Scotch Review: Grant's "Sherry Cask Finish"

Me:  I'm stalking a wall of economy blended Scotch whiskies, and trying to decide which one to abduct and hustle to checkout.

Customer:  A soccer mom in an expensive red and yellow Manchester United jersey approaches with two boys in tow.  I am guessing 8 and 12.  I think my friend Keith has the same Kankichi Ryotsu shirt as one of the boys.

"Can you tell me what aisle the Grand Cru Saint-Emilion is in?"

Me:  "Sorry, I don't work here."

Customer:  She stares clinically into my eyes like she might catch a glimpse of the depths of my soul.  Then, her nose flares, as if she has found my soul located on a tropical island littered with bikinis, white sand, waves and Johnnie Walker Black on ice that never melts in spite of the heat of the nearby hibachi and the endless summer afternoon.

"I have seen you here before.  I am sure of it."

 Me:  "I have been here before because I am a regular, but I don't work here," I somewhat sputter.

Customer:  "You are wearing black pants and a red golf shirt like the rest of them."

Me:  So, does Tiger Woods on the Sunday afternoons.  

Customer:  "This is unbelievably bad customer service!"

Me:  Before I can say anything, she storms off with her offspring, much to my bewilderment.  I turn back to my wall of shame, and try to choose a blend that is cheap.

Customer:  She points at me, followed by an employee, presumably the 'supervisor' who is also wearing a red polo shirt and black chinos.

"That's him," she hisses.

Supervisor:  He looks me up and down and maybe also sees my soul's quest for rest at a Caribbean island beach under a palm tree that would be fitting for an Axe deodorant commercial.

"Ma'am, he doesn't work here."

Customer:  "Are you sure?"

Me:  I don't even wait for the supervisor to respond.  I randomly grab a bottle and hightail it to checkout, where I pay the ransom.

Grant's Cask Editions "Sherry Cask Finish"
I can't make this up.  I get out of the liquor store and am headed to my Ford with all the urgency of Steve McQueen in Bullitt, only my all wheel drive Escape doesn't squeal in spite of me tramping the pedal, as I exit the liquor store parking lot.  I knew I should have bought that Mustang in the showroom.

Once home, I look at my Friday night purchase with little enthusiasm.  Been drinking a lot of Teacher's Highland Cream lately and was thinking I need some variety, but the choices are pretty slim in the economy blended Scotch category.  A lot of blends are designed for mixing and I don't want a cocktail.  I want a cheap, but pleasant sipper that I can enjoy neat.

So, I grabbed the Grant's, off the shelf (bottom shelf that is), figuring it's been about six years since my last review.  Maybe it has changed a bit in flavour.  You'd be surprised how many blended Scotches can change for a number of reasons ranging from new corporate ownership (e.g. Teacher's) or new staff (e.g. master blenders).  Sometimes there is substitution of old faithful malts with new ones because head office bean counters (e.g. pinstripes at Black Bottle) decide to use other distilleries in their portfolio to contribute to the blend rather than others who are not owned by them.  That's what happened to Teacher's Highland Cream.  GlenDronach was a key malt for decades but a change in ownership triggered the decision to drop GlenDronach from the blend and use another sherried malt from a distillery already owned by the company.  The change was not good for Teacher's.  Fortunately, since then they have improved the quality of sherried malt in the blend once more.

Nose (undiluted)
Sweetness of vanilla, bread, dandelion and sliced oranges.

Palate (undiluted)
Apples, honey, fruit cocktail, orange rind, cheerios cereal, white cake bread, pleasant oak.

Finish (undiluted)
More orange rind, citrus, a wee peat, a puff of decent smoke, and then it's gone in a flash.  The finish is short, but hey this is a cheap blend.



General Impressions
This has improved since my last review.  The improvement is in the finish.  Six years ago, I sampled two bottles and the finish is where the wheels came off the wagon.  It would be bitter on the finish.  Not so now.  You are left with a simple but pleasing sherry note that manifests itself as Florda oranges and rind.  All pleasant.

