Is Scotch Whisky stuggling? A blind whisky tasting review

[@Avalk9724]

Teerenpeli from Finland should absolutely be on your to-do list. Excellent whisky, some of their bottlings are vintages and cask strenght. Check them out!

[@MaltMariners-WhiskyRoads]

Thx for your comment, yes Teerenpeli has been on my radar for quite some time now. I have yet to try some of their stuff and I am even more curious now. Cheers!

[@justwhisky]

Very interesting and well presented. Cheers 🥃

[@MaltMariners-WhiskyRoads]

Thanks buddy

[@tiredoffools8929]

Like food, I enjoy whiskies from all over the world. I will never regulate myself to products of only one country or region. With that said, I still heavily gravitate toward the products of Scotland, however I am more selective with my picks because of rising costs, and I've also learned to appreciate the younger whiskies from other countries as well. I am really enjoying the variety of world whiskies available and have been really impressed with offerings from Taiwan, New Zealand, France, India, Italy, Japan, Ireland, Belgium, and even England. Many of these countries have distilleries that are creating malts that are punching well higher than their weight class or should I say competing with much larger distilleries than their footprint within the industry. Scotch is so vast with variety and variation that I don't actually believe it is struggling. I just think that with so much variation, that offers many opportunities for not only a lot of hits, but also a lot of misses as well. Higher prices will force Scotch drinkers to look for younger less expensive alternates, and I think that is why there is a rise in blended malts and younger world whiskies.

[@MaltMariners-WhiskyRoads]

Same here

[@GregsWhiskyGuide]

Interesting topic & Blind tasting never lies ! World whisky is becoming more & more potent imho in front of established Scottish ones (of course this is a generality, with exceptions), and it is good to see some French ones pop up into line ups like this one...Lots of great questions asked there, Leon, and it'll be tough to answer here & now shortly, but let's just say that for instance price increase is certainly an issue for me, at the moment of choosing which whisky to buy, value too, and that natural presentation in the widest sense possible (so not the one always mentioned on youtube, but one which would also include the least possible alteration of the distillate in the final product, casks policy wise) should also be taken into account, but not exclusively, especially for beginners into whisky, etc...I do enjoy the fact you're not sticking to Scotch whiskies, despite it's "my first love", but general or specific whisky topics are interesting too, not only tasting notes, to answer one of your questions. Cheers !

[@MaltMariners-WhiskyRoads]

I agree. In recent years I’ve become more and more aware of whisky that has been quickly polished with fresh intense casks (mostly sherry or other fortified wines) that are not very pleasantly balanced. Maybe as a German I’m am particularly sensitive with this issue since German whiskies tend to have this problem often. But maybe it has always been an issue and I’ve only grown more aware of it. What’s your thought on that regarding scotch and french whisky? Do you feel the same about scotch or is it just my perspective? The French whiskies I’ve tried so far were quite spirit driven and bold and not very cask focused, maybe that’s one reason why I like French whiskies.

[@GregsWhiskyGuide]

@@MaltMariners-WhiskyRoads Great question again, and impossible to answer quickly too, Leon...I'll just say that the offer regarding French whisky has changed a lot lately, widening to other styles of whiskies but many are cask focused, and especially red wine finishing obsessed (ok some with white & sweet wine too), most often with mixed results but there are some whisky makers there, experts in maturation who did change the game imho lately....I hope we'll be able to discuss of these kind of topics live at some point, and with examples to try before us...

[@TimHoekstra]

Now this makes me wonder what the new-style(flavor forward) scotch will do in a similar lineup. Will that perform differently/better? Give it a go and do another review. Secondly we've seen with aqvavitae's blind tastings 2 years in a row that the non-scotch pulled the attention (yoichi nas/ indri trini). Does make you wonder if it comes up because people are tuned in into scotch and thus the different whisky gets the attention/interest.

[@MaltMariners-WhiskyRoads]

A very good question that i have asked myself also. I mean the thing is: just because some scotches are not what they used to doesn’t mean it’s whole category is “not good any more”. Obviously there still is loads of excellent scotch whiskies they need to be reached. For me personally I think I expect a lot from scotch cause it is and used to be my benchmark for quality. But specially with the premium sector I’ve had my problems in recent years. I don’t see the point of paying 100 € $£ + for a just ok whisky (subjective opinion obviously). Raising prices is one thing but if a price increases is combined with a lowering in quality I think these premium product really have a problem on the long run.

[@MaltMariners-WhiskyRoads]

To me it feels like we could almost add the “New scotch kids” to the list of the world whiskies in therms of approach. From the looks of it it’s more the classics in a higher age that seem to struggle.

[@brettobrien5244]

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