One essential part of the whiskey infrastructure we have been missing in Ireland to date is a Whiskey Club. For those of us with modest means a club is the best way of sampling a wide range of fine whiskeys as well as exchanging knowledge with fellow enthusiasts.
Michael Foggarty, of the Celtic Whiskey Shop, hopes to fill this gap. He proposes a meeting in Bowes pub on Fleet Street (one of my favourite spots, with a good whiskey selection) in January to hammer out the details.
If you are in Ireland and like the sound of becoming a founding member of a new Whiskey Club, could you drop Michael a line (michaelfoggarty_AT_hotmail.com) so he can gauge the level of interest? Perhaps you could mention too if you are in Dublin and available for that meeting in January.
Sunday 21 December 2008
Whiskey recommendations from The Irish Times
The Irish Times magazine had a feature on recommended Irish whiskeys today. It's solid advice, and I'm especially pleased to see the Tyrconnell 10yo port finish highlighted. You saw it here first :-)
The photo chosen to accompany the piece (only in the printed edition, not online) shows Bernard Walsh of The Hot Irishman company beside a few of his products. Among those is the elusive The Irishman Cask Strength which we have covered here before. While the bottles have arrived in the Celtic Whiskey Shop they are still not quite on sale. See the fourth comment here for details.
The photo chosen to accompany the piece (only in the printed edition, not online) shows Bernard Walsh of The Hot Irishman company beside a few of his products. Among those is the elusive The Irishman Cask Strength which we have covered here before. While the bottles have arrived in the Celtic Whiskey Shop they are still not quite on sale. See the fourth comment here for details.
Sunday 14 December 2008
Event: Celtic whiskey tasting in Kilkenny
The Wine Centre in Kilkenny will pit the Celtic nations against one another on Saturday, Dec 20th. Three single malts will be sampled: Bushmills 10yo representing Ireland, Bruichladdich 12yo for Scotland, and Penderyn Single Malt from Wales.
Penderyn is the only distillery in Wales and first fired up its still in 2000, so the whiskey is still a little young. Nevertheless it has been getting good reviews and, after reading their website and the description of their unusual distillation technique, I'm very keen to try it myself.
Anyway, pop along to The Wine Shop between 12 noon and 6pm on Saturday for a chance to taste these whiskeys.
I don't have much firsthand knowledge of whiskey retailers outside Dublin so I took the opportunity to ask the shop's manager, Jim McKnight, about their whiskey stock. While The Wine Shop's focus is unsurprisingly on wine, Jim tells me that they have the largest selection of whiskeys in the south-east, and it's getting bigger by the week.
Naturally they have all the old favourites but it sounds like it's a good place to chance on some more unusual bottlings too. Three bottles of Jameson 15yo (a very rare, pure pot still version of Jameson) arrived in the shop last week, for example.
The Wine Shop is also offering 20% off limited edition Lockes and Tyrconnell in wooden presentation boxes.
Penderyn is the only distillery in Wales and first fired up its still in 2000, so the whiskey is still a little young. Nevertheless it has been getting good reviews and, after reading their website and the description of their unusual distillation technique, I'm very keen to try it myself.
Anyway, pop along to The Wine Shop between 12 noon and 6pm on Saturday for a chance to taste these whiskeys.
I don't have much firsthand knowledge of whiskey retailers outside Dublin so I took the opportunity to ask the shop's manager, Jim McKnight, about their whiskey stock. While The Wine Shop's focus is unsurprisingly on wine, Jim tells me that they have the largest selection of whiskeys in the south-east, and it's getting bigger by the week.
Naturally they have all the old favourites but it sounds like it's a good place to chance on some more unusual bottlings too. Three bottles of Jameson 15yo (a very rare, pure pot still version of Jameson) arrived in the shop last week, for example.
The Wine Shop is also offering 20% off limited edition Lockes and Tyrconnell in wooden presentation boxes.
Tuesday 9 December 2008
Connemara at JJ Fox
Thursday 4 December 2008
15yo Cooley finishes
It's no secret I have a special regard for a couple of Cooley expressions, namely their 15yo single cask and 10yo port finish Tyrconnells. I had idly wondered what a 15yo port finish would be like and was stunned to find that such a thing actually exists.
In the Malt Maniacs awards list I posted yesterday you might have noticed 15yo "Cooley" madeira and port finishes. I asked Cooley about these and the story is that a Belgian whiskey importer, The Nectar, often buys full casks from the distillery and bottles them independently.
These finishes are single casks, bottled at 46% and sold under The Nectar's Daily Dram label.
Since there is no immediate prospect of seeing a similar whiskey in Ireland we'll just have to scrounge a taste off the Belgians!
