Håvard Eide

A couple of weeks ago the tasting of the evening was from five closed distilleries, a very enjoyable sitdown with a large crowd at the local nmwl.

Littlemill, 1991, 16 yo, 46 % (Murray McDavid)

Nose: this has to be one of the stranges associations I’ve ever had in a whisky - every year at christmas we eat dried sheep ribs that are steamed on pieces of wood, and when this cools down and you digg in late at night when you get that munchies it has a very distinct smell…. this is what I initially thought when nosing this for the first time! When the initial shock was over it smelled very salt and had a distinct wet/harsh smell. Right now I was worried about the taste!
Palate: eucalyptus, some citrus is there, but then a dry malt cocoa comes through.
Finish: malt, very malty, then some salt and a distinct dried piece of wood finishes up the taste.
A Interesting dram, but nothing more than that.

Rosebank, 1990, 18 yo, 48 % (Dun Bheagan) - sherrybutt 611

Nose: honney and lots of floral smells on this one, the sherry cask have had its influence.
Palate: intense sherry hit on the tounge, then more mellow as it goes over in a much smoother sweetness.
Finish: suprising spice finish after the smoothness experienced earlier.

Dallas Dhu 1975, 1975 31 yo, 50 % (Closed Distilleries)

Nose: starts out as sweet honey, but let this one sit in the glass for a bit: after a while it came through with a cotton candy sweetness that was very intens. Actually it reminded me of the Ardbeg Renaissance after it too had a bit of air.
Palate: oh, the sweet round honney from the nose is there! lots of fruits, especially after adding a couple of drops of water in it.
Finish: it just stays there, a nice long aftertaste that finishes up the very good balance that this bottle gives you.

This was the winner of the evening, no doubt in that! Not too many bottles left in Norway, and the pricetag is a bit high, but who knows, maybe one will find its way here soon….

Brora, 24 yo, 48,5 % (Dun Bheagan) - Fino sherry cask 1424

Nose: round butter-oil and some iodine?
Palate: sherry, no doubt about that, a bit harsh maybe? That put me off a bit. A few drops of water opened it up and made it much rounder around the edges, much more enjoyable.

Not the best Brora I’ve had, shows that Brora isn’t bulletproof all the time ( doesn’t come close to the 20yo that I tried at L&B in Amsterdam a couple of years ago )

Port Ellen, 1982, 46 % (Berry Brothers & Rudd) - cask 2030/2035

Nose: sweet smoke.
Palate: this has what I can descibe as a very long sweet smoke blanket in my mouth that went on and on! Port Ellen is absolutely one of my favourite distilleries!

To finish up after the official tasting a Caol Ila 12yo Dun Behgan ( where can I get a bottle of this!! ), a Linkwood 14yo Dun Behgan and a Longmorn 15. A very good evening for the closed distilleries, and the Dallas Dhu came out at the top, no-one even close to it (ok, the Port Ellen then, it was very enjoyable)

Last week the time came for a Ardbeg Supernova tasting at Jekylls in Oslo, hosted by Chris Maile. The basement of Jekylls filled pretty much up and we were presented with a introduction by Chris about the Ardbeg distillery.

Then there was the tasting, first we tasted the new Renaissance before we digged into the Supernova.

Renaissance

Nose: citrus, pineapple and a nutty backdrop.
Taste: peat and salt, classic Ardbeg taste on this one. With a bit of water: more distinct smoke and tar. The smoke really fills the mouth! Then the citrus comes back. This develops really nice with a tiny drop of water.
The interesting thing with the Renaissance was after it had aired a bit: a very sweet cotton candy on the nose, very sweet! I’ve never seen this in a Ardbeg before!

Supernova

This was what we came for: Ardbeg Supernova 2001, aged on first fill burboun and sherry casks.
Nose: the citrus is there, and some iodine. Some dried fruits and the smoke is absolutely on track here!
Taste: The initial hit comes with coffee and very dry cocoapowder on the tounge. The cask strength is absolute noticable but not to a degree where it’s not drinkable. It then develops with the smoke, tar and peat that hits hard, but not as hard as “the peaties Ardbeg ever” would lead you to think. With a tiny splash of water it develops a very dry smoke on the toung, very dry, I can only describe it as a dry pile of ash. Finally the finish: long, very long! It just wouldn’t go away ( in a good manner ), so a interesting experience with this new bottle!

