I want to taste the whiskey first and foremost. There are sherried and other finishes that I love, but I am first and foremost a malt lover.

Learn your reviewers. Think about what you like. Pick a style or a region and think about which whiskey really does it for you.

Then go see what the reviewers say. I am astounded constantly that such and such a whiskey gets rated low, or high by so and so. Look at your tasting notes and theirs. Maybe their description is more accurate, or maybe it makes no sense to you at all. Maybe you see a pattern, when so and so says XXX it translates into you thinking a whiskey tastes salty, or peppery or whatever.

It can be quite eye opening to blind taste test your favorite whiskey(s) – sometimes, your expectation guides your palate. Knowing what it is, changes how you taste it, or what you think of when you taste or nose it.

At least, for me.

I find that my personal tastes lie somewhere between you two, but can rely on your notes to make tough purchasing decisions… They help me narrow choices down and highlight whiskies which I may have completely overlooked.

I often have people ask me to “tame down” other tasting notes and put them in laymen’s terms. The more approachable the notes, the more people that may be encouraged to purchase the whisky, not be thrown by it. Better for all of us!

Personally, I like to give first nose to a whisky in the wee hours of the morning, pre-food and coffee and come back to it for a taste 30 minutes later. I like to try 2-5 at a time, from similar distilleries or vintages. I’ve found a lot of value in letting something oxidize over the course of an hour and seeing how well it holds up to air and water.

A bit different than others, I also enjoy tasting and ranking with friends, but just one group. Because olfactory is linked so closely to memory, it’s nice to have someone remind you of an experience, food, or odor that you shared and relate it to a tasting note.
I also agree whole-heartedly that everything should be tasted, some swallowed… At least twice and with a control of environment and glassware.

Purchased a “Bukanter” my last trip and that’s been a lot of fun too. Also, while I might use someone else’s notes in an initial purchasing decision. I hide them away when it comes time to make my own, they can really sway your opinion and even what you smell and taste if the notes are right there.

And yes, I want to plug Serge at WhiskyFun.com. He’s doing a great job over there and often reviews Scotch (and European) whiskies) before they get here to the U.S., so be sure to check out his site.

“Try everything yourself if you can. That’s the best way!”

One of the best advices, imo.

Red_Arremer said:

“A friend of mine, says that he usually doesn’t take notes– because he’d rather just go back to the bottle instead”

How true, imo.

John H. said:

“But keep in mind that these are MY feelings and opinions about a whisky and not yours. So, you must determine how corrolated your palate is to mine. This is critical. You might discover that you more closely gravitate towards someone elses reviews and ratings. If that’s the case, then by all means follow their reviews and not mine.”

Very true. imo.

Some people can, but most people can’t. For some people, the word “scotch” gets a whisky extra points, “Islay” gets it a few more again.

And I think reviewers should taste the whisky on their own.

Picture a shooting target (archery perhaps), but rather than having a single bull’s-eye at the middle, there are a series of separate bull’s-eyes clustered around the middle of the target. If you stand close enough you can clearly see each individual bull’s-eye. If you stand far back, they seem to meld together into a hazy middle of the overall target. It is my belief that the combination of personal preference and individual palate causes any one whisky taster to in effect be shooting at a slightly different bull’s-eye (say it appears red to that person), especially with elaborately described tasting notes (which represent standing close to the target). The more tasting you’ve done (and better prepared your palate is on that day), the better you are at hitting your personally appropriate bull’s-eye with consistency. Does this mean that one taster’s notes are of no use to another? Not necessarily, if you consider that different styles of whisky (regions of production, mash-bill, cask type, length/location of aging) are actually entirely separate targets. Even different expressions from the same distillery could be different targets. If you stand just far enough away that the separate bull’s-eyes of any one target seem to meld together, you can still very clearly see that a particular bourbon, rye, Scotch, etc. are in fact different targets. Therefore I think that if enough individuals taste a particular expression, taken in the aggregate their combined impressions are a good representation of that particular bottling to the average whisky drinker. Any one whisky drinker won’t taste everything that’s been described, but he/she will likely pick out a few of the different shades and will get a similar feel of the overall impression given by any one whisky. Comparing two people’s tasting notes, it’s no surprise that you might find very little in common between them. But if you compare 10+ sets of tasting notes, I would expect some commonalities to emerge and an accurate overall impression of that whisky.

