Over the long weekend, I had the privilege to conduct a whisky tasting session for MY and his friends from church. Turns out, two of his friends were former schoolmates of mine. Small world, this Singapore island. The guys were having a bachelor's gathering and party for 3 members of their group, and I was honoured to share in that experience by introducing the guys to some of the representative and iconic whiskies.
As a first time conducting a whisky-tasting, I thought the experience was pretty good! Just gonna list down some of the things that I learnt through the process:
1. Research and preparation is crucial.
Knowing what whiskies the guys were going to taste beforehand was important, as I needed to do my own research, and dig out old tasting notes in order to know what to help the tasters look out for. That helped immensely as I was talking. The more familiar I was with the whiskies being tasted, the easier it was to talk about it, as I could fall back on preparation instead of having to do my own tasting, and try to help others make their way through the glass.
2. Logistics.
We didn't quite have enough glasses, so it was a bit challenging as it meant that everyone had to finish whatever was in their glass before we could move on. It also meant that not everyone managed to get the most out of the sniffing experience, which forms a significant aspect of whisky tasting.
The venue matters too, I think. For this session, we had it at a friend's house, so that was nice and comfy, but the seating arrangement, and the lack of a table accessible to everyone, made it a little tough to talk to everyone at the same time, while also allowing all the tasters to interact with each other. Access to water thus also became a little challenging.
3. Friendships
Whisky tasting is a great way to make friends, though it also helps if you're doing the tasting for friends. I think, because the 10 guys already knew each other, it was a lot easier getting them to talk about what they were tasting and smelling, and everyone was more comfortable asking questions. If I were conducting for strangers, I think more effort will have to be put into building rapport between the tasters.
4. Pacing
As we all only had 1 glass each, there were long pauses when we had to go around pouring whiskies for everyone. This led to lull periods between drams. It helped that there were snacks, and that the guys knew each other, so the long pauses were actually ok. If whisky tasting was conducted for people who did not know each other, pacing would have to be controlled a lot more tightly.
5. Whisky curation
As we had a few members in the group who were new to whisky tasting, the selection was meant to showcase the distinctive features of the major Scotch regional malts, though this is becoming increasingly illusory due to experimentation by various distilleries. Nonetheless, as an introduction, whiskies that were less complex, but more straightforward with what their region has to offer was probably, on hindsight, a good choice. (though I would perhaps have swapped one or two of the whiskies for something else, but that was going to be very expensive, and we were trying to conduct the session on a budget.)
My own notes on the whiskies will come in bits and pieces in the following days. Work has restarted, and things are getting busier. Whew.
And then there was the Cask Strength tasting session I had with PY, J, and EP the day before this noob master class. Whew. And then there's the whiskies tasted at LMDW, from their June free tasting...What a productive June! So currently on my whisky blogging backlog, are the following whiskies:
1. Arberlour A'bunadh, batch 58
2. Redbreast 12 CS
3. Lagavulin 12 (2016 special release)
4. Caol Ila CS by G&M, 2004/2016
5. North British 25, by Vom Fass
6. Glenkinchie 12
7. Balvenie 12 Triple Cask
8. Hakushu 12
9. Port Charlotte PC12 (2015 release)
10. Edradour 15 Fairy Flag
11. Kavalan Solist Vinho Barrique
Wow. When will I ever manage to get all these online...? Soon, I hope...Stay tuned...
