Whisky Live #2 – Glenfiddich 50

I haven’t posted about any single drams I’ve tasted recently, as in general I seem to do ‘proper tastings’ in flights or just not get around to writing about them. However, every now and again something comes along that’s a little bit special and deserves some extra attention – one of those popped up on the morning of the Saturday of Whisky Live. The night before Jonny McCormick, writer and chap who ran the World’s Most Collectible Whiskies masterclass at last year’s Whisky Live London, asked if I wanted to join in a little tasting the next day with Jamie Milne, Glenfiddich brand ambassador and the fellow IT industry escapee who convinced me to give Glenfiddich another try last year. It seems that Jonny and Jamie have been trying to get together and try a certain whisky for a while, and as there was just about enough in the miniature to split between two Jonny was wondering if I wanted some…

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The Glenfiddich Range with Jamie Milne at Albannach

Over the last few months I’ve almost felt that this blog has become an extension of the William Grant and Sons website, with bits about the Balvenie Whisky Den and Grants whiskies. So it’s vaguely fitting that I can also finish off their range of whisky brands by writing a bit about Glenfiddich – the most popular single malt whisky in the world.

My relationship with Glenfiddich has until recently been a fairly simple one – I hated it. I tried their old regular expression a number of times over the years and actively disliked it, referring to it as ‘Cooking Whisky’ and generally ignoring the whole Glenfiddich stable. Add to that a recent trip to the distillery where I felt the tour to be full of half-truths and innaccuracies that were obvious enough that my companions (who didn’t know much about whisky until that week) queried them with me. However, on Burns night I had a taste of the 12 year old replacement for the old bottling and was pleasantly surprised. Since then I’ve started giving them much more of the benefit of the doubt, and since starting to acknowledge my mainly baseless prejudice against them I’ve started finding that their whiskies are actually quite interesting. Not all to my taste, but definitely worth a look.

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