year I can
Continue Reading “Round 2! Innis & Gunn Irish Whiskey Finish with Dan & Julia”
Jack Daniel’s. You know it, you’ve had it. But you may not have had this. As the name suggests, this is bottled from a single barrel of Jack Daniel’s Tennessee whiskey. Okay, so why is that interesting? Because coming from a single barrel limits gives us the best indication of what Jack Daniel’s whiskey
Continue Reading “Jack Daniel’s Single Barrel Select with Matt, Marie-Michèle & Julia”
Round 2! Where we revisit bottles from the past for another taste and see how they stand up! I got this bottle for Matt’s housewarming… that I missed. But I made sure he got his gift and then drank some of it for him. Writer’s Tears has been one of my favourite Irish whiskeys since
Continue Reading “Round 2! Writer’s Tears with Matt & Brian”
Evan Williams Kentucky Straight Bourbon Extra Aged. What is it with bourbons and using their full name? Must be an American thing. There’s another Evan Quentin Williams the fourth or whatever bottle at the LCBO right now, a White Label that is “bottled-in-bond”, which I have discovered is kind of a weird thing. Bottled in bond
Continue Reading “Evan Williams Extra Aged with Dan, Steve & Alex”
The second review from my business trip to Michigan! I was going to be pretty disappointed if I didn’t find something local in MI, USA. It’s a working state, and working people need good booze to keep them from thinking about how much work they still have to do. And let me tell you, Traverse
Continue Reading “Traverse City Whiskey Company 4y Straight Bourbon with Dan & Julia”
We haven’t had an Irish whiskey in a while (wait.. fact check…woah). We haven’t actually had anything from Ireland since May, and no irish whiskeys for a year and three days. To be fair, there’s not a lot of Irish whiskey options at the LCBO that we haven’t already reviewed – on that note, prepare
Gentleman Jack Rare Tennessee Whiskey. Why is it a Gentleman and what makes it rare? Let’s investigate! The main selling difference between Gentleman Jack and his dirt common cousin regular Jack Daniel’s is a second charcoal filtering. If you believe the marketing, this smooths it significantly, and is noteworthy because Gentleman Jack is the only
Continue Reading “Gentleman Jack Rare Tennessee Whiskey with Davey & Alex”
Blanton’s Single Barrel Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey. This has been on the to-try list for a while now, so this was a great Christmas present. Great bottle. Good website. Excellent product placements on Bored To Death (a personal favourite), House Of Cards & Justified. A Sazerac brand related to the Buffalo Trace lineage, Blanton’s has
Continue Reading “Blanton’s Single Barrel with Goran & Davey”
Welcome to 2015. This year will mark 3 years of iScotch, and there’s a good chance we’ll cross 300 posts and a million views this year too. And what better way to start another year of whiskey than with something good and weird? Koval is definitely unusual: from Illinois, organic, single Minnesotan barrel and made
Continue Reading “Koval Single Barrel Millet Whiskey with Dan & Goran”
Return to Knob Country! Wow, that sounds like the name of a porn. Back to back Knobs here at-nope. Um… We’re busy Knobbing away-no. In the middle of a good Knobfest-not okay. SOMETHING SOMETHING THE 3RD KNOB CREEK. It’s awry. Well no, the start of this post is awry, this Knob Creek is a rye.