Supernova is released the 2nd of may here in Norway at 829NOK and I do think I’ll pick up a bottle, but you should at least have a little taste of this bottle if you get the chance ( at least if you like peaty whisky ). Supernova is still young ( only 8 years ) and I can imagine that it will be a good one after a few more years in a cask to smoothen out a bit. For now I prefer the Renaissance over the Supernova of the new cask strengths that Ardbeg has released the last year.

After the tasting I got on my bicycle and road back home, that was a experience in itself: the dry ash and smoke dried out my mouth all the way home and I had to cool down with a Ardbeg 10yo before going to bed that night.

A couple of weeks ago I sat down on a nmwl with 5 10yo whiskies in front of me to taste blind. This is always a good exercise since you don’t pre-judge based on the label of the bottle, everyone should try this from time to time just to see what happens. We got a list of 15 distilleries up front so that we had something to base our decision on. Here are my notes for the evening.

First up was Aberlour: sherry cask here? some vanilla and perfume, lots of perfume. some sulphur and the balance is not very good. Not a bottle I would buy. But: my initial thought that it had to be a Aberlour was correct
The second bottle smelled like green grass, had some pear and apple ( mainly fruity ) and a dry finish. It was a Glengoyne, and I did not guess correct.
The third bottle smelled like green apples and had a intense initial hit, then a salty taste that lingered, must be a burboun cask. This was Longrow 100 proof and I did not guess correct.
Fourth up was a odd one: smelled like a old wet fireplace, peaty and lots of wood. This was a Chieftain’s Choise Bunnahabain peated, I was correct and I bought myself a bottle of this the day after.
Finally Ardbeg was servered, this one I had correct ( Ardbeg is on my top 3 distilleries, wasn’t that hard to guess it ).

So: 3 out of 5 wasn’t that bad I think The suprise of the evening was the Bunnahabain peated that got a safe home the next day. Looking forward to opening that one!

I also got to taste a Glen Scotia 1999-2007 bottle 294/345, nose: dry hay, a liqurish hint and some spices. Mouth: bitter and dry liqurish with a hard liquor taste on it. It had a very short finish, this one should have a couple more years before shining through.
Then I tasted a Teaninich 12yo ( Exclusive malts ) that was a bit anonymous, and finally a Caol Ila Dun Behgan 12yo that was very good! I wish there was bottles of this one still available in Norway, I would get it instantly!

2009 have started out as good as 2008 was when it came to quality hiphop concerts, and looking at the schedule for what’s to come later this year it will be a great one! So far it’s been 3 concerts.

Check The Rhyme

This one went down on Betong in Oslo: a classic lineup of 5 groups that became a part of my youth when I grew up and started to listen to hiphop in the first place. My initial thought before buying a ticket was that this could end in disaster with groups showing up late and be a bit dis-organized, but it turned out great! All the groups showed up when they were supposed to and kept to the time schedule!
Jeru The Damaja started the show dropping classics from The Sun Rises in the East. A one-man show that rocked the hard-core fans in the audience, he didn’t have much of a stage show, but the impact that this guy have had on hiphop is legendary.
Next up was Paris a/k/a The Black Panther of Hip Hop: a hard-hitting westcoast rapper that I first encountered with Guerilla Funk back in -94. The set was thight with the distinct sound of Paris showing up ( up-beat and hard ).
Third up was the Alkaholics: these guys still do their thing and serving up classics one after the other.
Lords Of The Underground came up after this and this was the highlight of the evening: rocking the crowd with a (yet another) set of classic tunes( check out the Here Come the Lords album ). This was the group that managed to keep the crowd up and the intensity on stage so high that it really made the night! The set was so good it was worth the entire evening. I hope these guys come back to Oslo in the near future
Finally Beatnuts came on stage and delivered a worthy closure of a evening filled with 90s hiphop

Interesting to see was that there were a lot of younger people in the crowd early on the night, but these faded away quickly so that when LOTUG came on stage it was less people there then when it started….. This was a night for the old-school people that have been around since the early 90s growing up with these groups.

