...whiskey

At work I receive many, many emails from the various mailing lists I'm on. It does mean that I don't tend to subscribe to many in my personal life. For those, I rely on my friend Cathy. She gets sent information about a whole load of random events and so when she received details of a whiskey blending taking place at Brown's in St Martin's Lane, well, it was a given that we were going to do it! It was a really good deal and included a 3-course dinner (which is fortunate because I just dread to think what my hangover would have been without the food!).

Anyway, following the first two courses we sat down to a table with the following in front of us:

The evening started with Phil, the Brand Ambassador for Chivas Regal, telling us a bit about the history of whiskey (which as I'm currently engrossed in the Outlander series was a little familiar!) and explaining the different whiskies we had available to blend. There were 5 in total, covering a range of flavours from very light to smoky to ones with more depth of flavour. Following a review of the individual whiskies, the idea was to blend them to give a whiskey which suited our own personal taste.

And so it began...

I started off OK, but then decided I'd added to much of the smoky whiskey. I'd only added a what seemed like a small amount but it was very overpowering! We had a sheet that we were writing in the proportions of the various whiskies we were adding and I decided in my - at this point somewhat drunken state - to remove half of what I'd made and dilute down again with the lighter options. You'll see from this sheet, trying to do sums when you have consumed a substantial amount of whiskey is quite tricky!!

The idea was that we ended up with 250ml of whiskey. I really couldn't tell you from my scribblings if I achieved that, all I can say is that it fit in the bottle!!

I should probably say at this point, that I'm not a big whiskey drinker at all... So I'm unable to say whether or not it was a good blend or not. I can say it didn't win the prize for the best blend on the night, nor did I win the best name for the whiskey, nor could I expect it to appear in this guide...

...but it was a fun evening, at that's what matters isn't it!