Old vs New, A Comparative Taste Test, or 'I got love for you, if you were born in the 80s'18/1/2016 I have just discovered that, unbeknownst to me, my husband has recently been buying lots of random old bottles at auction. The most recent purchase being a bottle of Bell’s from the 80s. What’s a wife to do?… Suggest a comparative taste test, naturally! I was very excited to discover that not only has he been buying whisky from the 80s but also other spirits, including a bottle of Ricard from the 80s that he picked up for the bargain price of £4. Now I must confess, I have a huge soft spot for pastis, Ricard in particular, after spending a year living in Aix-en-Provence when I was a student. I felt terribly sophisticated, at age 19, sitting sipping (ok, slugging) Ricard and chain smoking Gauloises in the pavement cafés of Aix, instead of necking pints and shots in the student pubs of Sauchiehall Street. Nearly 20 years on (eeek!) I am still very partial to a wee glass or two of Ricard as an aperitif, even in the depths of Scottish winter (although it does taste much better on a sunny terrace in the South of France) Anyway, enough nostalgia. Back to the matter in hand, the comparative taste test, which was now to include the1980s Ricard vs the current Ricard as well as the 1980s 12yo Bell’s vs the current NAS Bell’s. After a quick trip to Tesco to pick up a bottle of Bell’s (since we didn’t have any in the house) and a detour via Mark’s office to pick up the 1980s Ricard that he had secreted there (doubtless along with a few other bottles he hopes to sneak into the house at a later date) we were good to go. We started with the Ricard since it is traditionally an aperitif. In the interests of fairness, we decided to do the tasting blind so I would pour Mark’s drinks while he was out the room and vice versa. Our efforts were thwarted though when the current Ricard turned out to be much darker than the 80s one, so it was immediately obvious which was which. No matter, we pressed on regardless.
So, on to the whiskies. Bell’s bottled c.1980s vs Bell’s bottled c.2015. Around a 30 year age difference in terms of bottling date. In terms of actual declared age, our 1980s bottle carries a 12yo age statement, whereas today’s one, as with many whiskies, is NAS (Bell’s having dropped their most recent 8yo age statement a number of years ago). This one was better suited to a blind tasting as the colour is more or less identical. That said, it was immediately obvious to us both which was the old bottling and which the current one. We both preferred the old one. The current one, to me, seemed much more one dimensional, although to be honest, it was still much better than I expected!
Conclusions then. The generally held belief is that, unlike wines, spirits do not mature/change once bottled and yet in this taste test both the pastis and the whisky are markedly different. Why is that? I’ve always been very sceptical about the so-called ‘old bottle effect’ in older (as in bottled a long time ago rather than matured for longer) whiskies, but this may have changed my mind. However Mark (who has tried many more old bottlings than I have) doesn’t find it in all old bottlings so maybe it is down to changes in production or maturation rather than the whisky/spirit continuing to evolve in the bottle? Or maybe it is a case of evolution, as in, there are tiny, imperceptible changes in character/flavour each year; when you compare this years bottling against last years they are virtually indistinguishable but if you compare this years bottling against one that was bottled 10, 20 or 30 years ago then the differences are much more marked.
I don’t know. What I do know is that I’ll definitely be seeking out more old £4 bottles of Ricard at auction - much cheaper and just as drinkable, if not more so, than the current offering. Not so bothered about the Bell’s, past or present, though!
