I’ve seen this mural… 500 times? More? Then this week I get off the bus and I see it as if it were the first time. The whole mural is beautiful but this part, framed just like this, with that little swoop of graffiti along the jaw-line, stopped me in my tracks that day. It’s my phone background now.
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That first Golden Wedding has a label on it assuring the consumer that no industrial/denatured/poisoned alcohol was added to it.
Some Prohibition-era whiskey bottles and a liquor prescription stub from the Museum of the American Gangster in NYC. There is such a place and now I've been there. It's... interesting. The interpretation, from a museum-person standpoint is not great. There are huge walls of text next to printed pictures but amongst all that, there are some amazing artifacts. A period still, lots of old liquor bottles, two safes from a speakeasy, Dillinger death masks, a children's cops and bootleggers chase set and more. There's a tour that hits all the highlights and gives some information not on the walls of text. Better? It's on the site of a former speak easy and the panic room is still intact downstairs. It mostly covers Prohibition-era stuff but there is some pre-history and it also looks like there's some intention to expand to more modern organized crime.
There are more pictures from my recent, very cold, whirlwind trip to New York up here.
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Johnny Drum Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey, Private Stock
Similar Maker’s… but malty instead of wheaty and I like it better.
Tin Cup American Whiskey
Sweet! Very, very sweet. Apparently it’s rye-heavy but if, like me, you’re more of a bourbon enthusiast, don’t let that scare you away. This is a totally bourbon drinker’s whiskey. I would have it again and again. Straight, rocks, water, I’ll take it however you serve it. This is some fine whiskey for my palate.
Stranahan’s Colorado Whiskey
Another bourbon-drinker-friendly whiskey from Colorado. I think I liked the Tin Cup just a touch better but I think that’s just because it’s a little sweeter. Aslo very, very nice.
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Wanna know a secret? This is a little embarrassing. For the longest time I conflated these two. I’d never tried either but I always mixed them up. I would hear Chivas Regal and imagine the purple, draw-string bag all my friends kept their dice in in high school. (Mine were in a hand-made velvet bag, thankyouverymuch.) I would hear Crown Royal and, well, I’d imagine the purple, draw-string bag all my friends kept their dice in in high school.
Silly me.
I did some actual research with this tasting and it turns out I really like everything Chivas Brothers has put out that I’ve tried so far except the Glenlivet 12y. Strathisla 12y? Instant favorite. Scapa 16y? Instant favorite. Chivas 18y? Fantastic. Glenlivet Nadurra 16y? Incredible. This is, of course, most similar to the Chivas Regal 18y. It’s a solid, smooth, blended scotch. Nice.
The Crown Royal couldn’t be more different. There’s no way I will ever conflate them again now that I’ve tried them. It’s lighter, more crisp than most of the Canadian whiskies I’ve tried. There’s a bit of a minty quality to it that I find strangely pleasant. Especially when you consider that I’m not a big fan of mint.
In summary: I appear to be a Chivas Brothers girl in addition to a Willet and Balvenie Girl; I liked them both; and I’ll never mix them up again.
Dewar’s White Label Blended Scotch Whisky
Straight, it’s good. Sort of like any other scotch. With ice, it’s bright and sweet and smooth and really very good. I’d take that any day.
Jack Daniel’s Tennessee Whiskey, Single Barrel Select
Nope. Not for me. This is actually the first JD I’ve had. It shares that particular aftertaste that is a complete no-go for me. One of these days, I’ll figure out what it is but for now I’m curious if other JD whiskeys share it.
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Compass Box Spice Tree Blended Scotch Whisky
I was expecting so much more from this. I learned about it from a bartender after I tried Compass Box’s Peat Monster and I looked around for it for a while before ordering just a dram of it to try. Maybe I psyched myself up for it too much. It was good. I’d even give it very good. But I was expecting more than good; I was expecting interesting. What I got was good.
Pappy Van Winkle Family Reserve Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey, 20 Year
Again, sublime. Layered. Interesting profile. I liked it better than the 23y and it was worth it to know what it tastes like but I will probably keep going back to the 12y and the 15y.
Hooker’s House Straight Bourbon Whiskey
Rye-heavy for a bourbon and matured in Pinot Noir barrels, this one is not for me. It shares the same aftertaste that drove me away from Whistle Pig and the one Dalmore that I’ve tried but my tasting companion for the evening didn’t get any of the flavors that I described and really, really liked it for her palate. Ice only intensified them. For me, it would’ve been undrinkable. For her, it was amazing.
Compass Box Delilah’s American Oak Blended Scotch Whisky
I went looking for a different Compass Box. The bar didn’t have it but counter-suggested this. (And serious hat tip to that bartender. Three of the four he pulled, I’d never even seen before.)
