“When I’m having breakfast in the morning, I’ll pick up my apple juice and nose it before I drink it–it just becomes a habit,” says Sam Simmons, the Balvenie Global Ambassador.
Sam, a.k.a. Doctor Whisky, is talking at the Scotch Malt Whisky Society in Leith, Edinburgh, to a small group of Canadian chefs, journalists and Balvenie folks. He wants us to really start paying attention to the smells of things in our daily lives, so we can develop our noses. “If you pick up and sniff an orange, say ‘orange’ three times, to help train your brain,” says Sam.
We’re with Sam for a whisky appreciation primer: His lessons won’t be wasted on me: until this evening, most of my experience was picked up at 50-pence Whisky Wednesdays, at some Glasgow hip-hop bar I used to go to as a student in the 1990s. There’s a hole in my stomach to prove it.
Before us small glasses are lined up, each filled with one of the different whiskies that make up Balvenie’s signature blend. Sam advises us to look first at the colour of the liquid. A yellowish tinge means the spirit was finished in an American oak barrel; a darker amber colour points to European oak. Why does this matter? Seventy percent of the flavour comes from the barrel in which the whisky was matured. Retired bourbon casks lend very different qualities to those that once held sherry or rum.
Reader's Digest food editor Valerie Howes blogs about cooking lessons with experts, recipes from new cookbooks and food trends across Canada.
