Rating: 10/23
I've heard great things about Drambuie, but I've always been skeptical because it's made from scotch. Scotch is a vague enough category that I don't know what to expect and it's also an expensive category, so I worry that the scotch used to make Drambuie is likely to be low quality. Today's the day to find out how good Drambuie is.
N: Sweet, herbal, and faintly musty. It reminds me of Chartreuse Green a fair bit with its spices (including cardamom and coriander) being balanced with the mint. I don't love the smell, but it's solid.
P: Immediately, I get sulfur mixed with heat and sweetness. More herbs come out, with licorice being especially prominent, as the palate goes on. The sulfur fades a bit throughout.
F: A big bitterness that's a hair numbing. There are faint herbal notes (including mint) and there's still a bit of a sulfuric presence.
- Conclusion -
This is a pretty big disappointment. I was prepared for it to be less than awesome, but that sulfur really made a mess of it. It's extra disappointing because the nose reminded me of Chartreuse Green and seemed to hold potential. Chartreuse Green is a lot stronger with more focus on the various herbal flavors instead of the sweetness (and none of that sulfur). This might go well in some certain cocktails - and it could possibly work as a Chartreuse Green substitute in a pinch - but it has a substantially flawed profile and certainly isn't sippable.
Compared with Jagermeister, this is sweeter and more complex, probably with less confectioner's sugar. Being sweeter than Jagermeister, this might be kind of too sweet. I would like take it over something like Vita Divine Hazelnut though. I'm trying to decide how much to penalize this for the sulphur. It can easily be drowned out, but it is definitely there when sipping this neat. I've considered the 9 to 11 range for this.
So here's the cocktail twist. The only cocktail I know of that uses this stuff is the rusty nail (3:1 scotch:Drambuie). The sulphur does show through when this is mixed with something like Pure Scot Virgin Oak (and so does the sweetness), but it also adds some nice complexity with its herbal character. In comparison with a 4:1 rusty nail, Highland Park 12 is substantially more complex and balanced, but also more sulphuric.
Even with that fairly effective mixing in a rusty nail, I find that this doesn't work super well because I want to compare it with scotch rather than cocktails and it's pretty easy to find a more complex scotch.Mixed with any scotch I'd actually drink, this at best does not improve it. Mixed with anything cheaper (which fortunately I don't have right now), this could possibly improve it, but I'm very skeptical that I would want to drink the result. Considering that, I'm going to go with the neat score of 10 here.
So here's the cocktail twist. The only cocktail I know of that uses this stuff is the rusty nail (3:1 scotch:Drambuie). The sulphur does show through when this is mixed with something like Pure Scot Virgin Oak (and so does the sweetness), but it also adds some nice complexity with its herbal character. In comparison with a 4:1 rusty nail, Highland Park 12 is substantially more complex and balanced, but also more sulphuric.
Even with that fairly effective mixing in a rusty nail, I find that this doesn't work super well because I want to compare it with scotch rather than cocktails and it's pretty easy to find a more complex scotch.Mixed with any scotch I'd actually drink, this at best does not improve it. Mixed with anything cheaper (which fortunately I don't have right now), this could possibly improve it, but I'm very skeptical that I would want to drink the result. Considering that, I'm going to go with the neat score of 10 here.
I did try it with some cheap Irish whiskey. I went with some very heavy forms of a rusty nail, but at best that faint Drambie added some slight improvement. Going back to scotch, I tried a range, but found that even the faintest of this was adding some complexity but not necessarily improving the product. I got a bit of Clynelish waxiness in one context, but this was drier and more herbal, so I don't think that it's really a fair comparison there. Considering the tiny volumes of this required, this is much more likely to be effective as an ingredient for home blending than for mixing. Of course, I've yet to find a scotch based cocktail that I thought was worthwhile, but I still don't like this that much, even in a cocktail.
Thanks for the sample
@ctbeck11 :)