Tasting Whiskey

by Lew Bryson

  Have a good fresh French fry with your nose wide open, and you get the earthiness of the potato, the slight caramel notes from the browned crispiness around the edges, the notes of the fry oil (let’s hope it’s clean and fresh; if not, you may smell fish or burnt corn), and the hot salt. Now clamp your nose tightly with your fingers and eat a fry from the same batch, still fresh and hot, and you’ll still taste the salt, still taste the fullness of the oil, still sense the texture, but all those top notes are gone, and you’re left with a much less appetizing mouthful.

  When you eat or drink, you’re tasting with the tongue, but you’re also smelling, as the aromatics ride the airflow through your mouth and up into your nose. It’s best to think of it the way the eighteenth-century French gastronome Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin so perspicaciously put it: “The taste and the sense of smell form but one sense, of which the mouth is the laboratory and the nose the chimney.”

  What makes whiskey and other spirits so much more exciting in this realm is the physical presence of alcohol. Alcohol, beyond its well-known effects on the mind and body, is also a powerful and volatile solvent. As we saw earlier, it dissolves and then absorbs aromatic compounds in the beer and in the barrel, carrying those to the finished whiskey. When it encounters the heat of your mouth — and the heat of your hand on the glass before even entering your mouth — it begins to evaporate and thus carries a stronger dose of those aromatics to the “chimney” of your nose.

  Whiskey is, in this sense, similar to perfume — also alcohol based — and carries its bouquet on a floating, volatile bed of alcohol. It’s a synergistic whole. The creation of alcohol in fermentation brings aromas and flavors along with it. The distillation process filters and concentrates those aromas and flavors. Barrel aging again filters, but it also adds a great deal to the liquid, including the appealing color. Then alcohol carries all those aromas and flavors to your senses and — let’s be honest — provides a unique blend of psychic and physical effects that, in moderation, have enlivened and fascinated humans for millennia.

  It all comes together in a single, delicious package. To quote Brillat-Savarin again: “Alcohol carries the pleasures of the palate to their highest degree.” Smart guy, that Brillat-Savarin.

  Shots! Shots! Shots!

  Sip it? Or slam it? What do you think I’m going to say? If you slam back your drink of whiskey all at once, “doing a shot,” it’s gone. You enjoy one drink, you gasp for air a bit, and it’s done, except for the finish, and you’re one drink closer to oblivion.

  Honesty is important: whiskey is a potent drink. Taking too many, too quickly is, frankly, dangerous. No matter how good it tastes, you must respect that, and take things slowly, and safely.

  It isn’t just dangerous to drink too fast; it blunts your appreciation of the whiskey, and quickly. “Taste” five whiskeys in 90 minutes, and you won’t be tasting the last one, maybe even the last two. Sipping paces your enjoyment and ensures that you’ll still be getting a full measure of flavor and feel out of the last one.

  With all that said, there is something to be said for the occasional restorative gulp of whiskey. A quick dram can brace the nerves, if only in the fashion of a slap in the face; it shocks you, focuses you, hits the reset button. Just don’t make it a habit!

  No Easy Way Out

  You’re now tasting whiskey; you’ve done the work of getting past The Wall. Congratulations! You’re here, the mouth/nose combination is clicking, and you’re ready to embark on the lifelong work and pleasure of tasting whiskey. The first thing to learn about the work and the pleasure is this: there are no shortcuts; there is no One Best Whiskey.

  That’s not the usual statement. There are books full of whiskey tasting notes, with ratings in numbers or stars of every whiskey the writer could find, buy, or get a sample of, and you can find the same in magazines and on whiskey websites. I write some of those reviews myself. You’ll find “top 10” lists, “world’s best” lists, and an ever-growing array of awards, medals, and ribbons. If that’s not enough, there’s someone in every whiskey bar and liquor store out there with an opinion on what the best whiskey is, often expressed like this: “I drink only X whiskey,” which implies that you should, too.

