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Scotch Malt Whisky Society of Canada May 2019 Outturn

Posted on May 3, 2019

by Evan

May of 2019 brings us one hell of an Outturn (yes, I am biased). Here are some stats:

Three of the seven bottles in the Outturn are cask finishes. Two hail from Speyside and just barely in the Highlands. All three are - at the very least - worth a taste. Two of them are my personal favourites in the lineup.
This is a peat-heavy month. Four of the seven bottles show at least some peat, with three of those showing smoke and earth in a very pronounced manner.
One of these peated malts comes from Loch Lomond Distillery, though it would be labelled as an Inchmoan in style. This is the first Inchmoan I have personally had, and possibly the first to hit the SMWS in Canada. It is also easily the best Loch Lomond Malt that I can remember every tasting, SMWS or otherwise.
Even more oddness regarding this 112 bottling: the SMWS Canada originally believed that they would be receiving 112.17. It was a serendipidous mistake that they received 112.27, but I am personally very happy that they did.
The ABV for the lineup is pretty tight, with all but one bottle coming in between 57.1% and 59.4% ABV.
That one outlier bottle is unique in other ways as well: It is bottled at 50% ABV, which is not cask strength. It has much larger than typical SMWS outturn at 2948 bottles. It is one of the SMWS new line of Blended Malts. This is Batch 003 of Peat Faerie. This is the first batch to come to the SMWS Canada, and like when we received Exotic Cargo last year, it likely won't last long.

As I said earlier and I will not repeat again for fear of overselling it (at least until next Outturn): this is a very impressive lineup. Enough from me though. Read on below for all of the info!


Cheers,
Evan
evan@kensingtonwinemarket.com
twitter: @sagelikefool
instagram: @sagelikefool



7.102 - A JOY TO SNIFF
This 13 year old Speysider comes from a new oak barrel and is 58.6%.
Flavour profile: Sweet, fruity & mellow.
Outturn: 178 bottles.
Panel's tasting note: Comments on the nose included ‘intriguing’, ‘complex’ and ‘a joy to sniff’ – Anton Berg plum and marzipan chocolates, honey and pineapple; lemon, wasabi, ginger and polished wood. We found the palate woody (balsa, oak, popsicle sticks) and fruity (black grape, persimmon, pear), with honey and cocoa sweetness.
Still complex with water, the nose incorporated sherbet lemons, orange zesty fruit cake, molasses, candy corns, sweet sherry and pata negra ham. The palate now grew sweeter – strawberry jam, marshmallows, marmalade and Campinos – citric peel, embers and oak tingling the after-effect. Following 12 years in ex-bourbon wood we transferred this into new oak." $178

41.106 - MASTERCHEF FINAL
This 10 year old Speysider comes in at 59.4% aft...

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Tight Wad - Frugal Finds

Posted on April 30, 2019

by Dave

I remember when I first started working at Kensington Wine Market, I had a couple of different reasons. First I wanted to earn some extra money to save enough to go travelling. Secondly, I wanted to still drink good wine but also spend less on it. The store helped in both of those aspects and also sent me down a new and amazing road of knowledge and diversion. I have always been on the search for good wine but at a good price as well. That's why we are always trying to make sure we have something new and affordable at the store. It's not always about having the fanciest wine or the very best; sometimes you just want the best for right now and not have to spend a boatload of money on it. That is also the beauty of these tastings that you can actually try the wines before committing to purchasing them. Not only that but you get to taste some amazing cheese and nibbles from Peasant Cheese. For the price, I think you would be hard beat to find a better value in all of Calgary for an awesome night out.





Dunes & Greene Pinot-Chardonnay Brut
I love sparkling wine and if I only had to choose one style of wine to drink it would be sparkling. This wine is always a winner for quality and price. This is a great tasting sparkling wine from the Eden Valley region of Australia. Made from a blend of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir it shows delicate aromas of lemon zest, fresh strawberries and cream. On the palate, look for Chardonnay flavours of subtle citrus notes and fresh acidity. The Pinot Noir complements this by adding richness and texture. The result is a full flavoured sparkling wine with a refined finish. Enjoy with appetizers, seafood, Chinese takeout or just when you feel like some bubbles. $19.99 for 750mL - also available in mini format.