It reminds me a lot of the lighter bourbons and sweeter American whiskies I’ve tried. It’s sweet; it’s vanilla; it’s oaky; and it’s very, very good.
Oh. OH.
I don’t think I have words for this yet. This was the last dram in the advent calendar* and: well done Master of Malt. Also: Holy crap this scotch is as old as I am. Past that? I… I’m sorry. This was very, very, VERY good. And I’m glad I saved it for a (personal) special occasion and that’s really all I can give you.
Even after all the progress I’ve made, I don’t feel ready/adequate/qualified/fuuuuckme to even begin to describe something of this caliber. I have another 40-y dram of something else I’m saving for my birthday. We’ll see how that goes and chat again in a few months.
Okay? Okay.
* And can I just take a moment to point out how much effort went into trying to keep those pictures of essentially the same damn thing over and over again interesting? The adventure’s not over. I have two more, smaller, tasting sets from Drinks by the Dram, too.
I was flipping between full auto in the sun (because: lazy) and manual indoors and in the shade and ended up forgetting and doing a whole series of shots outdoor with the aperture wide and the shutter long. Woops. I almost trashed the whole, blown-out lot of them in post (I do very little but sizing in post) but then this gem showed up. I sort of love it.
The rest of the shots from the Glass Beach are here. There are also sets from Point Cabrillo Lighthouse and the Sea Glass Museum.
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JP Wiser’s Rye Blended Canadian Whisky
This does not taste like a rye. This tastes like a big, bold bourbon. The bar where I tried it was trying to pour it off because, well, it doesn’t taste like a rye and rye drinkers didn’t like it. I, on the other hand, really enjoyed it.
JP Wiser’s Spiced Canadian Whisky, Vanilla
Cloyingly, eye-wateringly sweet but not too bad with a shot of soda water and some ice. I understand it’s quite good in eggnog, too.
Hudson Baby Bourbon Whiskey
This one has some odd… peanut butter? sort of aftertaste but it somehow works. I’m not sure I’d go buy a bottle of my own but I probably wouldn’t turn it down, either.
Balcones Brimstone Corn Whisky
Suuuuuuper smokey, as one would expect with a name like “Brimstone.” Like what that one person at the campfire or bonfire who is sensitive to smoke always gets a face full of. Or like the strong, billowing smoke from a house fire. Personal point of reference: the Victorians across the way from me burnt down two years ago and it smelled just likethis tastes. Someone walking by and maintaining a reasonable personal space bubble could smell it. Teasing out the whisky underneath the smoke, it’s nice, like everything else Balcones puts out but I prefer my smokey adult beverages to be limited to the “perfectly carbonized marshmallow” sort if they’re not mezcal which, paradoxically, I love. |
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Macallan Highland Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 12-year
Another sherry-finished scotch and, oh goodness, that is dangerously drinkable.
Cat Daddy Spiced MoonshineTasted more like a liqueur. Very, very sweet. Like undrinkably sweet. Ended up adding soda water and ice to it to manage it which made it actually not bad but I can’t imagine drinking it for anything more than the novelty of it.
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Mackmyra Brukswhisky
Swedish Whisky. Color me impressed. It’s more subtly sweet like a sherry or bourbon-finished (Huh. Turns out: both.) Only the faintest bit smokey. Really tasty.
Evan Williams Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey, Single Barrel Vintage, 2003
Oooooh, this one’s confusing. I went to go see what year of the Evan Williams Single Barrel Vintage I’ve tried and it turns out it’s this one. And I had a completely different experience last time. Last time I thought it was good but nothing to write home about. Last time was recently. So recently that my palate really should not have shifted, at least not this drastically.
This time:
Heavily vanilla and bread and fruit but somehow not super sweet, spicy with no bitter back-end. A few things that are just on the tip of my tongue (har—actually more to the back) but I haven’t been able to place them. It’s definitely aligned pretty well for my palate but threre’s a lot of fun stuff going on in there, not just the sweet.
The original is here.
Balcones Texas Single Malt Whisky
Dalmore Single Malt Scotch Whisky, 18-year
Not for me. It smells amazing. One inhale is fresh, still sticky, caramel corn and the next is campfire and that held such wonderful promise. But it has the same aftertaste as the Whistlepig Rye did and that’s an absolute no-go for my palate. I couldn’t finish it.
Her, on the couch: Can I have a some strawberries? Like three?
Me, in the kitchen with the strawberries but doing something that I didn’t want to walk away from right then: I don’t know, can you catch three?
Her: Let’s find out.