Back to the creek best known for its knobs. That is a terrible intro, so let me try again. Knob Creek! Single Barrel! 120 Proofs! All the proofs! We’ve had a Knob Creek before, about a year and a half ago, and the last review is a little, or completely, light on the information. I’m
Continue Reading “Knob Creek 9y Single Barrel Reserve with Dan”
Eagle Rare 10y. It’s got eagles, and it’s rare. ‘Murica. Eagle Rare is part of the Beam group, and is distilled in the same place as Buffalo Trace. We gave them crap about their web presence and marketing stuff the first time, but Eagle Rare is a little different. They have a lot of their
Bulleit Rye Whiskey. Because when you make okay bourbon, why not try okaying at other things too? While it doesn’t mention in what type of wood this whiskey was aged for or how long (presumably 3 years), the website does detail the mash pretty clearly: 95% rye 5% malted barley. We like that kind of
Continue Reading “Bulleit Rye Whiskey with Dan, Ryan & Davey”
Fighting Cock 6y Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey. Really, how could we not. This amazingly-named bourbon comes to us from Heaven Hill Distillery by way of the SAQ in Sherbrooke. We’ve previously tried the Elijah Craig 12y from Heaven Hill, a review that suffered from the lack of much information online. Heaven Hill’s brand-specific web presence
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Taking a brief break from the flavoured kids and getting back with a classic, Jim Beam. The Jim Beam Black is a 6y bourbon.. or 8, depending where and when you buy it, which means you’re getting either triple aged or… uh.. double aged? This is weird – the website calls this a double-aged 8y,
We’re riding the line between Weirdosland and Flavoured Country right now, and this week we wander into Black Cherry gulch. Gulch being apt as it’s the grossest sounding place name I can think of without Googling. Red Stag is a line from Jim Beam which also offers such other palate-bangers as “Hardcore Cider” (I love
Continue Reading “Red Stag Kentucky Black Cherry Bourbon Whiskey with Dan & Goran”
As you know if you’ve read any of our previous 200-some-odd posts, here at iScotch we are novelty junkies. We love new, weird ways of making whiskey. We’re going to be showcasing some new stuff here over the next few months, including some flavoured whiskies, some foreign whiskies and just some weirdo whiskies. It’s the
Continue Reading “Updated! Dry Fly Washington Wheat Whiskey with Dan, Ryan & Goran”
Sometimes St Paddy’s Day is actually St Paddy’s Week, because we love to reinforce European ethnic stereotypes whenever and wherever possible. And what better way to lower liver function as a celebration of Irish culture than with a Scottish beer? Scottish beer that’s finished in Irish whiskey casks, that is. iScotch loves Innis & Gunn
Continue Reading “Innis & Gunn Irish Whiskey Finish with Dan & Ryan”
Christmas Washington Bourbon! Thanks Devin & Brenna! Oola Distillery hails from the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Seattle, Washington, what reads like a fairly gentrified area of the downtown, central to the culture of the city. The name Oola appears to be a village in Ireland, a link that might be alluded to by the spelling
Continue Reading “Oola Distillery Waitsburg Bourbon with Devin, Jono, Ryan, Dan & Goran”
The first of the Christmas present whiskies, thanks Ross! Widow Jane is a Brooklyn, New York distiller, and the name comes from the mine where they draw their water. At least I think they do, they only mention this fact once in the pages and pages of marketing stuff at widowjane.com, widowjanespirits.com and widowjanewhiskey.com. Except
Continue Reading “Widow Jane 7y Straight Bourbon with Goran, Ryan, Sarah, Dan & Matt”
Continued attempts by team iScotch to find a rye we can actually get behind – Dan is probably our most rye-positive member while Ryan ironically insists no good rye exists. Either way, this is not that rye. We’ve reviewed a Wild Turkey before: decent but not amazing. This is the rye equivalent – Wild Turkey
Continue Reading “Wild Turkey Kentucky Straight Rye Whiskey with Dan, Ryan & Goran”
This one has been on the list for a while, good grab on Dan’s part. Connemara‘s claim to fame is being the only peated single malt irish whiskey, which sounds pretty unverifiable from this side of the Atlantic. Still a good pitch. If you read the site you realize that it’s a blend of young
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BattleScotch! The Budget Bourbon Edition. We have no one’s favourite Jim Beam Devil’s Cut battling fellow delinquent Labrot & Graham Woodford Reserve Distiller’s Select. It’s like listening to your neighbors fight: you don’t don’t care who wins, you just want it to be over so you can go to sleep because if you don’t get
On the eve of the good day, we tried a bad bourbon. A bad bourbon with very good marketing. If the label and media is to be believed, there are two endearingly- and juxtaposedly-named losses during the aging of whiskey. The Angel’s Share is the portion of the whiskey lost to evaporation (or a fungus),
