Neat’s a perfectly fine way to enjoy your glass of whisky. However, a glass of water with a cocktail straw is a good accessory. Try it neat, and then use the straw to add as many drops of water as you care to add. The added water will change the taste. Whether you like the effect or not, is another question. I wil drink cask strength neat, so I’m perhaps the wrong guy to ask.
Me, I’d drink the whisky, and save the bottle. The food coloring is a neat idea. What a thoughtful gift! (I wish I had such thoughtful relatives.)
Use it to make “homeopathic” whiskey! Take a drop of it, dilute with water 10 jillion times-drink that and you get the full effect! And you can keep your (nearly full) bottle forever.
My first single malt experience was Bushmills 10 year old. I like it and still do. It is “unpeated”, that is to say the barley is dried with hot air as opposed in the heat/smoke of burning peat. It gives it a pretty light taste. I’ve never heard of the special stuff you are talking about but would have no reason to doubt its quality. Drink it up and report back!
ETA: My Catholic friends from Belfast wouldn’t be caught dead drinking Bushmills - its damn Protestant whiskey!
I haven’t had this 12 Year Old Distillery Reserve yet, but I’d love to try it.
My favorite Irish is plain old Powers. Very nice. Bushmill’s (regular Bushmill’s – White Bush) is my second favorite. I actually like it better than Black Bush. I’d still love to try the 12 Year Old Distillery Reserve, though.
For special occasions, if you like high-end Irish whiskey, Middleton is wonderful, but it’s well over $100 a bottle. Redbreast is also great, and goes for around $45 for a 750 ml bottle.
I had planned to wait until Christmas to open the bottle, but having read everyone’s posts I don’t know if I’ll make it past the weekend without having some.
With my inexperienced palate I’ll bet I won’t be able to distinguish the whiskey’s denomination. {Smile, in case that sounds snarky.
I hadn’t realized how violent the Catholic/Protestant divide still was until the girls came back telling me about a bomb that was placed in a mall.
Really, Ireland didn’t get into the single malt thing as much as Scotland. Ireland local claim is single pot still whiskey. Redbreast and Green Spot are two of them, the former if not both I’ve seen in the US.
Well if you come back with a need to never touch the damnable spirit again, then you’ve become a Free Presbyterian.
A bomb recently? Thankfully, it’s fringe elements who are doing this nowadays, and I wouldn’t let it affect my travel plans anymore than a threat in Washington DC would affect it.
{Smile, in case that sounds snarky.