In the Malt Maniacs awards list I posted yesterday you might have noticed 15yo "Cooley" madeira and port finishes. I asked Cooley about these and the story is that a Belgian whiskey importer, The Nectar, often buys full casks from the distillery and bottles them independently.
These finishes are single casks, bottled at 46% and sold under The Nectar's Daily Dram label.
Since there is no immediate prospect of seeing a similar whiskey in Ireland we'll just have to scrounge a taste off the Belgians!
Wednesday 3 December 2008
Malt Maniacs Awards 2008
The Malt Maniacs, an "international collective of malt whisky lovers", have announced their 2008 awards. What's nice about these particular awards is that the Maniacs are very transparent about the judging process and they don't accept money from any interested parties.
They do, however, depend on distillers, bottlers, etc. submitting a bottle for consideration so you should understand that this is not a head-to-head among all of the world's whiskeys. That said, they still managed to sip their way through almost 200 candidates so this is no small endeavour.
Apart from the whiskey awards, they also singled out Cooley distillery this year for a special prize, World Whiskey Distillery 2008 to recognise Cooley's impressive improvement. When the full tasting notes are published we should discover more about the motivation for this award.
In the meantime, I have extracted just the Irish whiskeys from the final line up. If you are used to Jim Murray's scoring, you might find that the Maniacs score a little on the low side. As a reference, their highest rating in 2008 was 91.
Silver Medal
Connemara 1992/2007 (50.5%, OB for Whisky Fair Germany, peated malt, C# K92/34 4184)
Score: 87
Bronze Medal
Cooley 15yo 1993/2008 'The Mad(eira) Angel' (46%, The Nectar, Madeira Finish, 370 Bts.)
Score: 84
Connemara 1992/2007 (46%, OB, Peated, C#K92/334086)
Score: 84
Cooley 15yo 1993/2008 'The Angel's Port(al)' (46%, The Nectar Daily Dram, Port Finish, 360 Bts.)
Score: 84
Connemara NAS 'Cask Strength' (57.9%, OB, Peated, +/-2008)
Score: 84
Cooley 16yo 1991/2008 (46%, Milroy's of Soho, first fill Bourbon, C#12441, 264 Bts.)
Score: 83
Tyrconnell 10yo Madeira Cask Finish (46%, OB, +/-2008)
Score: 83
Tyrconnell 10yo Sherry Cask Finish (46%, OB, +/-2008)
Score: 82
Tyrconnell 15yo (46%, OB, C#1852/92, +/-2008)
Score: 82
Greenore 15yo (43%, OB, Limited Edition, 5000 Bts.)
Score: 81
Connemara NAS (40%, OB, Peated, +/-2008)
Score: 80
Bushmills NAS '400th Anniversary 1608' (46%, OB, 2008)
Score: 80
They do, however, depend on distillers, bottlers, etc. submitting a bottle for consideration so you should understand that this is not a head-to-head among all of the world's whiskeys. That said, they still managed to sip their way through almost 200 candidates so this is no small endeavour.
Apart from the whiskey awards, they also singled out Cooley distillery this year for a special prize, World Whiskey Distillery 2008 to recognise Cooley's impressive improvement. When the full tasting notes are published we should discover more about the motivation for this award.
In the meantime, I have extracted just the Irish whiskeys from the final line up. If you are used to Jim Murray's scoring, you might find that the Maniacs score a little on the low side. As a reference, their highest rating in 2008 was 91.
Silver Medal
Connemara 1992/2007 (50.5%, OB for Whisky Fair Germany, peated malt, C# K92/34 4184)
Score: 87
Bronze Medal
Cooley 15yo 1993/2008 'The Mad(eira) Angel' (46%, The Nectar, Madeira Finish, 370 Bts.)
Score: 84
Connemara 1992/2007 (46%, OB, Peated, C#K92/334086)
Score: 84
Cooley 15yo 1993/2008 'The Angel's Port(al)' (46%, The Nectar Daily Dram, Port Finish, 360 Bts.)
Score: 84
Connemara NAS 'Cask Strength' (57.9%, OB, Peated, +/-2008)
Score: 84
Cooley 16yo 1991/2008 (46%, Milroy's of Soho, first fill Bourbon, C#12441, 264 Bts.)
Score: 83
Tyrconnell 10yo Madeira Cask Finish (46%, OB, +/-2008)
Score: 83
Tyrconnell 10yo Sherry Cask Finish (46%, OB, +/-2008)
Score: 82
Tyrconnell 15yo (46%, OB, C#1852/92, +/-2008)
Score: 82
Greenore 15yo (43%, OB, Limited Edition, 5000 Bts.)
Score: 81
Connemara NAS (40%, OB, Peated, +/-2008)
Score: 80
Bushmills NAS '400th Anniversary 1608' (46%, OB, 2008)
Score: 80
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