  I get it. It’s an appealingly easy idea. There are a lot of choices, and as whiskey becomes more popular, there are more choices hitting the shelves every month. It’s intimidating, and it can be expensive. Instead of spending a lot of money on whiskeys, and taking time to taste whiskeys, and doing all that thinking about them as you taste them, why not simply look at one of these guides and then go on your way rejoicing, drinking “the best” whiskey?

  If you do that, you’ll not only be cheating yourself out of a lot of fun, and a lot of good whiskey, you’ll be stunting your education before it begins and maybe even condemning yourself to some serious dissatisfaction. I don’t want you to become one of the people who will take me aside when I’m talking about whiskey or doing a tasting and ask, with clear confidence that there is some secret, single answer, “But which one is the best?” Because that’s the one whiskey and the only whiskey they want to buy — the best — whether from a desire to save decision time, or to bask in the relieving knowledge that they bought the best, or to be able to tell their friends that they have the best whiskey.

  Myself, I like to go to the liquor store or the bar and take a look at all my options. Do I want something tried and true, do I want to splurge a bit on a small upgrade from my usual, or do I really want to lay out the coin for something truly rare and wonderful this time? I’ve never yet made a decision that I’ve really regretted, because it’s almost always been good, and it’s been educational every time. There was one truly terrible blended whisky at the airport bar in Frankfurt . . . but even that made a good story: no one should ever taste a whisky named “Glob Kitty,” even on a dare.

  Barry Schwartz, in his book The Paradox of Choice, calls people who use these approaches to dealing with a proliferation of choices “maximizers” and “satisficers.” Maximizers look to get the best possible results from their decisions, every time. Satisficers are looking for “good enough” results. As a confirmed satisficer, I’m hoping for a little better than merely “good enough,” but you get the point. Maximizers generally have a harder time making a decision; they spend more time researching it and asking what other people are buying and often wind up less satisfied with their decisions.

  They’re also going to pay more . . . a lot more. High-end whiskey is often rare whiskey, and that kind of rarity costs. A bottle of 40-year-old single malt can cost $1,000 or more; a bottle of the coveted Pappy Van Winkle 20-year-old bourbon will run you over $800, if you can manage to find one. There is not enough of what people call the best to go around, and looking for it can be maddening.

  If someone’s that fixated on getting only the best whiskey, it’s possible that he doesn’t even like whiskey that much. If he did, he’d be in it for the enjoyment the rest of us experience: drinking the whiskey, not owning it. These are people who are buying labels and bottles, not whiskey. Let them buy the rare and expensive; when the bubble bursts, maybe you can pick them up at auction.

  Then there are people who are just as focused, but on one particular whiskey or brand: Maker’s Mark, Macallan, Jameson, Gentleman Jack, Johnnie Walker Blue, whatever. They’ll drink only that whiskey, they’ll let you know it’s the best whiskey, they’ll have a beer or wine rather than drink a different whiskey if their favorite isn’t available.

  No matter what whiskey they’re drinking, they’re wrong: it’s not the only best whiskey for everyone. But for whatever reason, it’s working for them, and they like it, and I doubt they’re ever going to read this, so they’ll stay happy drinking their whiskey of choice.

  The folks you really have to watch out for are the category snobs. You can see them pop up anytime a story on whiskey runs on a national news website, because they can’t resist the chance to tell everyone else they’re drinking the wrong whi
skey. The only true whiskey is sour mash, they’ll say; you should be drinking single malt or you’re not really drinking whiskey; Irish whiskey is the first whiskey; and so on.

  They’ve made a singular mistake, and you shouldn’t let them influence your choices. Because just like there is no One Best Whiskey, there is no One Best Type of Whiskey, either. It’s fine for someone to say, “I like Scotch whisky the most,” or “Bourbon’s harsh on my palate, so I drink Irish whiskey,” or “I think single malts have more flavor than blends.” Those are personal preferences. But to confuse personal preferences for world truths is no way to go through life. (And that’s true whether you’re talking about whiskey or any other subject under the sun.)

