Oban 14

This Oban 14 was bought at the Duty Free shop at Changi Airport. It was selling for about $70. Fairly reasonable price for a reasonable drink. I bought this as something like a daily dram - complex and nice enough to drink regularly, and not too expensive that I'll feel like I better savour every single drop.

I first tried it at a bar along Somerset, and found a rather strong oak taste in the Oban 14, which I did not really enjoy, though there were other notes in there that were interesting enough. I am glad that the overt oakiness is much more muted in the bottle I bought than in the glass I had at the bar. Maybe the oak becomes more pronounced with oxidation and time? Anyhows.

Colour: Gold. Somewhat orangey. Between gold and amber. My vocabulary for describing colours is limited.

Nose: Something fruity comes up at first. A melon. Maybe a somewhat raw honey dew, with some sourness still in it, especially just under the skin. Oranges as well. A light sea breeze, bringing with it whiffs of seaweed. Suggestions of smoke, but this is not strong on the nose. The oak comes through as a backdrop, being present but a little muted through all of this other smells.

Palate: Fruit comes to mind once the liquid hits the tongue. The same fruit tastes as in the nosing. A little bit of bitterness, like tea. The palate is sprinkled with a small pinch of sea salt and pepper. Malt, cereal-like flavours, and oak again. This oak is coming up quite regularly, but not strong enough to throw the dram off balance. In general, the mix of flavours go quite well.

Finish: The smoke comes up in the finish, a lingering smoky feel at the back of the throat. Oak is present there, together with the malt/cereal like flavours. Breathing through the mouth brings back hints of pepper (feels like black, unground pepper).

Fairly straight forward dram, this one. Nothing much hiding behind the scenes, no long, complex unfurling of layers of flavours, no explosion, nothing very unexpected. Nose to palate to finish is pretty straightforward.

For me, I often find myself comparing this to the Talisker 10. Similar taste profile, with the things that are present in the Oban 14 present in the Talisker 10 as well. However, the Talisker 10 has a wilder side to it, is less shy on the peat, smoke and pepper, and has a bourbon like sweetness that isn't as present in the Oban 14. I like the pepper explosion in the Talisker 10 better, but that doesn't mean that the Oban 14 is a bad whisky. It is perhaps not as good as the Talisker 10, but for someone who likes that bit of smoke and is just looking for a simple dram to round off the day, the Oban 14 is a good bet.

First post!

This blog was started about a year after I first started drinking whisky. I don't remember the tastes of many of these whiskies enough to pen my own notes for them. Yet, there are some that stick in my mind, as if something about the whisky still lingers on long after the bottle is emptied.

There is always some difficulty in deciding how to inaugurate a blog. What shall we start with? A couple of popular, go-to whiskies? Start with a bang? Start with an award winner?

Maybe I'll start with a story about my first proper exposure to whisky...

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A year ago, I was privileged to be invited to a good friend's house for the Lunar New Year. His father had purchased several bottles of whisky to entertain the guests who'll be coming around. Among the bottles that were on the table, I remember a Glenrothes 30, 25, 20. There was a Ballantine's 30 year, as well as a Hakushu 18. There were probably one or two more, but my memory is hazy. I remember clearly that I loved the Hakushu 18, for how refreshing and mellow it was, with slight grassy, warming peatiness, and the gentle citrus notes...beautiful, balanced flavours. The Ballantine's was smooth, as one would expect from a 30 year old blend. Floral, nutty, but I thought that it wasn't that special, nor quite worth the price, if I were just talking about how it tasted and smelt. 

As I was happily sipping a dram of the Hakushu 18, one of the other guests poured herself a glass of the Glenrothes 30 (this one: https://www.whiskybase.com/whisky/820/glenrothes-30-year-old). And by a glass, I mean about 100 ml or slightly more. Of a 30 year old whisky. She took a sip, and declared that it was too strong. 

So, she split that glass of whisky into two glasses. She then took up a pack of Pokka's Jasmine Green Tea, less sugar, opened the pack of Green Tea, and poured the whole packet of green tea into the two half-glasses of 30 year-old Glenrothes. Mixing the drinks, she took another sip, and with great satisfaction, said that the drink was now "much better". After all, we have to mix whisky so that we can drink more, she sagely proclaimed.

And thus, a tragedy. 

There are many ways to drink whisky, and some of us do like to mix our whiskies into highballs and cocktails. No problem. I'm just not sure if a $1000 bottle was supposed to be drunk in this way...

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Is there a moral to this story? Perhaps not. But this story is firmly part of my initiation to whisky drinking. The heartache I felt for the Glenrothes, and the joy I got from the Hakushu, became the starting point of my whisky journey. Pain and joy are part of life's journey - they nudge us on, step by step, out of the Garden of Eden (or is it the forests on the Japanese Southern Alps??) and into the scary and beautiful world out there...

The next post will have some notes about two whiskies that I like enough to drink them as daily (ok, not quite daily) sips: the Oban 14, and the Talisker 10.