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We are approaching the end of our wee Christmas countdown and Day 11 brings us Eleven Pipers Piping. Whisky springs immediately to mind as you’ve got that old classic 100 Pipers blend, or, the most widely sold whisky in the world, Bagpiper (which despite the name is actually made and consumed in India! And despite being branded as a whisky is actually made from molasses so technically more rum than whisky) My inspiration for Day 11’s tenuous link drink though comes from one of the biggest piping events, the World Pipe Band Championships, held every year on Glasgow Green. 223 bands competed in the 2014 event, which attracted some 30,000 spectators. The winners, for the 4th year running were the Field Marshall Montgomery band, from Lisburn in Northern Ireland. Lisburn is also home to the Hilden Brewing Company, so my choice of tenuous link drink for Day 11 is a pint of Hilden Ale. Cheers!  On the eleventh day of Christmas, my true love sent to me;
Eleven Pipers Piping Ten Lords a Leaping Nine Ladies Dancing Eight Maids a Milking Seven Swans a Swimming Six Geese a Laying Five Golden Rings Four Calling Birds Three French Hens Two Turtle Doves and a Partridge in a Pear Tree  Hmm, let’s see, swans? Where can we go with this? Well, the Diageo Flora and Fauna range could be a good start - their bottlings of Linkwood featured a swan on the label. Alternatively, you could try a wee Penderyn Welsh Whisky since the Master Blender there is a certain Jim Swan. It seems that after having no links at all to whiskies for the first 4 days of this countdown, I now can’t get away from it! Let’s have a look at the history then, see if that gives us any alternatives. According to Celtic and British mythology lost loved ones would come back as swans, which had gold or silver chains around their neck to symbolise their enchantment. Swan necks… that’s taken us back to whisky again hasn’t it! Or spirits anyway. I’m just going to have to go with the whisky angle again on this one as the link to swan necks seems too good to ignore. Swan necks then are a feature on all copper pot stills. One of the largest manufacturers of copper pot stills is Forsyths in Rothes, in the heart of Speyside. Part of the Forsyths plant is on the site of what was, until relatively recently, the Caperdonich distillery so for Day 7, let’s go for Caperdonich*! (* Another closed distillery, so if you are struggling to get hold of some, you could always go for some Glen Grant, since Caperdonich was originally known as Glen Grant 2)
Day 6 and we are still on the bird theme, this time geese. The obvious choice for today would be Grey Goose vodka, produced in the Cognac region of France. Bit too obvious though, isn't it. I really feel I need to make you work a bit harder for your tenuous links drink. As well as being a very tasty addition to a traditional Christmas dinner, geese were also honoured for their protective services. (Have you ever been stuck in a field with a load of geese when they all start running towards you? Scary. And noisy. I can see why they were effective protectors) So, on the subject of protective geese - Dumbarton distillery, near Glasgow, was once renowned for having a gaggle of ‘guard geese’ as its site security. There were actually three different types of whisky produced on the one site; Dumbarton grain, Lomond and Inverleven single malt (The Lomond still is now at Bruichladdich). The distillery closed in 2003, but you can still find bottles by the likes of William Cadenhead*, Scotland’s Oldest Independent Bottler. Day 6 then, get yourself a dram of Dumbarton. Might take a bit a tracking down but hopefully worth the effort. *Yes, this is a shameless plug for my husband’s employer. Other indy bottlings are of course available too!  On the sixth Day of Christmas, my true love sent to me;
Six Geese a Laying Five Golden Rings Four Calling Birds Three French Hens Two Turtle Doves and a Partridge in a Pear Tree On the fifth day of Christmas my true love sent to me Five Gold Rings Four Calling Birds, Three French Hens, Two Turtle Doves And a Partridge in a Pear Tree. At first glance, the gift of 5 gold rings seems very extravagant after all the birds gifted on previous days, but apparently the 5 gold rings actually referred to ring necked birds, like a pheasant, which were considered quite exotic at the time of writing. Good to know that the gift giving ‘True Love’ in the song finds a theme he likes and then sticks to it!  So, what are we going to drink today to link in with the Five Gold Rings? Goldschlager springs immediately to mind - it’s even got real gold flakes in it - but doesn’t really fit with the rings. Let’s see…rings…There are 5 Olympic Rings and the aim of the Olympic Games is to win gold medals. The Olympic Games originated in Greece so maybe we should be looking to Greece for inspiration? Possibly the most well known Greek national drink is ouzo (as anyone who has been there on holiday can probably attest to, and, if you are anything like us, probably has a dusty bottle of it at the back of a cupboard somewhere to prove it) but we’ve already had raki as one of our tenuous links drinks so I think I’ll pass on that one.
