Brown Drink Bottling Note
As you may well know, here at Master of Malt we bottle up a range of
hundreds of samples of all kinds of spirits, from whisky, rum and brandy, to sotol, vodka, gin and genever. What we do is take full-sized bottles and make them into 3cl samples, or “drams”. We make 23 samples from each bottle, and each sample is very slightly over 3cl, which leaves a few ml left over. Now, if our Nanas have taught us anything, it’s that you mustn’t waste anything. Even if you’re already full, and eating any more Shepherd’s Pie will make you feel unwell. So we gathered all of the remnants from each bottle, and we vatted them all together.
We tried some of this “Brown Drink”, and were pleasantly surprised that a mix of spirits from many, many distilleries, all over the world resulted in something really rather delicious. So, we’ve bottled it. Batch 1 of Brown Drink made up just 37 bottles, which include 542 different spirits, From Aberlour 19 Year Old Cask Strength, to Zuidam 5 Year Old Rye!
This is Batch One...
Nose: Rather malty with a decent amount of peat and some nutmeg. It’s quite sweet too, with manuka honey, toffee apple and brown sugar, and a hint of vanilla. Something tangy develops in the glass, like sour apple sweets, and there’s just a hint of old-fashioned cola and coconut ice.
Palate: Tangy and very spicy. This is absurdly enjoyable, and it tastes bizarre. Grassy, gristy with hints of condensed milk, some coriander seeds, nutmeg, and more than a suggestion of gin botanicals. There’s also a hint of the rubber they use to make basketballs, which is a refreshing change from all those other whiskies which don’t taste like sporting products. Very herbal as it develops.
Finish: Long, very spicy and warming. Some cold coffee, almond, and gin botanicals on the tail, with trailing ginger sweetness.
Overall: Utterly bonkers, but really rather wonderful!