Ailios

Expert Senior  Senior Expert

About Ailios:

My earliest memory of drinking whisky was when I must have been somewhere around 12 years old. My parents used to run a Spar shop so they would often not be home until quite late and my dad always had a bottle of cheap blended whisky in the house (usually Bells or Spar's own blend) and I used to occasionally have a sneaky wee dram. At first I just knocked it back in one like you see in films but I found that too quick and easy so I used to just hold it my mouth as long as I could. I can’t say at that time I was an instant fan but I didn’t dislike it either.  I think my first bottle of whisky, or rather whiskey, was a bottle of Jack Daniels that I got as a present for my 18th birthday.


It wasn’t until 2009 when I was 25 that I really started drinking whisky. One day I just thought it would be interesting to try the 5 major cheap blended whiskies (Bells, Grouse, Teachers, Grants and Whyte & Mackay) to compare them and see which I thought was the best. My conclusion was (and still is) I thought Teachers was the best. I then tried the Tesco own blends, I wasn't that impressed with the cheaper Special Reserve and I thought the slightly more expensive Finest Reserve 12 (unfortunatly no longer available) was nice but it wasn’t at all what I thought higher quality whisky should taste like, I remember thinking it’s just like liquid fruit cake and I thought whisky should taste and smell more sort of dusty, musky, woody and a perhaps a bit smoky. So then there was only one place to move onto from there and that was the single malts, I’m fairly certain my first one was the typical starting point, Glenfiddich 12. I remember being quite amazed how different the flavour was with a much more distinct, cleaner character and even to a novice it was clearly better quality. I then tried other malts like Glenmorangie 10 and Glenlivet 12 which I liked equally as much but then I tried Balvenie 12 Double Wood and that was probably the moment when I truly got hooked to whisky, I can remember trying it for the first time and just saying to myself “wow!” and thinking I have found something very special, not just the specific whisky itself but also whisky in general.

I then explored the diversity of single malt whisky such as heavily peated whiskies like Talisker 10 and Laphroaig 10, some of the older expressions of Glenfiddich and Glenlivet and some of the other great entry level malts like Highland Park 12, Bunnahabhain 12 and Old Pulteney 12. Just as I was building a base knowledge of whisky and starting my journey into malts, it had to stop as I became unemployed and I didn’t work for at least a year. Therefore I had to go back to the cheap blends, I wasn’t too distraught, it was always a struggle to have enough money for any bottle of whisky so I was very grateful to get anything. After a while living on next to nothing I even got to a point where I remember thinking “God all that money I pissed away on those malts”. But eventually I managed to find a bit of work valeting cars which became quite a lot of steady work and gradually got back on my feet. Then one day doing some shopping in Tesco I saw a malt I had heard about and was very interested in trying so I had to buy it. It was Bruichladdich The Laddie 10 (first release) and after having nothing but cheap blends for more than a year the moment I tried it, it immediately reignited my passion for quality whisky and I haven’t looked back since.

I currently have over 450 bottles (not including miniatures/samples) which I have worked out if I don’t buy any whisky in the meantime that would easily last me 15 years, even so I have an irrational desire to keep buying more. It was never really by design to build a collection of hundreds of bottles of whisky, I suppose the main reason is prices are constantly going up so it does make sense to buy sooner rather than later but also there is so much great whisky out there and some come and go never to be seen again. Most of my collection is made up of single malts from Scotland and while that is what I favour I will buy whisky produced in any country as long as it is decent and they don't take the piss with the price. Although it once used to be that Scotland were second to none when it comes to producing great whisky that is no longer the case because all their production secrets that gave them the edge are known all the over world so any country can now make great whisky but where Scotland still has an advantage today is the huge variety of different whiskies due to there being so many distilleries. I do like blends as well although I do find myself buying less nowadays as I do feel with so many different whiskies being vatted together they sort of cancel each other out which tends to give a bit of a vague character, I do however particularly like buying blends at auction bottled in the 80’s, 70’s or earlier as you can still get them at reasonable prices and they can be absolutely stunning whiskies. I also have an ever growing collection and fondness for American whiskey probably mostly because I love whiskies that are bold and cask forward and also because it has flavour profile you generally don't find in other whiskies. Japanese whisky for sure can be exceptional but to get something exceptional you have to pay ridiculous prices for now and since the major producers compromised quality for quantity in recent years in order to try and keep up with demand even the entry level stuff is way too expensive for what you get so the way things are going I have less and less interest in them, I'm much more interested in the stuff that is coming out of Kavalan in Taiwan and Amrut in India.

Whiskybase is really great site, although I don't always share the same opinion on the ratings it is one the best references to use when deciding when a whisky is worth buying or not and also to have the ability to easily see my whole collection in one place is very useful.
  • Gender
    M
  • Vintage
    1983
  • United Kingdom
    gb
  • Points
    6240
  • Check-in
    24

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