Dawn bus

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Dawn Bus

I took this way back in 2011. These days, I process very few photos immediately - I like to go back to my work much later and see my photos without the bias of immediate enthusiasm.

This one kept popping back into my mind though - I knew I'd taken a photo I was happy with. And it only took me four years to find it again, process it and publish it.

Ladies' Day At Lords

Submitted by Philip Storry on

As I select a picture to put up this week, Australia have just collapsed in the fourth Test of the Ashes.

So a cricket theme seemed reasonable right now. A few years ago, I got invited to Lord's to sit in the Pavilion. It was Lord's Ladies Day, at which ladies get free entry to encourage their interest in the game. I happened to catch this photo, which I think will increase ladies' interest in cricket considerably.

2015 Birthday Dramming

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DSC_0179For my birthday in 2015, I wanted to open some half-decent drams and share them with friends. This, naturally, leads to what is known as Analysis Paralysis.

I decided to make it easy by going for something rare - and settled on a Brora.

Of course, many of my friends are experienced and widely travelled whisky connoisseurs - I associate with a cut above the average drunkard, I can assure you. For many of them, Brora is less of a special event than you'd think, so I decided to let reverse psychology work its magic. I told them I'd be bringing a lesser Brora.

That did the trick.


In truth, there have been many bottlings of Brora over the years, and some have better reputations than others. I decided to pick one that was from over a decade ago, which was highly unlikely to have been tasted before. Everyone rushes for the Special Releases or a Rare Malt, but bottlers like Gordon & MacPhail, Douglas Laing and Signatory were keeping us well stocked in excellent Brora for many years.

So I selected a Signatory Vintage Un-chillfiltered Collection Brora, and on opening it I found only one regret - that I'd waited over a decade to do so!

DSC_0180Of course, there may be deviants and heretics amongst my friends who - for moral, religious or other dubious grounds - may refuse a Brora. I'm unsure where I met these people, but they just won't go away, and I'm too polite to tell them where to go. For these people, I arranged a fallback whisky - an Alchemist bottling of 10 year old Springbank, with a twist.

We are all merely temporarily strangers

Submitted by Philip Storry on

Out of my depthIt's the anniversary of the 7th July 2005 London bombings today, and lots of people have stories about how close they were to danger.

That's human nature. A strange kind of braggadocio that we all succumb to - albeit in this case in the noble cause of trying to encourage empathy in all around us.

I was fairly safe. I worked with one of the victims, but can't really claim to have known him well. Our office was on Bunhill Row in the City of London, we worked on different floors. But that day, our department was out on a departmental away day. We were over at Lincoln's Inn Fields, near Holborn.

Over the last decade, on each anniversary's reflections, I've come to think of James Mayes as a person I almost knew. I'd bumped into him a few times, but only exchanged greetings and a few sentences. At our little departmental away day, the intention was to get to know the other colleagues in my department better. We might have learnt how to build a bridge out of six sheets of A4, three paper clips and a pencil. We'd have been bored during speeches. And we'd have done our best to hide our suspicion that most of the team bonding would have been better done in a pub.

(And I'd have certainly been going to the pub afterwards. We had that kind of team, and lots of the other teams in the department were the same!)

SMWS July 2015 Outturn

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DSC_0215A very good list for the warm weather - a little something for everyone, but mostly lighter and sweeter notes that met the hot weather well. Apparently, the drams are matched with jazz tracks this month. Which means very little to me, but the deviants jazz enthusiasts that I know seem to have enjoyed it, and who am I to stop them?

A lot of people have been asking me about the Bladnoch, but I don't think it's all that. For me, the pick of the list is either the waxy and fruity Clynelish or the incredibly well constructed Royal Brackla - both superb drams.

The clean, light and fruity Balmenach also stood out for me, as did the caramel and cigar boxes of the Mortlach. And for the peat-freaks, the vegetal earthiness of the Kilchoman is going to tick all the boxes.

Sadly, this is a bad list for fans of the sherry cask - not one in sight!.

But if you want an unusual wood, you're in luck! Don't forget the ex-port barrique Longmorn, which brought plenty of well integrated fruits. There's also the first-fill toasted oak Glen Moray - which gave everything from Turkish Delight and red apples to shoe leather and dark chocolate.

SMWS June 2015 Outturn

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DSC_0212The July outturn had an interestig mix of wood - a little more sherry than usual, and plenty of first fill bourbon.

There are two bottlings with limited edition labels - the Clynelish and the Bowmore. Both were excellent.

The Dailuaine and the Glenrothes are both wonderful examples of older whiskies, elegant and very well constructed.

That having been said, by volume my favourite of the outturn seems to be the Linkwood - it was excellent every time I went back to it, and I went back to it a lot. It only scored 3.5/5, but it's so drinkable. And we've had a lot of hot summer's days this June... *hic*

The Girvan Vial Pack

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I was kindly sent a Girvan "vial pack" as thanks for some photos I took of their stand at The Whisky Show last year.

It's no secret that I'm a big fan of grain whiskies, so I viewed this as an excellent kindness on their part. But it's also no secret that I'm something of a proselytiser for grain whisky, and I realised that it would be quite immoral to keep this bounty to myself! I arranged to share it with Ben Cops and The Whisky Cyclist, both of whom have kindly put up with my grainy predilections over the years. After talking about it for several months we finally set a time and location and got down to it.

The pack has four 50cl bottles at 42% abv:

  • Girvan Patent Still New Make
  • Girvan Patent Still No. 4 Apps
  • Girvan Patent Still 25 Year Old
  • Girvan Patent Still 30 Year Old

We topped this up with two independent bottlings:

  • The Whisky Agency Girvan 48 Year Old
  • SMWS G7.2 "Fascinating and inspiring"

About Girvan Distillery

Girvan is a grain distillery built in 1963 by William Grant & Sons, who also own the Glenfiddich, Balvenie, Ailsa Bay and Kininvie malt distilleries. It first distilled on Christmas day in 1963 and is the second largest distillery in Scotland producing around 103 million litres of spirit per year. (They could produce a little more, but stop distillation for two weeks of every year to clean everything.) It has three sets of stills, and uses a unique multi-pressure system that allows distillation under partial vacuum - thus lowering the boiling point, and allowing flavours to be carried by the boiling alcohols without being burnt. Clever! But this behemoth of a distillery isn't what everyone would call a pretty face. The traditional distillery image of a pagoda roof and whitewashed walls isn't the case here - Girvan is an industrial site, planned with purpose and run with precision.

Which, frankly, sounds like my kind of place - I'd probably spend hours tracing all the piping trying to reverse engineer their stills!

Now, let's get on to those tasting notes...

Wooden

Submitted by Philip Storry on

This is the wooden front of Edmund Martin Ltd's shop - tripe dressers, meat & offal salesmen, according to the sign that I conveniently left out of shot.

Wooden

Taken back in 2008, this shop was demolished as part of the Crossrail works, which is a great shame.

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