Famous Grouse 18 Year

Blended Scotch
Purchase Price: Generally $60+
Place of Purchase: Received as gift
Rating: 8.8

This blend vaulted to the top of the list the second I took a sip after receiving a bottle for Christmas. If White Horse is my favorite everyday blend, this is easily my favorite "indulgence" blend. Benefiting from some strong but not overpowering sherry influence that matches the maroon label quite nicely, this stuff possesses a sweet smoothness that reminds me of Balvenie DoubleWood but in the end might even be better than that much heralded single malt. As full and rich an experience as you can ask of a "mere" blend. A great, great whisky and worth the money even if you are not fortunate enough to receive a bottle as a gift. Trust me, I wouldn't lie about this!

Clontarf Classic Blend

Irish Whiskey
Purchase Price: $16
Place of Purchase: Warehouse - New York, NY
Rating: 7.6

Clontarf Single Malt is very nearly my all-time favorite Irish Whiskey so I had high hopes for its cheaper “Little Brother” blend. Well it didn’t live up to my expectations—this is pretty dull stuff. Somewhat paradoxically, it reminds me a bit of Brennan's in the way it makes me completely forget about it only five minutes after drinking it. It also appears that this brand has gotten a facelift in the labeling department (I’ve posted a picture of the old label since that was the bottle this review is based on) and a new ad campaign geared towards twentysomething binge drinkers. Their website actually stoops to utilizing a picture of two fetching coeds clinched in a lip-lock to get the pulses of potential consumers racing. How utterly puerile. I’m not sure what else to say except that the song "The Friendly Ranger at Clontarf Castle" by Thin Lizzy is a pretty good song.

Lord Calvert

Canadian Whisky
Purchase Price: $10
Place of Purchase: Warehouse - New York, NY
Rating: 7.9

I hadn’t given this brand so much as a stray though in decades and then, boom, there it is, sitting on the shelf in Warehouse going for the decidedly un-Lordly price of $9.99 per 750ml. With just one glance at a bottle shape and label that hasn’t changed in probably half a century, I was instantly transported back to a late-seventies era I spent thumbing through shoplifted copies of Penthouse and National Lampoon magazines. Lord Calvert always seemed to have a full page ad in these periodicals every month of the year. It’s worth noting that when I googled this to find a picture of the bottle, one of the first links I saw was an article about some vehicular miscreant who was found passed out in the front seat of his car with “four pint bottles of Lord Calvert scattered about.” There also appears to be a Lord Calvert bowling alley somewhere in Maryland. Rather fitting I think, although, I must admit, I actually like this. It’s got a touch of Juicy Fruit-type sweetness that reminds me a bit of an Irish whiskey but still plenty enough rye overtones to reassure that this is indeed a product of north North America. A pleasant surprise!!

Rittenhouse 100 Proof

Rye
Purchase Price: $15
Place of Purchase: Warehouse - New York, NY
Rating: 8.0

Along with flinging money into a black hole meant to bail out bankers and automobile manufacturers and insurance companies, the United States government is also charged with ensuring that certain liquors are “Bonded”--meaning they are bottled and sold at a certain minimum proof. Rittenhouse is a grand old name in rye, and is a serviceable example of this oft-overlooked category, but it suffers in comparison to the identically-priced Old Overholt. You’d think something that is 25% stronger than the normal 80 proof would have a bit more “oomph” but Rittenhouse just doesn’t bowl me over the way my favorite ryes do. Worth a try, though.

Rain

Vodka
Purchase Price: Generally $16-20
Place of Purchase: Never Purchased
Rating: 5.0

I hear a lot of chirping about how vodka’s infamous “neutral taste” makes it impossible for a truly "bad" vodka to exist, but I must disagree and hold (at arm’s length) a bottle of Rain up as evidence. I first had the displeasure of sampling this at an art opening on the LES that caused me to say a lot of disparaging things about it in a loud tone of voice—rather ungentlemanly behavior on the part of a guest, but drinking is at least as serious a business as art, don’t you think? I was hoping never to see it again, but only scant months later I was at a party somewhere in Tribeca where there were about six bottles of Rain arranged about the kitchen counter and honestly, no alternative in sight, not even a cheap bottle of wine! I tried to choke down a plastic cup full, even adding some fruit juice to it, but there was no escaping the slightly sickening, throat-constricting feeling this vodka produces. So it was down the stairs for a six-pack of micro-brewed beer. Rain really is a must to avoid.

Knappogue Castle 1993

Irish Whiskey
Purchase Price: $36
Place of Purchase: Warehouse - New York, NY
Rating: 7.8

Knappogue is an Irish single malt initially recommended to me by a bartender in an authentic Irish Pub in the authentically Irish city of Boston, so my hopes for this were as high as Carrauntoohil, but it never really scaled those dizzying heights of 3,000 feet or so. It seems really washed-out and thin to me, like a summer blouse fashioned from Irish Linen instead of the hefty Munster Rugby jersey I was anticipating. Hmmm. Retarded analogies aside, this is way too mild-mannered for me—and they’re not exactly selling it for eleven bucks, either. A surprising let-down.

Johnnie Walker Blue Label

Blended Scotch
Purchase Price: Generally $160--200
Place of Purchase: By the glass in several different places
Rating: 8.1

I'm probably one of the few people strolling the planet who's had a FULL bottle of Johnnie Walker Blue THROWN at them. Last December, I bore witness to a bunch of skateboard punks relieving some businessman-type guy of his belongings, shortly after beating him down to the sidewalk. One of the items they nabbed was a bottle of Johnnie Walker Blue--perhaps a client or business partner had given it to their victim for Christmas? In any case, these kids must have been straight-edge or single malt snobs because they heaved this most famous of blends my way without so much as blinking an eye. Even being the most overpriced, overhyped scotch out there, it really didn't deserve that sort of treatment. Luckily for my well-being, the kid who threw it wasn't quite ready to give Brett Favre or even Trent Dilfer a run for his money so I escaped with some "minor splashing" on the lower parts of my Z. Cavaricci trousers. The businessman was a bit more unfortunate, he was blubbering like a girl after his overcoat had been pulled over his head and the sleeves tied up around his noggin like the bow on a wedding gift. Did I mention that Johnnie Walker Blue is overpriced and overhyped? If you want to drop $200 on a blend, Chivas Regal Royal Salute is the only way to go. And it comes in a beautiful ceramic vessel that even the most cretinous teenager would think twice about destroying.