While I am not a big whisky drinker my bio-dad introduced me to Lagavulin a few years ago, and I look forward to sipping on a glass or two when I go visit him.
My go to blend is Teachers for those guests who insist on filling up their glass with ginger ale or coke. I find it okay to drink on its own but LAphroig is my true favourite.
I’d say my favourite whisky would be the one I have in a glass in front of me if I had one at the moment.
I’m surprised at the opprobrium being heaped on blends and suspect it’s probably just people being snotty. I quite like JW Black. Among the single malts I like Laphroaig and MacAllan. I’ve really been wanting to try the Japanese one - Yamazaki
Y’know the Kirklands 20 year old sherry casked Speyside I have in my cabinet right now is actually quite good. And for a peaty smokey style a bit of Longrow double peated Cambeltown goes a long way.
Quiet - don’t rile up the whiskey snobs, They’re a bunch of surly drunks, they are.
People have different palates, so don’t expect any agreement on the ‘best’ whisky. They are also something of an acquired taste. Laphroig suits me perfectly, while many supposedly milder malts have a particular taste I don’t like.
No, not at all. Most blends are ideal for use with mixers. They are typically produced by mixing one or more single malts with cheap light spirits, resulting in a less complex flavour. This doesn’t necessarily mean a single malt will taste better to an individual, especially if they are used to drinking a particular brand, but there is a very fundamental difference between the two. Personally, I’ve never found a blend I can enjoy neat, but there are also plenty of single malts I can’t enjoy.
There are some expensive blends where single malts have been selected to produce a particular taste, which would be unobtainable from a single distillery. It’s the water source used that gives whiskies from different regions much of their individual flavour.
Some slight misunderstandings about terminology here, I’m sorry. First of all you have to keep in mind that single malt is not a technical term, it’s about marketing.
You have two kinds of whiskies (to be called whisky, according to Scottish law, the spirit must have been matured in an oak cask for at least three years) to start with when blending (or not blending at all as the case might be):
[ol]
[li]malt whisky, which is made from malted barley alone and batch distilled in a pot still.[/li][li]grain whisky, which can be made from malted barley alone, but usually contains unmalted cereals as well (I don’t remember exactly how much malt you need to start the fermentation process). It is also made in a continuous distillation.[/li][/ol]
The main difference between malt and grain whisky is that malt whisky contains impurities that add to the flavour of the finished product, whereas grain whisky is pure alcohol (think vodka).
Most whiskies are blended in some way, i.e. contains whisky from different sources, but to be marketed as malt whisky it may only contain malt whisky. If it contains grain whisky, however little, it’s called blended. The reason for blending is that each batch bottled should taste the same OR to create a blend with a special flavour.
The world of malt whiskies has a number of marketing terms, such as:
[ul]
[li]pure malt, i.e. a blend of whiskies from two or more different distilleries.[/li][li]single malt, i.e. whisky from one distillery alone. Within single malt you can specify:[/li][LIST]
[li]if it’s blended from whiskies distilled during one year only[/li][li]if it’s blended from different casks containing whiskies from the same batch[/li][li]if it’s not blended at all, but taken from one specific cask[/li][li]etc etc[/li][/ul][/LIST]
I hope I was understandable and now it’s off to my favourite little whisky bar.
Thanks for the clarification Floater. My main point was, there is a real difference between blends and malt whiskies. It’s much cheaper to produce grain whiskies, but almost no-one drinks pure grain whisky, it is blended with a malt. No-one is going to get any flak from me for preferring a blend over a malt, but there are real differences between the two.
Feel free to be specific in a separate post. 
Macallan, Laphroiag, Balvenie. Preferably old enough to vote.
I can’t say I tried them all, but these 3 are my favorite brands of single malt sippin’ whiskeys.
- Caol Ila
- Lagavulin
- Laphroig
As for everyday blended whiskeys, JW Black is still my fave (typically with a splash of club soda). To paraphrase Katt Williams, I drink that on my birthday, my mom’s birthday, Jesus’s birthday, and anyone else’s birthday!
My "Other"s that come to mind are Balvenie and Aberlour. Oh, and I also thought this The Arran Cask Finish was great. I don’t know if you can get it anymore.
[URL=“http://www.scotchblog.ca/scotch_blog/2012/08/the-arran-malt-napoleon-cognac-cask-finish.html”]
Blended: Dimple (aka Pinch)
Single malt: Lagavulin, Laphraoig, Oban
I drink them all neat.
I think I have tried a pure grain whisky blend from the makers of The Famous Grouse and it wasn’t all that bad.
The best whisky I have ever tasted was 40 YO single sherry cask MacAllan (costing ca 900 GBP per bottle).
I’m just getting into single malts. I’ve only tried a few so far.
I loved Macallan 12. Either neat or with a drop or two of water. This will stay in rotation.
I thought Glenfiddich 12 was passable, but wouldn’t be my first choice.
I really wanted to like Lagavulin 16, but I’m not sure I do. I’ve only had it once, and it’s smoky as hell, with a very long linger. I even tried adding a little bit of water, but I don’t know. I’ll try it again and maybe grow to like it, but I don’t think it would ever be more than a ‘once in a while’ drink.
Last night I tried Talisker 10. I loved it! Both neat and with a tiny bit of water. This would be a drink I would keep in rotation.
I will also try Cragganmore 12, but probably not until the weekend.
I tend to return to one of the following: Springbank, The Balvenie Doublewood, Laphroaig Quarter Cask or Ardbeg. I’m especially fond of Ardbeg’s special bottlings; Uigeadail, Corrywreckan and others.
A guy here in Oregon just bought a bottle of 50-year old Glenfiddich single malt for $27,000. Story.
I lied; I tried this one last night. Neat, and loved it.
So far I think I liked the Talisker best, then Macallan, then Cragganmore.