EPMD

EPMD came to Blå to deliver one of the best concerts that I’ve seen, they were only on stage for a good hour, but delivered such a thight set that I couldn’t care less. This was hiphop at its finest!

Too $hort

Last night I went back to Blå to see Too $hort, the okland pimp that goes back 20+ years and 17 albums. The weed smoke was thick and the pimpin factor was high for the disappointingly short 45 minutes that he was on stage ( and what was up with the “dj”, he looked so misplaced he could just have been off stage ).
Image by Vilhelm, my colleague

With these 3 concerts I’ve now seen 7 of the groups that I grew up with in the 90s for the first time live. I just hope more of them are coming out ( must be a lot of 20year anniversaries for a lot of those groups these days )

Today I have set up planet-whisky.com: a site that aggregates whisky blogs and news from around the world into one easy-to-read overview of what’s happening in the whisky world.

The site fetches RSS feeds from various sources that I have picked out on a regular basis (once every hour ). You can of course use google reader or any other RSS reader, but with a planet site you don’t have to go out and find the sites, I’ll find them and put them up there as they appear ( there is even a feed that you can use in your favourite RSS reader if you prefer that ).

I would love some feedback on the site and tips on others sites that could be included.

Det er valg år i år, og Hallvard Lavoll sitt Politikere på twitter innlegg fekk meg til å tenke litt angåande valget som kjem om ikkje så altfor lenge: kva bedriv politikarane i Noreg med for tida? Eg satte meg ned og klikka meg gjennom ein del sider, men å halde seg oppdatert på ein dag til dag basis på denne måten er ikkje haldbar. Eg kunne ha lagt til alle sidene i google sin rss lesar, men dette er noko andre og bør halde seg oppdatert på. Eg er programmerar til dagleg og kjenner godt til planetplanet, ein applikasjon for å aggregere nyhende fra forskjellege bloggar inn i ein oversiktleg straum, og dermed vart politikken.info født: ei side med tre delar:

• Parti
• Nyhende
• Twitter

Kvar av desse seksjonane hentar oppdatert informasjon kvar time om kva norske politikarar seier på internett, enten dette er på partiet sine heimeside, bloggar, nyhende fra større aviser og til slutt ei oversikt over norske politikarar på twitter.

Ein del parti og nyhets kjelder manglar, men dette er ikkje min feil: politikken.info aggregerar kun fra kjelder som har ein politikk kategori og/eller har ein RSS straum, dersom dette manglar kan eg ikkje hente informasjonen derfra. Så vist eit politisk parti ( det er ein del av dei ) har lyst å være med her: legg opp ein RSS straum som eg kan få tak i!

Vist du har andre aviser, bloggar, folk på twitter etc. som kan være interessant å ha med på sida: legg til ein kommentar her, så skal eg legge den til på politikken.info

Har du innspel til sida så legg gjerne til ein kommentar så skal eg kikke på det og gi deg tilbakemelding så snart som mulig.

This week I ended up at the nmwl meeting where topic of the night was Flora and Fauna - this is the unofficial name of a series of malt whisky from Diageo/United Distillers ( originally coined by Michael Jackson after the decor on the bottles, and the term just stuck), we tasted 5 different bottles and was accompanied by a very good lecture on the different bottlings and general information regarding Flora and Fauna.
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The Drammies 2008 awards has been anounced, and you should take some time to send them a email with your votes: What’s with the email anyway, where’s the online form that I can submit? Anyway, I’ve submitted my votes and here are my votes for 2008:
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The Malt Whisky yearbook is now up to its fourth edition - 2009, and last weekend I finally got some time to read through it ( waiting on the airport always gives me the opportunity ). So I thought I’d put up a quick review of this edition.
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Last week I suddenly found out that a trip to Bergen was in order, I haven’t seen some of my friends for a long time, so tickets was ordered, hotell booked and then it hit me: I have recently tried the Ardbeg 1974 and knew that there was one bottle left at the state run bottle shop in Bergen. Monday night I noticed it was still available, but when I called on tuesday it was gone…. The last bottle of Ardbeg 1974, gone! Very disappointing, but saturday morning I was off for a very good weekend, and it turned out I wouldn’t be too disappointed when it came to whisky this weekend either.
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