The nose was good on this blend, and the palate was not offensive in the least.  With no change in corporate ownership at Grant's, I would attribute this improvement to the blending team's attention to detail.  Well done!

I am not a huge fan of the Grant's Family Reserve, but this Sherry Cask Finish is much better.

Worth a try, especially if you need a cheap daily sipper!

Cheers!



Jason Debly

P.S.  I am back from a bit of an entrepreneurial sabbatical and ready to post much more regular, so get ready for lots of my nonsense!

Review: Grant's "Cask Editions" Sherry Cask Finish

I am not a fan of Grant's Family Reserve.  A bottom shelf economy blend that brings to mind what it must be like to lick a rust encrusted copper pipe.  Besides the copper plumbing notes, it's grainy, thin and lacking in character.  Let me be more precise, it is a blend that exhibits the character of no character.  Capisce?

For a couple of years now, the people at William Grant and Sons Ltd. have been releasing what they call "Cask Editions."  The concept behind the Cask Editions is to take the not so delectable Grant's Family Reserve and age that blended Scotch whisky briefly (up to four months) in casks that previously held another alcoholic beverage (beer, sherry, etc.).  The aim of this finishing process is to hopefully impart interesting and pleasing flavors upon the exceptionally unexceptional Family Reserve.

So, their first experiment was to age Family Reserve in casks that previously held Scottish beer (Innis and Gunn - good beer by the way).   Hence, the release was unimaginatively entitled: Ale Cask Reserve.  An interesting experiment that improved upon the Family Reserve, but not to the point of lifting the blend out of mediocrity.  The most recent release is the "Sherry Cask Finish."  Given the genealogy of Grant's Cask Editions Sherry Cask Finish, I was not expecting much.

Nose (undiluted)
Apple juice & honey.

Palate (undiluted)
Lots of apples, sweet malt, and honey oats.

Finish (undiluted)
Grainy, off-putting heat, pearl onions, and some acrid smoke.

General Impressions
The nose on this entry level blend was not bad.  Basically apple juice.  That's okay.  Moving to the flavor profile, again, it was not terrible.  A decent delivery of apple pie, malt, honey, and some breakfast oats too.  What surprised me was that for a blend that was supposed to be finished in sherry casks, I did not detect a lot of sherry in the flavor profile.  Really quite faint.  Hell!  Very faint, practically absent!  For those seeking lots of sherry notes, look elsewhere.  Grant's Sherry Cask reads like a typo.  It really is a stereotypical Speyside fruit cup style blend.  Hardly sherried at all in terms of flavor.

Of the fruit cup in syrup flavors that are presented, the delivery is simple.  Very linear, but at this price point, such a style of whisky is not breaking any rules.  So, so-far, so-good right?  Yup, until you experience the 'finish.'  Once this baby is down the hatch, your plain-jane chevy sedan of a blend will suddenly veer off the highway, through a Do-Not Enter, One-Way barrier and straight off a cliff a la Thelma & Louise.

What happened?  This blend started out okay, but once swallowed you encounter a cheap, boozey heat, and stale cigarettes.  The interesting thing about this whisky was the longer the bottle was open, I mean as I returned to it a week later, and another week and so on, that finish became less grainy and acetone, but only up to a point.

I had two bottles of this blend.  One I purchased a while back and another given to me from a friend over the holidays.  So, the first bottle was gone. No review written as I pondered what to say.  My first reaction was just to trash this whisky and move on, but it did have some redeeming value.  I just found it hard to put my finger on it.  It was easy drinking as blended Scotch is purposely designed.  It had some charm, but what exactly was the charm?

I had to sort all of these thoughts out.  So, in order to be fair to the whisky and my review, I and the bottle went for a walk in the park, earlier this Spring.  No drinking involved on this jaunt to the local forest with groomed trails, just the bottle, a camera and myself.  Took a few pics and tried to figure out how to articulate the charm of this blend.  There was a piece to the puzzle that I was missing.

