Last week I was one of the members of the tasting panel at Whisky Magazine's "Best of the Best" tasting in Bardstown at the Oscar Getz Museum. This year's event was different from the one I attended in 2002. There were only 5 flights of whiskey and they did not include Japanese whisky or Single Malt Scotch. This was actually good because the palate did not get as burned out by the end of the day.
I was sitting at the table with Peter Pogue and Bill Friell. There were many others involved such as Chuck Cowdery, Julian and Preston Van Winkle, Jerry Dalton and other Master Distillers both past and present. We were to rank the products on a scale of 5 to 10 (the theory being that this was the best of the best and none should be less than a 5). We tasted blended Irish and blended Scotch, Single Malt Irish and two flights of bourbon. We had lunch between the morning flights (the Irish and Scotch whiskeys) with the bourbon and ryes after lunch.
The thing that I found interesting is that our panel agreed pretty much with the Irish counterpart as to what were the best Irish and Scotch whiskeys but we were radically different with our choices of bourbons and ryes. I would assume the Irish panel had a similar mix of distillers and others involved in the whiskey industry in Ireland. What I thought it interesting that the Americans seem to know and agree with them as to what makes a good whiskey in Ireland and Scotland but they did not seem to know the same about American whiskey.
Chuck, If you are listening, I think this difference would make an interesting article for the Reader. Why is there this big difference? Explore this and write about it and let us know.
Mike Veach