A Blind Dive Into Whiskey

At this point, I think everyone knows gin is our preferred liquor of choice. But, when the weather cools down we turn to another booze to warm our insides: whiskey. It’s perfect for our favorite cold weather beverage, the hot toddy. It’s also great for cocktails and more recently, Broad has joined Beard in drinking it straight up. We both have our preferred whiskeys and bourbons, but Broad is less likely to branch out from her favorites. Beard is more more willing to try anything. We got to thinking, with a chill in the air a whiskey tasting would be a great way to usher in the fall season. We have a lot of friends who are either big whiskey fans or just getting into it, so we knew we’d have willing participants. The question was in the setup.

The Who
We suggest having a group who is serious about whiskey and/or who are eager to learn about the booze. You don’t want to waste expensive liquor on people who won’t appreciate it. We had 12 people total and that was the perfect number. Our group ranged from whiskey connoisseurs to whiskey novices, but we were all much more enlightened by the end the event.

The How
So how were we going to try a bunch of different whiskeys without dying? Yeah, that was a TOUGH question, one we thought about quite a bit. We told everyone to bring at least one bottle. Some brought their favorite, some brought a new one and some people brought more than one bottle. We ended up with 12 bottles total. This actually ended up being nearly the perfect amount, if not a bottle or two too much.

Beard came up with the idea of doing a blind tasting. This allowed everyone to go into each sample with no preconceived opinions. Once everyone was present, we put the bottles in tall brown paper bags and mixed them up. Everyone presented Beard a bottle and he wrote a number on it (1-12).

For our usual tastings, we pour our first drink, talk about it and move on. Well, by the time we get through a bunch we get tired of pouring and people stop paying attention. It becomes an exercise in herding cats. Drunk, drunk cats. This time we switched it up. We poured a one ounce sample from each bottle into a cup with a corresponding number, then lined all samples up in front of each person. It took a bit of time but was well worth it. We took a sip of the first one, talked about it, then moved through the rest. This way we could really be clear headed and talk about all 12. After going through them for one round, we picked our top three, then went back. We HIGHLY recommend this process.

The Whiskey
We had a wide array of whiskeys, bourbons and ryes. Some new and some favorites. Here’s what everyone brought:

• Lip Service Rye
• Bulleit Rye
• Templeton Rye 6 Year
• Blanton’s Single Barrel
• Redemption Rye
• New Riff Bourbon
• Woodford Reserve Double Oaked Bourbon
• Cleveland Underground Whiskey (Hickory Wood)
• King’s Cut Whiskey
• Western Reserve Bourbon
• Basil Hayden’s Dark Rye
• Evan William’s Single Barrel Bourbon

We also threw in a Laphroaig Scotch 10 Year for anyone who wanted to try that. Broad is a huge Scotch fan; always smoky though, never peaty.

The Results
We had everyone keep notes and we were so impressed with the details everyone wrote down. Talking about each one upon first sip was also super helpful. There was a clear top three: Woodford Reserve Double Oaked, Basil Hayden’s Dark Rye, and Blanton’s Single Barrel. Those were also favorites of many before the tasting. People described these as “sweet, no burn, smooth, no big bite, mapley, appley.” The VERY CLEAR non-favorites were Cleveland Underground and Western Reserve. No one in our group liked those. The descriptors used for those were “burnt, chemical tasting, thick, metallic, boozy.” We had a lot of self-proclaimed rye lovers in this group and surprisingly, a lot of the ryes did not score well!

Like with every booze tasting, we suggest having a lot of food for everyone to nosh on before, during and after this tasting! Beard looked up food that paired well with whiskey which included cheese, chocolate, mushrooms, etc. Also be sure to have a hydration station and hydrate well before! This was our first liquor-only tasting, but it will not be our last. Being able to pour the samples all at once and compare differences such as aroma, color and taste while still having everything in front of you was a definite plus. Who knows what the colder months ahead will bring, but we’re sure it’ll be something fun to keep us entertained as we brave another Ohio winter. Cheers!