I walked for about 45 minutes, occasionally setting the bottle down, snapping a few photographs, attracting puzzled looks from passerbys, and then moving on.  I was getting warm, tired and thirsty.  And then I had an epiphany.  This whisky would probably be refreshing if paired with some fruit.  What fruit?  Apples?  Nah.  Over kill.  What could be paired with this whisky that would compliment it and take that nasty finish away?  Watermelon I thought.

Quick trip to the grocery store, and back home, I sliced up some watermelon and paired it with the Grant's Sherry Cask.   If I took a sip of this blend and then a bite of watermelon, there was no acrid finish to contend with.  Instead a nice, refreshing taste of honey whisky notes meeting watermelon.  A marriage worth celebrating.  It would make an excellent food and whisky pairing to start with before progressing into a meal of salmon with couscous.

A friend of mine and I made our way through much of the bottle with the watermelon pairing and concluded that this whisky is most definitely enjoyed with this fruit and probably others.  Tasted neat with no accompaniment was a mistake.  Mind you the website for Grant's suggest serving this neat or with a little water.  I think not.  Try it with watermelon.  Very quaff-able when having lighthearted conversation and contests to see who can shoot watermelon seeds pinched between fingers the furthest!

Cheers!


Jason Debly

Copyright © Jason Debly, 2009-2013. All rights reserved. Any and all use is prohibited without permission. 

Review: Grant's Ale Cask Reserve Blended Scotch Whisky

Grant's Ale Cask Reserve Blended Scotch Whisky

Here's the concept:  After aging a blend of grain and malt whiskies in oak casks, move them to some casks that previously held strong Scottish beer.  Age for three additional months and what do you get?  Answer:  Grant's Ale Cask Reserve. 

Beer?  Scotch?  Do they go together like coffee and cigarettes or like oil and water?  You be the judge . . .

Nose (undiluted)
Weak malty notes.  Apple juice!  Seriously, apple juice!  Just like the scent wafting up from my four year old's yellow plastic Winnie the Pooh cup!  Hops?  Maybe.  That being said, this is pleasing and very restrained.

Palate (undiluted)
Starts sweet, cantaloupe, apple juice that was betrayed on the nose comes to fruition on the palate.  Turning malty now and mid-palate there are some definite beer flavors coming into focus.

Finish (undiluted)
Very short hang time dude.  If you're riding that flavor wave, it's gone man in a flash.  What you ever so briefly experience is a taste of cereal, water and then the grainy/restrained alcohol wave chased by a weak puff of a Vantage cigarette you often can smell as you climb into the backseat of a dented, yellow New York cab.

General Impressions
This is very easy drinking.  Hell, it is tremendously easy drinking.  I mean there is nothing stopping you from chugging the whole bottle.  It just goes down so quickly.  In a flash it is gone and I am thinking "where was the flavor?"  So, I take another sip or should I say gulp in my quest for flavor.  Very light bodied, in the style of a Lowland malt. 

Price Point
Low price.  I did not pay a lot and frankly I did not get a lot.  I don't feel that I got ripped off, but rather a fair exchange.  I didn't shell out a lot and I did not get a lot in return.  A basic blended scotch on the lightly honeyed, apple cider side.  Simple, no complexity, but hey at the price I paid, I did not expect much.

Flaws?
There are two big flaws with this economy blended scotch whisky.  First, it is lacking in flavor.  As I mentioned above, it is so light and thin that you practically gulp the stuff down.  Secondly, it is grainy like the above photo.  Find that photo annoying and disconcerting?  The finish to this blend is much the same.

Targeted Consumer
If I had to guess, this whisky targets the most mainstream of consumers who place a premium on smooth, light flavors and low price point.  This is a good mixer for cocktails or for the guy who likes to load his drink up with lots of ice.

Not a horrible blended scotch.  Just mediocre with considerable graininess on the finish that can at times be bitter.  But, as the adage goes, you get what you pay for.  For me, I prefer a more robust flavor and so, I favor Teacher's Highland Cream, White Horse and for those fans of the more smokey peaty variety, Black Bottle.

Peer Review
It's better than Bell's and Ballantine's, but lags behind Teacher's, White Horse and Black Bottle.

Final Analysis
Would I buy it again?  Ahh no.

Cheers!