Giving any one whisky a numerical score is equivalent to placing a second “shadow” target directly behind the first, but with some offset between the middle of the two targets. The first target represents what you’re actually drinking. The shadow target (picture your arrows passing through the first and hitting the second) represents what you EXPECT that whisky to taste like. Note that you still have certain expectations even if the whisky tasting is done blind. The score is a measure of how far apart the hits are between the two targets. Because of the role of expectation, this scoring process is way more subjective. Nevertheless, if you average together several taster’s expectations, you’ll still get a reasonable representation of how the whisky at hand (say a 10 year old bourbon) compares to some average expectation of what an 8-12 year old bourbon should taste like.

I hope that was helpful. In the above scenario, when anyone tastes a whisky more than once, it represents firing more than one shot. The average of these shots has a much better chance of representing the location of that individual’s bull’s-eye, and if giving a numerical score, the average will give a more reproducible score if the same person were to taste the same whisky at a later date. The practical limit is how many samples you have to taste in a certain period of time and the effects of drunkenness on your accuracy- no one should shoot while drunk!

Having said that, I tend to be very easily disturbed whilst I need a lot of concentration, especially since I’m writing my notes in what’s not my mother tongue. One more handicap, uh! Indeed, I need less ‘tranquillity’ when writing in French, but that doesn’t happen too often.

Seems to me that this is the essence of appreciating scotch as a drink. The reviews and such, the discussion of the product and the industry, serve primarily to add a sense of social depth, cultural location, extended community, and significance.

Serge, you say that “friends are great for freewheeling dramming, not for tasting and scoring.” Maybe that’s true. For my part, though I very much enjoy sharing a dram with my girlfriend or a close friend. We take our time with the whisky, chat about it a little. It’s a relaxing and meditative experience. Two people focusing on one thing. Like listening to an interesting piece of music with someone whose taste you respect. Nothing “freewheeling” about it. I like to take my time with whisky alone too. That can also be great. The point is that focusing on something, appreciating it, and taking it seriously, can all be achieved without the striving towards an image of nonbias or objectivity.

I must say that reviewing (and rating) whiskies is the hardest thing I do professionally and I take it very seriously.

There are whiskies I like, whiskies I don’t like and whiskies that are just “okay”. My numerical ratings of whiskies are my way of expressing this.

But keep in mind that these are MY feelings and opinions about a whisky and not yours. So, you must determine how corrolated your palate is to mine. This is critical. You might discover that you more closely gravitate towards someone elses reviews and ratings. If that’s the case, then by all means follow their reviews and not mine.

And this is why some of you out there don’t even believe in assigning a rating to a whisky, because likes and dislikes is a personal thing. Fair enough!

But I think that my ratings, and Jim’s ratings and Serge’s ratings, etc., all serve a purpose. The key reason why you read our reviews is because you want to get a feel for a whisky’s flavor profile and overall quality before plopping down big bucks to buy it. Yes, YOUR opinion is what matter’s most. BUT, you don’t always have the luxury to taste a whisky before deciding to buy it. We usually do, and this is where we can help.

As long as you understand that reviews and ratings are just guides, and you should use as many as possible to help form an opinion, then I think our reviews–and ratings–can be very helpful.

Quentin, Two-bit, Adam H., etc: regarding your question of bias, fortunately I like all categories of whiskies and styles of whiskies. I think this helps.

Keep the comments coming! We can all learn from this discussion.

Also, when I don’t feel like, I don’t do any tasting.
As mentioned by Butephoto, whenever possible, try everything yourself since you are the final judge.
Unfortunately, It is not always possible to taste the whisky that you desire, so I will consult tasting notes produced by others. Regarding scoring, I put a score from 0 to 5 for the nose, taste, finish and general impression. It has pro and cons, but this was my decision. To my opinion, to give the best description as possible, I write tasting notes and rate them. Again, this might be criticized, but that is the best compromise I found. Two whiskies might have a similar profile, but one taste better than the other one, so a score is needed, and vice-versa.

Regarding the vocabulary, I try to use the same vocabulary to make cross-comparison possible. Of course, as mention by Serge, the flavor description is based on my olfactory experience and I guess that some aromas such as quince, gentian or liquorice might not be very meaningful for a Japanese or Indian whisky enthusiast. Well, we could use refer to flavors based on the chemical structure, but this would not very useful. Isn’t it?

About nosing only?
For blenders, they are looking for consistency for their blends. Well, this might be adequate when you are nosing all the time similar whiskies, since you know what to expect on the palate. Each whisky I taste is almost new to me, I will taste it. If not, the information I will get out of it would be rather limited and would not be too useful to the whisky drinker?