At The Whisky Bar

We've not been to the distilleries in Scotland together, and that is a trip both the man and I want to take. The scenery and whisky will all be stunning. A pity that we can't make the trip with the friends this May. SIGH. We'll make do with what we can wherever we are then.

We've had enough of wine, clearly. I get grouchy if no whisky come my way. So for the recent meals, beer and whisky have showed up very often. We chilled out at Baranows Lounge and had many drams of good whisky.

I had a light Edradour 10y.o that is straight from the cask. The man was intrigued by the Elements of Islay. He picked out Laphroaig's LP1 and Lagavulin's LG2 to taste. The LG2 is almost sweet and oaty, but with a lingery fiery aftertaste. It was well accompanied by the LP1 which bears a deep smoke. Then, there're the rare bottles of Port Ellen that we simply had to try a dram of because with the closure of the distillery, these expressions are not in production and whatever is left, is floating around the collectors' cellars.

We had a taste of the newest Islay distillery- Kilchoman. Its 2.y.o is young and almost flat. The 4y.o is surprisingly peaty, with a lot of promise when it matures into an 8y.o. The bartender clearly knew his whiskies. He was very engaging and introduced us to Tasmanian whisky as well as the Australian non chill-filtered Bakery Hill single cask classic and peated expressions. Quite nice.

There was an intense discussion about up and coming distilleries outside of Scotland. The warmer climate in these areas mean that whisky mature faster and a young expression will taste richer than its year. We agreed on the point that whisky is turning contemporary and many of the younger expressions between 8 to 10 years could match a 12 y.o or even 15 y.o in terms of nose and taste, but perhaps not the complexity and aftertaste.