When Bad Scotch Happens to Good People
Written: Apr 24 '00
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Nary a one
Cons: A public disservice
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| mshawpyle's Full Review: Chivas Regal 12 year old whisky |
I know what you're thinking: what do people whose traditional dishes are porridge, finnan haddie, haggis, and cock-a-leekie soup know about taste?
Well, quite a lot, actually. Unfortunately, we Scots also have a fatal affinity for marketing. The result: a betrayal of our own traditions of whisky, uisgue beatha, the water of life.
I refer, of course, to blended whisky (shudder).
There are two types of people who drink singlemalts: the pretentious, on the one hand, seeking to bolster their own insecurities by condescension and ostentation
and gallant, handsome, intelligent, mature people like you and me. (Or at least you.)
There are also two types of people who drink Scotch whisky, in America, to begin with: singlemalt types (who fall into one of the two categories above); and those who don't know any better, and drink blended dishwater.
You see, Scotch has a certain cachet, 'a certain je ne sais quoi I just can't put a name to.' Of course there are American drinkers of Scotch whisky who have discovered they like the taste of peat but have yet to progress to the heights of singlemalts. But there are also and there are none but the marketers to blame for this people who drink blended Scotch whisky simply for the label.
Chivas Regal is perfect for these unfortunate and deeply troubled folks.
There will always be a market for blended whiskies, so long as there are the socially aspirant. People who've made their first million and had their second divorce, and have thus resolved to flee to suburbia, join the Whiskypalian church, and gun for a country club invite. Newly-minted Republicans. Southerners, inexplicably ashamed of that heritage, who are desperate to be taken for Yankees and are thus terrified by bourbon (there do exist such people: it's in the DSMR-IV). Sudden breakouts from middle-management Babbitry. These are the sort of people a twee bottle, a hint of faked royalty, and an ad campaign will hook every time.
But strip this appalling drench of its marketing connotations and taste it
. Dear God.
All blended whisky from Scotland consists of a vast, bland, white-bread-and-Miracle-Whip, exciting-as-Omaha foundation of grain spirit to which has been added the merest soupcon of singlemalt. Each such adulteration is characterless, inoffensive, middle-of-the-road, and wholly meretricious. They are the national news anchors of the whisky trade.
Appropriately, but fatally in that it further conceals their awfulness, these are the Scotch whiskies that whisky tyros drink watered further down, and numbed by ice.
I defy anyone to enjoy Chivas (God save the mark) 'Regal' (gad) straight up.
It's gilded. Peachy. It's lightweight. Uh-oh.
It has a medicinal alcohol smell, more scrub-up than smoke. The nose knows not any significant peatsmoke, nor any malt of note. Dundee marmalade, a little; but you can't put whisky on your toast. Islay spindrift and haddock? Forget it. Campbelltown heather? Give me a break.
Okay, try and choke it down. Snore. (Sorry, drifted off for a moment.) Bland as a temperance hotel. No depth, no structure, no tang. No character. You could easily reproduce this by drizzling two drops each of Ardbeg and that ghastly 'liquid smoke flavor' possibly with a drop of castor oil into a gallon of Canadian. And it mightn't be as unhealthy.
It's a mere squatter in the mouth, claiming adverse possession.
And that, really, is it. Bereft of the ballyhoo and snob appeal, this is simply swill. And a disservice to those wishing to learn the high and ancient art of Scotch whisky. That the widget factory - um, distillery - can charge these rates ... well, there must be a Gaelic synonym for chutzpah.
That faint sound you hear? Is it 'crystal' ('glasses,' to the secure) at some party where all the men are wearing dinner suits ('tuxes,' doubtless, to the ad people)?
Nope. It is the cash register, ringing up the profits of ignorance.
Money for old rope. Save your shillings for the real stuff, please.
Recommended:
No
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Epinions.com ID:
mshawpyle
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Member: Markham Shaw Pyle, JD
Location: Houston, Texas
Reviews written: 539
Trusted by: 391 members
About Me:
Historian, baseballing bon vivant, Boll Weevil, W&L man; and the Walter Mitty of field sports
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