 On the Third Day of Christmas my true love sent to me Three French Hens Two Turtle Doves And a Partridge in a Pear Tree Hmm, so what to have on day 3 of our Christmas Drinks countdown? As soon as I saw this one I thought of some kind of flip, made with a whole egg, to tie in nicely with the hen part of the equation. Flips are basically made from any fortified wine or liquor, shaken with a whole egg and sweetened with sugar. Given that there are some cracking French spirits around out there, this seemed like the perfect solution! Diffords Guide (always a good source of cocktail inspiration) has a good generic recipe that can be used with your base spirit of choice; 2 shots Brandy/Whisk(e)y/Rum/etc 1 shot Sugar Syrup 1 fresh egg (yolk and white) 1/2 shot Unsweetened Single Cream Shake all ingredients over ice and fine strain into a martini glass. Alternatively, serve hot in a toddy glass - just heat the ingredients in a microwave or in a pan over the stove. Although this appeals to me less, this is maybe the more ‘authentic’ version as the original flips, way back in the late 1600s, consisted of a tankard of ale to which a mixture of sugar, eggs and spices was added before being heated with a red-hot iron poker from the fire. I wouldn't recommend trying that one at home. The subject being 3 French Hens, I would suggest trying cognac, armagnac or maybe calvados as the base spirit. Or why not all 3 to see which works best? It is Christmas after all!
 On the second day of Christmas my true love sent to me Two Turtle Doves And a Partridge in a Pear Tree. Okay, so day 2 is looking a bit trickier. Nothing containing or featuring turtles or doves immediately springs to mind. A quick internet search though brings up a cocktail called a Turtle Dove; 2oz vanilla vodka 2 oz Frangelico 1 oz Amaretto 1 1/2 oz full fat milk Shaken over ice and strained into a Martini glass. Apart from the fact that it sounds like an alcoholic milkshake (one of my least favourite drinks - milkshakes that is, not alcohol!) it’s also not very imaginative. Back to the drawing board then, or in this case google, to see what else I can find. Now doves are generally considered a symbol of love, so maybe that gives us something more promising to work with? Turns out it does. The Phonecian goddess of love, Astarte, is said to have hatched from an egg, warmed by two turtledoves, on the banks of the Euphrates river. The source of the Euphrates is in Turkey (appropriately Christmassy I thought) where the national drink is the anise-flavoured Raki. Day 2 then in our Christmas countdown, Raki! Similar in style to Greek Ouzo or French Pastis, Raki is generally drunk diluted with cold water, turning it a milky white colour which the Turks call lion’s milk. I’m not much of a Raki connoisseur I must confess so if anyone has any recommendations please share them.   According to my advent calendar (yes, I still get one, my Mum buys me one every year!) there are 12 days to go til Christmas, which made me think of the song 12 Days of Christmas. You know the one, ‘On the first day of Christmas my true love sent to me, a partridge in a pear tree, etc etc’. I also recently read a very funny wee book by John Julius Norwich about the 12 Days of Christmas giving an amusing insight into what the recipient really thinks of the 12 imaginative gifts her true love sends her, accompanied by illustrations by Quentin Blake. I’ve always liked Quentin Blake, ever since reading all the Roald Dahl books as a kid. Anyway, back to drinks which is the whole point of this post - I thought it would be fun to do a wee Christmas countdown, finding drinks that tie in with each of the 12 days of Christmas. A quick google search showed that I was by no means the first to think of this little ploy so I’m going to try to go for slightly more tenuous connections* rather than the obvious. So, Day 1 - A Partridge in a Pear Tree… Well, the pear bit is easy, you could have Kopparberg Pear Cider, or Babycham for that retro vibe (as a bonus it has a Christmassy deer/reindeer type thing on the label) or even a Poire Williams for a little bit more class. But what about the Partridge? At first, I thought, a partridge is a game bird, so is a Grouse… some kind of Grouse and pear concoction maybe? That seemed a bit of a cop out though so after a bit of digging I discovered that the Partridge in a Pear Tree was originally intended as a gift of fertility - partridges being the reproductive equivalent of rabbits in ye olde days, and fruit trees often used in fertility rites, such as wassailing. Wassailing apparently involved pouring a mixture of cider, honey, spices and pulp from a burst apple around the base of the fruit tree. Hmm, sounds a lot like mulled cider to me so day one is going to be mulled cider, whether you choose to drink it while dancing around a pear tree is entirely up to you!
* Disclaimer: My choice of drink is not a recommendation or an endorsement of said product, it is solely to do with how well I think it ties in with the Day of Christmas in question. If it happens to be palatable, or even very tasty, then so much the better but no guarantees!
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AuthorWhisky Impressions is run by Kate Watt. Previously at Springbank and then Glenfarclas, I now design some whisky related stuff and write about it, and anything else that takes my fancy, on this blog. Archives
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