This was revealing.
We had been trying to taste Bruichladdich since we had met Jay, who works at the distillery, on our way from Ireland to Scotland on a small ferry. He had said it was pretty fine, and when I saw the ferry captain trying to get a bottle delivered, I knew that this was a scotch that at least the locals believed in.
We had trouble finding any when we were in Scotland. So when I got home, I did manage to find a bottle of Laddie Classic Edition_01. This was the first bottle we drank, when we got home, and we had very little experience. It was good, but I did not feel that it was quite as good as others that we had had, to me. My wife, however, really liked it a lot.
So in discussing things with Jay after we returned, he suggested the 10 year old. "It's excellent." So we bought both the Laddie 10 and the Bruichladdich 12 (Second Edition) since there was not lot of difference in price between the two.
We decided on blind taste tests. Of course, since I was pouring, I knew which was which.
The Bruichladdich 12 is labeled as "lightly peated". The 10 is labeled as unpeated. So we all know what peated means....it is the smoky taste that gets into the scotch when the barley is dried by peat fires. Some have suggested it makes the scotch taste like dirt. Smoky dirt. Good SCOTTISH smoky dirt!
So there we were with the three glasses. I had put something I can't recall in the first glass, perhaps the Macallan, followed by the 12 year old, then the ten. And we tasted.
The first glass was not remarkable. I don't even recall what it was. However the second glass (we are talking perhaps a quarter of an ounce in each glass) was VERY smoky. Strong and bold and somewhat overpowering. The third glass was still a little smoky, but much more mild.
Well, we concluded. Jay was right. (Was there any doubt?) But then we decided to try each again. It was then I noticed that the bottle of Bruichladdich 12 was still full. I hadn't poured what I thought I had. I had poured BL10 twice. My jaw dropped. Those two glasses tasted markedly different! They were NOT the same. But we were faced with facts. They did taste different. And they were the same scotch.
This was an epiphany for me. Expectations, mood, what was previously in your mouth, all impact in a SIGNIFICANT way on the taste. And what was most revealing was which taste was the 'correct' one. Which could be counted on?
BL10 has a very nice sweet mild smoky taste. The only other smoky scotch we had tried is smoky 'over the top' lagavulin. It took me several trips to the BL10 for me to form firm opinions about it. BL10 is much milder than Lagavulin, and it is excellent. Of the smoky scotches I have tried, I like it the best, by far. So much, in fact, that when I found out our liquor store was not carrying it anymore, I bought up half the remaining stock in our province. A week later, there was only one bottle available. Now, there are none. I hope my stockpile will last me a few years, but unless I find something that can take the place of this mild smoky scotch, I am afraid that they won't make it through the year.
The BL12, although mildly peated, did not seem to have much, if any, smoky taste. When we toured the Oban distillery, the tour guide talked of one of the tastes being 'salt'. I can taste salt quite prominently in the BL12. My wife really likes the salt taste in scotch, while I prefer something either sweeter or smokier. The BL12 has a nice bite to it, not overpowering, but not limp.
But between the two, I prefer the warm smoky taste of the BL10. However, I was confused. Why is the unpeated BL10 smoky, and the mildly peated BL12 not? I could not figure that out, so I decided to ask Jay, whom I message with. If I have understood him correctly (he sometimes writes with an accent!) t BL10 is aged in Bourbon barrels, which unlike Sherry or Port barrels, have been charred on the inside. Perhaps the smoky flavour comes, not from the peat, but from the barrels? Whatever the basis for the mild smoky flavour of BL10....."it's excellent!"
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