Jason Debly

Copyright © Jason Debly, 2009-2011. All rights reserved.

Grant's Family Reserve Scotch Whisky

If you take a look at most of the tasting notes I have posted in this blog, you will observe that I praise most of the different scotches. Reviewers of scotch, amateur (myself) and professional (ie. Jim Murray) tend to heap praise on every spirit evaluated. Trouble is, we may give the impression that it is all good. Not so! There are some dogs out there and the question for this post to consider is whether or not Grant's Family Reserve Scotch Whisky is one of them.

Whisky expert, Jim Murray, in his book, Classic Blended Scotch, described Grant's Family Reserve as "A stunner of a whisky, one of the most complex blends the industry will ever produce."

Ok, that is saying a lot. Too much in my opinion. It's one thing to like a blended scotch, but when you make statements like ". . . one of the most complex blends the industry will ever produce" you catch my attention. For me, Murray had thrown down the gauntlet and challenged me through his words. Me, being a big fan of blends, decided to try this blended scotch and see if it lived up to his high pitched praise. I had tried this blend in the past and did not like it one little bit, but in light of Murray's eloquent admiration of the highest order, which is trumpeted on William Grant's & Sons website (http://www.grantusa.com) I decided to second guess my earlier judgment and revisit this very popular brand (4th best selling blended scotch in the world).

Nose (undiluted)
Faint malty notes. Not picking up much else. Not overly inviting.

Nose (diluted)
Water added to this blend seems to accentuate the malty notes.

Palate (undiluted)
You need to take a big slug of this to get any flavor. Don't be shy. This is not a 25 year old single malt that rewards the tiniest of sips with an explosion of splendid flavors. Not so here.

Once you take the medium to big sip, you will be greeted by light/thin flavors of cinnamon stick, cloves, and nutmeg enveloped in an unmistakably grainy, unadulterated alcohol bear hug.

Drank neat, there is no complexity of flavors. I am dumbfounded as to how Jim Murray can say ". . . one of the most complex blends the industry the industry will ever produce." There's truly nothing here.

Palate (diluted)
I added a splash of water (ie. one teaspoon per shot) and was able to detect some creaminess in addition to the malty/cinnamon flavors present when drunk neat. The water lessened the grainy, alcohol soaked backbone of the flavor profile. Bottom line: Water improves this blend.

Finish (undiluted)
Almost non-existent. The finish is gone in a flash and while it lasts, it's mostly a grainy alcohol imbued couple of seconds.

Finish (diluted)
Strangely, the addition of water adds some body to this scotch that translates into a finish with more depth and even a richness to the aforementioned flavors than when drunk neat.

General Impressions
Served neat, this blended scotch tastes cheap mainly due to the alcohol hanging in the background like a groupie at a rock concert. How Jim Murray can praise this blend at all is beyond my comprehension. This is not a stunner of a whisky. It has virtually no complexity of flavor.

Served with a splash of water, this blend improves. Alcohol is toned down, the grainy character is still there but more tolerable, and there is a creamy richness that emerges. Does the addition of water transform this blend into a "stunner?" I think not. It still tastes cheap, but simply more tolerable. Maybe on a very hot summer's day with ice, it would be pleasing or as a base ingredient in a mixed drink.

Whether consumed neat or with water, there is no peat flavors. The constitutent single malts used are Speyside classics: Balvenie and Glenfiddich. You can taste the Balvenie, unfortunately, not enough of it. There is a great deal of grain whisky in this blended scotch, and that is not a good thing.

My lasting impression from tasting this on several occasions is that it Grant's Family Reserve is cheap, bottom shelf, blended scotch, that is not worth the low price charged. For the same price, there are significantly better blends out there like: Black Bottle, White Horse, Teacher's Highland Cream, Johnnie Walker Red, and Cutty Sark.

So how come this blend is one of the top world leaders in sales? I think the combination of the low price, a weak flavor profile that lends itself easily to mixed drinks results in it being a staple of bars around the world.

Anyway, you deserve better! Avoid this.

Cheers!

© Jason Debly, 2009-2013. All rights reserved.