  Let’s take this apart right now. Scotch whisky sells more than any other type, worldwide (with the exception of the “whiskies” of southern Asia, most of which are not considered traditional whiskies at all because they’re not grain based). Part of that success stems from the success of export marketing, some of it is left over from the once-wide influence of the British empire, and some of it is from the business and political failures that interrupted the growth of American and Irish whiskey.

  Some of it, of course, is because Scotch whisky is an excellent product . . . but it has no exclusive hold on that claim. The other major whiskeys — bourbon, rye, Irish, Canadian, Japanese — are also excellent products, and well liked by their fans. I’ve had very nice examples of each of them, whiskeys I’d happily drink again and proudly offer to my best friends. You won’t be able to find what you like by drinking only one type of whiskey.

  So what do you pick when you go to the store? Is there a guide to picking the best whiskey? There is one, but let’s have a look at which guides don’t work first.

  Whiskey Sales Worldwide

  *Measured in industry-standard 9-liter case equivalents

  “Older is better.” Older is certainly older, and older is usually more expensive. Better? Sometimes, sometimes not. Keep in mind, higher price does not always mean better whiskey; mostly it means rarer whiskey, and that’s a different prospect. Young whiskey costs less because it’s been held less time, but it also costs less because there’s a lot more of it.

  There is always going to be more young whiskey than old whiskey because of the evaporative “angel’s share” process we talked about in the previous chapter. Whiskey simply disappears in the aging process. Distillers put the same amount of money — grain, energy, labor, barrels, and the physical space for aging — into the barrel of 8-year-old whiskey as they did for the barrel of 20-year-old, and there’s a lot less of the 20-year-old. If there’s less whiskey, it’s more expensive, so the older stuff is going to cost more. They have to sell it for more to make the same profit per bottle.

  It is therefore in the whiskey makers’ interest for us to believe that older, more expensive whiskey is necessarily better. It always tastes different, but “better” is more subjective. For example, bourbons that are 15 years old and older are enjoying strong popularity these days, led by the hard-to-find Van Winkle wheated bourbons. They score high in ratings, they win clutches of awards, and collectors hoard them jealously. But for me the sweet spot for bourbons is between 7 and 12 years old. That’s when they’ve left behind the green and fiery days of their youth, and they aren’t dominated by the drying, not-quite-astringent wood character of old age (sorry, “maturity”; I have to remind myself that I’m getting close to that era myself). There are exceptions, and there always will be — older bourbons that because of an exceptional barrel or warehouse placement retain more of the freshness of youth — but in my mind, at least, older is not always better. Rye whiskeys are even more variable on this angle; there are some spectacular young ryes. It’s a matter of personal appreciation.

  What about Scotch, though? That’s where you’ll find the truly stratospheric prices and the older-than-you-are whiskies that feed into this type of thinking. The older blends command higher prices, and once single malts get over about 15 years of age, their prices climb steeply. Surely that 30-year-old is more refined, more majestic, recognizably better than the same distillery’s callow 15-year-old?

  Again, it depends on what you’re looking for, what taste it is that you love. Distillery character can be as bold and roaring as the peat of an Islay or as light and loving as the malt of a Lowland. Yet the bold can be done in by aging too long in the wrong wood, or by a clumsily selected finish, and the delicate can be enhanced greatly by skillful aging, perhaps in older refill casks that don’t overwhelm.

  You can learn what you like, the age you find most likely to please, only by tasting whiskeys. It’s your best defense against paying a huge amount for a whiskey that may be disappointing.

  Evolution of Flavor as a Whiskey Ages

  *“Spirit character” defines the nature of the new, unaged spirit — Glenmorangie’s light and elegant sweetness, Glenfarclas’s beefy and oily weight, Maker’s Mark’s clean corn, and all the many different shapes of peat. It starts out as the dominant flavor and quickly combines with everything else, the wood being first.

