Welcome to 2022’s first episode of Whisky You Can Drink, wherein I continue to drink whisky and tell you about it. Today’s dram (that’s some fancy-pants whisky nerd shit) is Loch Lomond Original, a single-malt Highland Scotch whisky with no age statement, that tips the scales at 80 proof. I paid $22 for this bottle on sale, which is why you can drink it.
Loch Lomond is a picturesque spot just north of Glasgow in the southern Highlands, where the hills rise quickly and dramatically from lake level. We stopped to take a few pictures on our way back to Edinburgh from Inveraray Jail, because when you’re a practicing Penologist the thing to do when you travel to other countries is visit 19th-century jails. I kind of wish we’d gone to Peterhead instead, but it was over 3 hours away. Having been there made it all the more interesting to find this whisky at my local store.
What’s it smell like? The whisky, I mean, not the lake, which you can probably guess smells like a fucking lake. It smells like Scotch. Like, when you think “What does Scotch smell like?” the answer is “This.”
What’s it taste like? Just fucking with you. What’s it smell like, besides “Scotch?” I detect some lavender, with some peach or pear undertones, but with a slight earthiness. At some point, I began to wonder what heather smells like, because I’ll bet it smells like this. Surer than shit, looking at other reviews, they find notes of “heather.” Anyhow…………….there is a mild smokiness to this, which eventually morphs into a scent of smoked ham, then into a full-blown pea soup kind of thing. The smell part is kind of an interesting ride if you pay close enough attention.
Now, what does it taste like? It is slightly medicinal, like a Fisherman’s Friend cough drop. There is a bit of licorice or anisette. It is mildly sweet, but also smoky. There are undertones of fruit and honey or butterscotch, maybe even some dark chocolate. The finish is short and fairly clean. There is just a hint of that bite-and-scratch that Scotch tends to do.
Should you buy it? Don’t let me tell you what to do with your money. New year, same mantra.
Will I buy it again? This is an unassuming but perfectly respectable Highland whisky, a good change of pace from the sweeter Speyside-ish whiskies I tend to favor. It’s on sale again this month and hell yeah, I’ll probably grab another.
Thank you…you are my expert of choice (no pressure!).
Have you bought any of these bottles besides the EC?
I have avoided the especially “value priced” and the scotch. I am working my through a gift bottle, and had that Japanese bottle; then I am going to go with a Lemmy pick.
…ellie’s right…if I win a lottery or otherwise come into a shitload of cash I’m spending a bunch of it on fancy single-malts (& the necessary shipping) so I can find out what you think of the sort of unjustifiably expensive whisky I fondly imagine I might one day get to taste before I shuffle off this mortal coil
If I win the lottery I’m booking passage on a clipper ship and sailing to Scotland to try them at the source.
…any chance I could tag along on that tour?
They had a whiskey tasting at Edinburgh Castle while we were there, but I had just gotten off a 10-hour overnight flight and was afraid I’d go back to the hotel and pass out if I drank any.
I sometimes debate buying the more expensive whiskies in half-pint bottles just to try them, but the prices still make me flinch.
Also – Loch Lomond is home to the ruins of my ancestors.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inchgalbraith
I know nothing of the whiskey though.
I don’t know what volume of fluid a dram is, but I know I see it used in historical romance novels often as some unit of measurement.
But given that Americans will measure with anything besides the metric system, I am in no place to criticize a fancy drink measurement used by others.
Near as I can tell, in the Official Whiskey Lexicon it means “a glass with a bit of whiskey in it.” How big a “bit” depends on who’s pouring it.
…it was at one point a standard measure…& apparently if you fill one of the measures from back then you wind up with about 1/13th of a pint…which I think might actually line up quite close to a standard pour in the states
…but somehow there’s an “official” definition that puts it at something absurd like 1/8th of a fluid ounce…which I’m pretty sure barely fills a teaspoon
…I think my favorite definition would be one I’ve heard a few times (& at least once in scotland) though