Me: [throws one]
Cat, on the couch between her and the kitchen: [startles, looks up, looks at her, looks at me, looks up]
Me: [throws another]
Cat: [startles, stares intently at the spot above her that the strawberry just passed through]
Her: Great. Now she thinks strawberries can fly.
Me: [throws the last one] We should throw strawberries from now on. That should be their principal method of relocation.
Cat: [continues to stare intently at the spot above her that the strawberries passed through for another five minutes]
This year the Asian Art Museum brought in a bell. Short version: ring the bell to rid yourself of last year’s awfulness. Longer version: On December 31, they let 108 (groups of) people ring that bell to shed the year’s badness, to let things go. I had a good year. I had a really good year. I mean, just look at the last eight months of this blog. But I am not the only person in my life and a lot of my friends, a lot of my loved ones, have had really sincerely fucked up years. So I went.
I didn’t ring it because I didn’t need to but I went to stand witness. It was beautiful and it was glorious and I am not using any sort of artistic license or hyperbole when I tell you that it nearly brought me both to my knees and to tears.
…
There’s this superstition that the way you spend New Years, that three seconds spanning from 11:59:59 to 00:00:01, is somehow indicative of how you will spend the following year. Begin as you mean to end it. I like that. I’ve given that some amount of credence, even if I know it’s self-fulfilling.
For the last umpty years, I’ve spent New Year’s on my own, on the couch, in comfy clothes, with a carefully-chosen book. I was with someone for a number of those years but we were usually in different time zones come the fireworks. Go on ahead and talk to me about the importance of NYE kisses. I’ll wait. I can’t remember the last one I had and I designed it that way. It was how I chose to be. It was how I wanted to be. It was how I wanted to be for the next year and I made it happen, plus or minus.
This year, I didn’t manage to finish the book before the book I had carefully chosen as my New Years read before the Big Day.
And so it begins.
I went out for a dinner. That’s unusual. I usually cook for myself. I had some superficial interactions that were aaaaalmost not… and then were. I had some deeper interactions. And after everyone who didn’t work there and who wasn’t a regular left, we kept talking and—drinking or no—my guard was already down whether they realized it or not and it would’ve been so easy to stay. But at 11:45, I pardoned myself.
"Y’all are great and I love you but I have a date with a couch, some sweats and East of Eden.”
So I left. To… to what? To preserve my tradition? To “predict” 2014? To solidify the theme for 2014 in my head? And I rushed. I rushed. There were no cabs. There were no busses. I was maybe twenty minutes out by foot and I had fifteen minutes until midnight so I rushed.
And fuck
that
rushing.
I was in a park near my home when the fireworks went off and people started yelling. There were horns. There was a small amount of good-natured screaming. I stopped on purpose in that liminal space between nurturing friends and manufactured privacy. I stood and looked across this beautiful goddamned city I live in and I breathed the fresh air and I let the moment happen and it was the most chaotic and peaceful I’ve ever been, all at once.
It was nearly 2am before I read another paragraph of East of Eden.
There is probably a lot more to say about that and what all this means (because I’ve decided it means… it?) but right now all I can see is that one transcendent moment between the chaos and the acceptance and if that is what 2014 has to offer me then I accept that moment as predictive.
I accept the roller coaster.
Please excuse the inevitable shrieking.
…
This is 39/52. 38 will need to wait a little while. It’ll make sense when I actually post 38.
The other times I’ve had Tullamore D.E.W. (and until recently, I wasn’t sure if it was the original or the 12-year) have been out of a flask during one 12- and one 24-hour endurance event. Let’s just say that anything would’ve been pleasant then and I didn’t feel like I’d done a proper tasting of it so I didn’t write it up. I strongly associate it with those events. It’s a physical memory. One sip of either and I’m all wrapped up in physical exertion and effort and pain and exhaustion and camaraderie. There’s also a bourbon that I’ll get to eventually that will probably have the same association. But I digress.
The original smells the way most Irish Whiskies taste to me, which is not altogether pleasant but it doesn’t taste like that at all. Messed with my head a bit. It had more of a bite and a burn than the 12-year but some nice, crisp fruitiness and a nice, clean aftertaste.
The 12-year smelled like pine and lemons (which would be the more diplomatic way to say furniture polish) but, again, the taste was completely different. Mellower and rounder than the original in every way.
I had a suspicion that ice might ruin these for me—don’t know if it’s because my affection for Tullamore D.E.W. comes from drinking it out of an ambient temperature flask when I’m filthy and exhausted or if I’m just getting better at predicting—so I drank them both neat and then, to be thorough, dropped a bit of ice into the last couple of sips. I was right. The addition didn’t do anything for me and I liked them better neat.
Image courtesy of the gent whose flask I first had it out of. That flask. That ruck. Cheers.
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