  **Peat and Sherry are optional.

  “Higher proof is better.” The idea here is that the standard minimum legal 80 proof (40 percent ABV) is “watered down.” Therefore, higher-proof bottlings are better, not because you’re getting more alcohol — though some folks do feel that way — but because you’re getting more flavor and more stuff, and more of the whiskey’s character comes through when you blend it into a cocktail, or add water or ice.

  I’ve been guilty of this one myself; I’m a big fan of cask-strength whiskeys (bottled without dilution to a standard proof) and bottled-in-bond bourbons (“bonded” bourbon is legally required to be 100 proof). I like being able to cut back on the proof to my liking, and I like to know that there’s as much flavor there as there can be. High-proof bottlings are often good values, too, particularly the bonded ones still on the market, because some consumers either don’t know what they are or are intimidated by them. Heaven Hill has a 6-year-old bonded bourbon that just oozes with lusty young bourbon flavor and packs an authoritative 100-proof punch.

  But what about one of my favorite summertime whiskeys, the standard “Yellow Label” Four Roses bourbon? For me it’s perfect at 40 percent ABV when we’ve got one of our hot and humid summer days going; throw a handful of ice cubes in a squat, solid tumbler, drown them with Yellow, and drink at will. Just as I like a solidly overproof rye in a Manhattan, I prefer standard-proof whiskey in tall drinks for summer.

  Then there are the whiskeys, lots of them, that simply aren’t available at higher proof; most Canadian and Irish whiskeys, for example, and most Scotch blends. Do you just write them off? Of course not. Once again, you have to taste them — and in this case, taste them in different settings, neat, iced, or in cocktails — to know what you like.

  The Peat Race

  Peat freaks love to compare peaty whiskies, and they look to ppm (parts per million) of phenols, the smoky compounds from peat smoke, as an objective measure. Phenols are easily measured in malt . . . but that doesn’t necessarily mean they all get into the bottle. Lagavulin distillery manager Georgie Crawford told me that phenols in malt are about three times what they are in the spirit. Don’t get wrapped up in the numbers; peatiness is, after all, only part of a whisky’s whole. Still, it’s kind of fun to compare ppms. Here’s the phenol content for some distillers and a few particularly peaty whiskies — but note that ppm can vary between bottlings. Also note that even unpeated malt, like Glenlivet, has some natural phenol content. (If you’re wondering where Highland Park is, the distillery smokes some of its own malt to “between 35 and 50 ppm” and then mixes that in a 1:4 ratio with unpeated malt; the result is pleasingly variable.)

  “Smokier is better!” Obviously we’re talking about Scotch whisky here, though there are some American craft whiskeys that are doing interesting things with smoke. The same misconception applies to them all: If smoke is good, more smoke must be bet
ter.

  This reminds me directly of the 20-year arc of hoppiness in American craft beers: hoppy, hoppier, hoppiest . . . no, hoppier still! Because 25 years ago, you could scarcely give away peaty whiskies like Lagavulin or Talisker. Port Ellen was closed, Ardbeg was closed, Bruichladdich would soon close, and peaty whisky was a thing for odd aficionados and for spicing up blends.

  But as single malts gained popularity, the popularity of peat rose even more steeply, and peat aficionados were no longer so odd. Ardbeg and Bruichladdich reopened, sales and production increased, and we saw bottlings named Peat Monster, Big Peat, and The Big Smoke, along with highly peated distillery bottlings like Bruichladdich Octomore and Ardbeg Supernova. It seemed that what we really wanted was so much peat in the whisky that it would rise right out of the glass and smack us.

  Which is great; if you really like peat, more smoke is better, up to a point. But if you’re one of the whisky drinkers who honestly don’t like it, or who like the richness and depth that a little smoke brings, more is definitely not better for you. Again, you can learn what you like only by tasting whiskeys, not by being told.

  “Craft/small maker is better.” I like small producers. Meeting the brewers at a brewpub and talking about their beer is a great experience. You can learn a lot speaking to artisanal cheesemakers, bakers, and butchers. You’ll learn why things are done the way they are, where the flavors come from, what makes their products different.