Lamura Organico Bianco 2016
Sicily provides the perfect environment for the production of organic wines; in fact, most would agree that Sicily is the best region in the whole of Italy for the production of organic grapes. The abundance of sunshine combined with the sea breezes and low rainfall combine to make ideal grape-growing conditions: there are no problems with ripening grapes and there is very little disease, so the grapes from this winery have always been virtually organic, with the minimum of treatments. The result is consistently excellent quality grapes. This was a very interesting wine that would be fantastic with food. Chicken, fish, or even some light pork chops. With nice acidity and balanced with a wonderful minerality, it's definitely something worth trying. $17.99

Ochoa Calendas Blanco Viura Chardonnay 2017
A well-priced and delicious Viura-Chardonnay blend from one of our fave Spanish wineries! Javier Ochoa has headed up this family-owned winery for the past 35 years, but his daughter Adriana is the winemaker. She trained in Bordeaux and then studied in Australia befo...

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Bourbon and BBQ

Posted on April 30, 2019

by Evan

Bourbon. Barbecue. Unless you are a vegan teetotaler, these are likely two of your favourite words in the English language. For good reason too. They are two great tastes that should hopefully taste great together, right? All of those blogs and food shows can’t be wrong.

I have admitted many a time that I am not a food pairing guy. This still holds true. I typically drink my whisky on its own after dinner. In a dark room. Alone. Just kidding about those last two things. No need for an intervention at this time, I swear.

Anyhow, the food thing. It is hard to go wrong with Barbecue. We have paired it Beer and Wine in past tastings with great success, so why not Bourbon? Both have - maybe not their roots - but a lot of branches and at least a good portion of the trunk make their home in the midwest and southern states of the US of A. It is natural that they would pair well, since each has had such a great deal of influence on the other through the ages.





The other reason for doing this (beyond getting some excellent BBQ from Holy Smoke), is that it allowed us to put another American Whiskey/Bourbon tasting on our schedule. Whiskey from our neighbour's to the south has been incredibly popular as of late, and the tastings we host with them as the showcase always seem to sell out fast despite the attendees having to put up with me for the duration. So adding another Bourbon tasting was a no brainer, but we didn’t want to just do the same thing twice.

We are seemingly going through a renaissance of Barbecue in Calgary right now. Some of the craft beer joints that have opened up have put in BBQ restaurants at the same time, such as Paddy’s and Prairie Dog. Hayden Block has been a Kensington staple since opening a few years back. But it is Holy Smoke that we chose to order from to pair with our Bourbon tasting, just as we had with the previously mentioned Wine and Beer tastings before.

The food did not last long enough for me to get a picture of it sadly, so without further ado, here is the lineup we tasted our way through:



Burwood Single Hive Rye Finish
Burwood Distillery is located right within Calgary, Alberta. It began distilling in mid-2017. The Single Hive Rye Finish was distilled from 100% Alberta Honey, the spirit was aged in a first-fill ex-rye whiskey barrel for nine months before being bottled in 375mL format at 44.2% ABV.

It is definitely not a whisky, since it is not only too young but also not made from grain, but it is a heck of an interesting dram. Burwood also made a Single Hive Bourbon Finish that was made in a similar fashion, aged in an ex-Bourbon barrel and bottled at 44.1% ABV. $40

Rebel Yell
This wheated bourbon left Billy Idol crying more, more, more and purportedly used to be a favourite of both Keith Richards...

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Asian Whisky Revival: A Rose By Any Other Name…

Posted on April 25, 2019

by Curt

…would smell as sweet. Thus spake William Shakespeare. And if the sentiment is good enough for the Bard, it’s good enough for me. Of course, at the time Romeo was being talked off the ledge by our darling Juliet, whisky as we know it was still in its infancy. But this isn’t about time; it’s about place. Either way, the message is the same: It doesn’t matter where you’re from, so long as you’re perfectly put together. Okay…so my paraphrasing needs some work.

This Asian Whisky Revival tasting was a bit of a last minute affair for me. It sorta fell in my lap, as is our way at Kensington Wine Market. And as much as we like to roll our eyes at the fly-by-the-seat-of-pants nature to many things at KWM, the simple reality is that most of the staff would probably have it no other way. It’s what makes us family. What unites us. Just as shared drinks with new friends do. And for me, that’s the enjoyment in hosting whisky tastings in the shop.

