WHISKY IMPRESSIONS
  • Home
  • Blog
  • Privacy Policy

Tenuous Links Drinks Day 4 - Four Calling Birds

16/12/2014

0 Comments

 
Tenuous Links Drinks Day 4 - Four Calling Birds

On the fourth day of Christmas my true love sent to me
Four Calling Birds,
Three French Hens,
Two Turtle Doves 
And a Partridge in a Pear Tree.

This one gave me a bit more trouble than yesterday’s as I tried to think of different types of calling birds - canaries maybe? I remember drinking quite a lot of honey rum one year in the Canary Islands but I’m sure I can come up with a better tenuous link than that.

Then I read that in the original song, it was actually Four Colly Birds, not Calling Birds. What on earth are colly birds you may well ask? Turns out that colly meant black (as in coaly/coal maybe?) so probably referred to blackbirds or crows which were something of a delicacy at the time (remember the nursery rhyme with the four-and-twenty blackbirds baked in a pie?) Doesn’t sound very appetising but the black bird angle does open up a few more potential drink options;


Black grouse anyone? Or Coal Ila at a push going on the black/coal link?

My final choice of tenuous link drink for today though has got to be a glass of Merlot. The reason? We all know that merlot is a type of grape, but it is also a literal translation of ‘young blackbird’ in French. Not so many people know that. (Including me, much to my shame when my non-French speaking husband pointed this out to me!). 

Picture
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Author

    Whisky 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

    January 2019
    November 2016
    September 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    March 2015
    December 2014

    Categories

    All
    Adelphi
    Ardnamurchan
    Australia
    Australian Whisky
    Australian Whisky Appreciation Society
    Ballindalloch
    Beer
    Bells
    Books
    Cadenheads
    Campbeltown
    Caperdonich
    Casks
    Christmas
    Christmas Jumpers
    Cider
    Coburns
    Cocktails
    Commissions
    Compass Box
    Competition
    Corks
    Crafts
    Distilleries
    Drinks
    Dufftown
    Dumbarton
    Duty
    Fakes
    France
    French Whisky
    Glasgow
    Glasgow Distillery Company
    Glenfarclas
    Glengyle
    Glenrothes
    Glen Scotia
    G&M
    Hazelburn
    History
    Jim Murray
    Kilkerran
    Lark
    Local Barley
    Loch Lomond Group
    Lost Distilleries
    Luxury
    Macallan
    Map Prints
    NAS
    New Distilleries
    Not A Luxury Whisky
    Pastis
    Photography
    Piping
    Pricing
    Raki
    Ricard
    Spirits
    Springbank
    Stills
    SWA
    Tastings
    Tax
    T-Shirts
    Whipper Snapper
    Whisky
    Whisky Bible 2016
    Whisky Festival
    Whisky Shop Dufftown
    Wine
    Wolfburn

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.
  • Home
  • Blog
  • Privacy Policy