On the internet, there are a couple of places to learn how to host a whisky tasting, several of them quite informative. However, none of these "how-to" guides goes beyond the basics of the tasting process, leaving a bit of a gap for people aiming to host a series of tastings to increase their knowledge of whisky with friends. Today we'll just cover some of those basics, and provide links to other sites where you can boost your knowledge. In the next posting, we'll try to provide a new resource by exploring a series of potential "themes" for whisky tastings.
For any tasting, there are 3 basic requirements: a variety of whisky, proper glasses, and water. Other extras can really add to the experience, but are not critical to organizing your first couple of tastings.
The Right Whisky Glass
First, the glasses. Throughout the twentieth century, whisky has most commonly been served on ice mixed with a carbonated beverage of some sort. Accordingly, the "rocks glass" is often associated with whisky. However, the rocks glass is not designed to capture and focus the aromas of whisky for a discerning single malt drinker, who wouldn't fathom adding ice to dull the flavour of a fine whisky. As such, many professional tasters and master distillers/blenders have long used tulip-shaped sherry copitas for tasting ("nosing"). In recent years, however, several companies have come up with specially-designed whisky glasses. There are arguments to be made in favour of each of these new designs, but the Scottish-made Glencairn Glass has done quite nicely for our purposes.
Water
While some would say that water isn't a necessity for a whisky, having a bit of Scottish spring water on hand is always a good idea, especially when dealing with cask strength whiskies. Adding small amounts of room temperature water to your whisky will help to open up aromas not often noticeable under the predominance of alcohol at full strength. All in all, the question of water is highly personal, some people preferring to "unleash the serpent" (i.e. add water) only for certain whiskies, while always leaving others "neat." If hosting a tasting, though, provide the water in a small pitcher that enables delicate control of the quantity of water being added to the whisky - you wouldn't want to ruin a dram of 25 year old Highland Park by adding too much water!
Other Nice Extras
In addition, oatcakes or shortbread are a traditional and tasty way to cleanse the palate between each whisky tasted during an evening. Ideally, these will be homemade (if you're lucky), but several companies such as Walker's do a pretty good job with pre-packaged stuff. Depending on the theme of your tasting, you may also offer chocolates matched with each whisky, cheese, or seafood, but a good general rule is to leave anything that might interfere with your senses of smell and taste until after the whisky tasting is complete. Aside from food, a couple of other accessories that would improve any tasting session include: napkins, note paper and pens (for recording individual tasting notes), a single shot thimble measure (to ensure people will be able to make it through the tasting, among other things), and a couple of copies of whisky "nosing wheels" or other handouts to allow inexperienced tasters to better identify what they are experiencing with each whisky. Such resources are available from some of the links identified below in the "Nosing" section.
Choosing the Whisky
Choosing your selection of whiskies will be the subject of our next post, which will be dedicated to exploring a number of exciting and educational themes for whisky tasting sessions. For starters, you should generally aim to have at least 3-4 whiskies for any tasting session. In the initial stages of developing your abilities, you could try exploring one whisky from each of the main regions of Scotch whisky production: Speyside, Islay, Highlands, Lowlands, Campbeltowns, and Islands (which is a subdivision of the Highland region). After that, you could move on to exploring several whiskies from the same region to note the differences and similarities that can be identified. Beyond the basic regional themes, things can get a bit more exciting.
Nosing the Whisky
Once you have your whiskies chosen, you can move on to the actual tasting of the whisky. Several websites already have excellent guides to the process of "nosing" whisky; evaluating the colour, body, nose, palate, and finish. Among the following sites, Whisky Magazine's nosing "course" is perhaps the most comprehensive, but each has its own unique advice to offer!
This should be enough to get you started. As with wine tasting or any other similar activity, the nosing whisky takes time, experience, and a desire to learn. Don't be put off by the flowery language of some of the professional whisky writers and brand ambassadors - start out by using words and tastes you already know. See what your friends think, too - disagreements are common, but the resulting conversation will simply have you enjoying the whisky more than ever.
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