Continue Reading “Jim Beam Devil’s Cut with Krystal, Dan, Ryan, Alex & Eddie”
Number three of the Beam Small Batch Bourbon Collection, Baker’s 7y doesn’t disappoint. We’ve been pretty solidly pro for the Basil Hayden and Knob Creek, and this bottle pulls its weight on the team. smell Dan – pleasant pickle, warm corn, musky, creme brule Simon – sugar maple, sweet, warm, char Ryan – bourbon, corn,
Continue Reading “Baker’s 7y Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey with Dan & Ryan”
This is the last refugee of my quick trip to Saint John, New Brunswick, and the second of what we’re calling Transnational Blends. If Three Ships was a curious rendezvous with a southern-hemisphere enchantress that makes you want to visit her foreign lands (nudgenudgewinkwink), then Phillips Union Whiskey’s cross-border mix of Kentucky Straight Bourbon and
Continue Reading “Phillips Union Whiskey Kentucky Straight Bourbon/Canadian Whisky with Dan”
Sometimes there isn’t much to say about a bourbon. Allegedly Jim Beam is the world’s best selling bourbon, oops, sorry, “Number 1” bourbon. “Best selling” is something that could be backed up by data. Whereas “Number 1” is a sort of nebulous non-specific claim that looks good in marketing materials. They make lots of claims
Continue Reading “Jim Beam Original Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey with Ryan & Goran”
Back in bourbon country. I am developing a fondness for the matured southern dram, that’s for sure. Wild Turkey 81 is… getting there. I wasn’t blown away, but there was enough merit to look into some of the others in the line. The website says it’s aged 6-8 years, so there’s no age expression on
Continue Reading “Wild Turkey 81 Kentucky Straight Bourbon with Dan”
Just a quick few words today on a old soldier. Jameson Irish Whisky has been around forever, for good reason. While nothing outstanding, this is a good whiskey for the price. smell Simon – smooth, wood, sweet, light solvent Goran – liquor, chocolate, rose Ryan – plastic, floral neat Simon – smooth, late burn, raspberry
Not much to say about Jack Daniel’s that you haven’t already thrown up in an alley, praying for death. They make Tennessee Sour Mash Whiskey, which legally is just bourbon from Tennessee. It does taste different from worse than any bourbon I’ve tried, so there’s that. However, this is the bottom line of the range,
Continue Reading “Jack Daniel’s Old No. 7 Tennessee Sour Mash with Dan & Ryan”
A twisty irish bottle, not usually a good sign. A website with lots of videos and drink recipes is also never a good sign. Especially when I can’t *find* this bottle anywhere on their site. kilbegganwhiskey.com also doesn’t mention being the oldest distillery, which is something you’d think they’d mention a lot, since they say
Yeah… Grant’s. To be fair, this is their entry scotch. But it does set off a few specific warning bells: blend, twist off, website mentions mixing, etc. Not that there’s anything inherently wrong with a blend, we just haven’t had a good one here yet. Still haven’t. smell Dan – sulfur, peat, burnt sugar Simon
Continue Reading “Grant’s Family Reserve Blended Scotch Whisky with Dan, Ryan & Goran”
Yay! More bourbon! Weird name tho, I don’t know how you trace a buffalo. This appears to be a case of giving the marketing people free license – Buffalo Trace Distillery sits on an ancient buffalo migratory path and may be the oldest (non-continuous) liquor production site in the USA. But only if you count
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Last week Beyond The Pale tweeted that they were releasing a Maker’s Mark cask-aged version of their Easy brew at noon on Saturday. I was out front at about quarter-to and within 5 minutes there were a dozen others. I grabbed two bottles of Make’r Easy, but wasn’t able to get any of the original
Continue Reading “Make’r Easy with Mom, Dad & Dev – Beyond The Pale Part 4 of 3”
Another case of a splash of water making all the difference. And it’s another case of a slightly overproofed spirit. It’s possible that my tongue has become accustomed to the 40-43% abv range and anything over that, while fun to drink for other reasons, is simply too overpowering for a true tasting. Anyway, Elijah Wood
Continue Reading “Elijah Craig 12y Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey with Dan & Alex”
Another bourbon! Bulleit is a Diageo brand, allegedly based on a 150 year old recipe that includes rye and barley malt in the make. It is not a particularly complicated drink, which leads me to believe it hasn’t been aged for any noteworthy length of time (also, the lack of age expression on the bottle
Continue Reading “Bulleit Bourbon Frontier Whiskey with Dan”
My buddy and previous guest reviewer Jono brought this back from one of his trips to the States. Dan and I tucked into it and here’s what we thought. smell simon – smooth, creamy, corn dan – very creamy neat simon – butter, smooth, sweet, butterscotch dan – creamy, slight burn, “legit shit” butterscotch, almost
Continue Reading “Knob Creek 9y Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey with The Dan”