This evening’s tasting was a unique opportunity to break down some preconceptions, shatter some biases and maybe, just maybe, enlighten a few thirsty souls as to how incredible some of the whiskies are that are only now being given their moment on the world’s stage.

Mention Asian whisky and the immediate connotation is Japanese whisky. You’ll get knowing nods and dreamy eyes from those that may have had the privilege of tasting the old Yamazaki 18 or maybe a brilliant Hakushu. Or if they were in the right place at the right time, maybe even a few drops of the lost and mourned unicorn distillery, Karuizawa. But while Japanese whisky may be the most widely recognized of the Asian drams hitting the market, we do a disservice to our tastebuds (and wallets!) by not expanding our horizons a bit and recognizing intrinsic quality wherever it may lie.

Case in point: India. Man…there is some incredible distillate flowing off the stills in both Bangalore and Goa. Amrut has spent the last decade or so blazing trails and smashing boundaries. Their contemporaries at Paul John, ditto. But we’ll come back to that. ‘Cause there’s much to say. But it’s important to understand the mission statement for a tasting like this: there’s more to what we know than meets the eye.

So, let’s talk about Japan first, and how a huge drop in interest for Japanese whisky in the 1980s led to drastically decreased production regimes, a decision that is now costing whisky lovers dearly. Especially those with a bent towards the more esoteric flavours that develop on sub-tropical climates like we’re focusing on here. Can we still get that kinda juice? Well…not really. Not without sacrificing the kids’ college funds anyway.What we’ve ended up with instead of those deep and tropical fruit notes, accente...

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Espiritu de Mexico

Posted on April 14, 2019

by Shawn

These agave tastings are becoming more frequent, and - if I do say so - more fun as of late. Though they nearly always sell out anyway, the surge in Mezcal popularity over the past three years has permanently made its mark on our tastings, to the point where sometimes we host solely Mezcal tastings. Naturally, it’s WAY more fun to show off both spirits at once and let our guests decide and discover and enjoy.

We nearly ran the gamut in this tasting, the lineup was made up of three unique and high-quality Tequilas, followed by some very traditional and complex Mezcals. Luckily, next door we have the extraordinary Peasant Cheese and owner Crystal McKenzie who is incredible at putting together boards that fit perfectly with the night's theme. Take a quick look at our lineup and snacks!





Arette Reposado
Arette is the product of 2 brothers of the famous tequila distilling family Orendain. Eduardo and Jamie are part of the 6th generation of the family and operate the El Llano distillery in the heart of the city of Tequila. Arette is the name of a horse that brought home 2 gold medals in the 1948 Olympics. Aromas of moderate oaky vanilla, spice and mildly floral. Lightly sweet agave with hints of more spice and earth along with hints of charred oak. $53

Ayate Reposado
This tequila is sourced by Napa Valley winemaker Dave Phinney for his distillery Savage & Cooke. It spends 4 months in ex-bourbon oak, followed by 4 months in Chardonnay casks. This product (a KWM exclusive mind you!) is a wonderful example of how sources spirit can be used to produce something a little different and allows the bottler to exercise creativity if they so desire. This spirit shows aggressive wood character along with delicate notes of white fruit and pepper. Spending some time with it in the glass brings out more vanilla and butterscotch and slight hints of butter. $120

Gran Orendain Anejo
Marcela Orendain Gonzalez is the sister of Eduardo and Jamie of Arette. Marcela does things a little differently in her distillery Casa Mexicana. Gran Orendain is triple distilled, making for a light, delicate, and drier spirit of high quality. The French oak used for maturation is different than the typical ex-bourbon in that it gives a more mild and spicy profile with earthy hints and allows the spirit itself to show off. $100

Cenizo Colonial San Miguel de Temoaya
Cenizo Colonial is a line of single village Mezcals from the state of Durango. This Cenizo spirit is from the village of San Miguel Temoaya. The machete crushed agave is wild fermented and distilled in unique “Filipino-style” stills. More unique still is the aromas on this bottle. Sweat, light smoke and hints of reptile aquarium with a dry, earthy palate with light tropical fruit and floral notes. $83

Los Siete Misterios MexicanoContinue Reading →




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