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A few weeks after tasting Talisker Storm I knew that Talisker was releasing another bottling, this time finished in Port casks: Talisker Port Ruighe.

You can imagine how I felt!. I am not what you would call a fan of Talisker but I really enjoy the peat and pepper character of its whiskies and I have been in love with it since I tasted some of Talisker oldest bottles. I tried by all the means to get a sample from the distillery but…

I have had to wait for the guys of Master of Malt to released it in their drink by the dram section ( God bless them! ). So just to complete the tasting I added other whiskies that I were really interested in tasting: A Jura 1999 Bourbon XU, a now discontinued Arran The Eagle and the new Cutty Storm.

I have no idea how each of them are, but the Jura that says heavily peated… so let’s begin with the blended whisky.

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Someone has to do it!

This is my drinking queue for July with lots of interesting stuff. I will begin with Bruichladdich Cuvee First Growth. The rest of stuff is a vertical tasting of Tomintoul, several Aberlour whiskies including two A’bunadh, five peated whiskies including this year Feis Ile’s Kilchoman whisky and eight whiskies of the world.

I will keep you updated!

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Argh! Isn’t Spain lovely? Sun, beach, siesta and 35ºC every day of the summer. I am so desperate I will even drink a Johnnie Walker on the rocks. Man! I need a break. So there I was at my favorite summer spot, on the shadows, under a huge ceiling fan when the whisky fairy ringed the door…

My bottle of Laphroaig Cairdeas arrived home and well, as I happen to have several samples of this year Feis Ile 2013 thanks to the chaps of Master of Malt ( thanks to them and to £50 I spent on the samples ) I decided it was time for a proper healthy peat tasting to combat this awful heat wave.

In case you don’t know, Feis Ile is Islay’s annual festival of Malt and Music. Islay has a long and ancient history of Gaelic music and the last week in May was a time when both island musicians and indeed Gaelic folk musicians from the mainland would gather on the island to play and sing at Ceilidh’s, the Gaelic word for Gatherings. But not all it music, all of the eight Islay Whisky Distilleries join the celebration in what is probably the most famous whisky event in the World calendar.

So let’s see some of the whiskies I have taste. Let’s stay from the south and move up.

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A few weeks ago I was asked about Alexander & James, an online shop with a big focus on luxury spirits, and after a few minutes on the website I had a clear idea of what they have there.

Really, don’t go to Alexander & James for a wide range of whiskies or other spirits. They have a limited offering of whiskies, but some of the greatest between them, like you know, Talisker, Lagavulin, Caol Ila, Cardhu,…, one gin, one vodka ( who need another vodka anyway ), Zacapa rums and Don Julio Tequila. So, why I am writing about them?

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May your whisky never runs out my friend! Unless you are drinking Johnnie Walker, if you are please… let me pour something better on your glass…

This is not a proper What the F*** tasting session with blind samples, but I just got from my evil box stuff that I wanted to drink. Particularly there were two whiskies I have a huge interest in tasting: Yamazaki 10 years old… I still remember when I could buy bottles of this one at £17… and Octomore 10 years old. As you know I collect whisky and I had my chance of buying this Octomore for it RRP… but still £150 was quite high for such a whisky… Did I go wrong with it?

Time to drink!

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What the hell! July already?! Well, I was supposed to write about this WTS 2013-03 session almost two months ago, but as the poet says there is no harm on delaying if the whisky is good.

As usual, Whisky Tasting Sessions is a set of six whiskies that Jean Marie Putz chooses himself and tasted blindly by us. Just a number on each sample so you can identify it and most of the times they are not sorted in any proper way. But as always, it is a pleasure to test my senses against them.

This session has a great dram that I really love and it has been really fun to discover what it was. Usually between strange independent bottlings of bizarre distilleries there is a jewel or two, like a 38 years old Bunnahabhain that really surprise you. Such is the case…

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