Home-blending single malts...

[sparky]

Hey, has anyone tried blending their single malts? I realize I run the risk of angering the smsw gods, but try adding 1 part islay with 1 part speyside. 0.2 Oz of Ardbeg with 0.8 Oz of Glenlivet? A splash of smokehead to some not so great Glenfiddich perhaps. How about a sherry monster with a lowland? Laddie and Springbank? How about mixing scotch and Irish? Just wondering of there are any good recipes out there or should I go into hiding for the mere suggestion before the lords on smsw strike me down with a bolt of flaming J&B ...

[Deactivated Member]

Click on "Frequently Asked Questions" at the top of the Q&A forum, and scroll down to "Improving whisky". There are three threads thereunder dealing with home vatting.

[mikeymad]

I know that ganga has started the mixing of beverages... bored I guess... Other than leftovers in the glass when I pour a new one I have not played with it.

But I think that it could be fun though. I would start with just two malts if I was going to try it. And being a engineer, I probably be pretty exact with meaturing and recording it. So that I and others could reproduce it.

Don't blow anything up...

Cheers,

[kyorke1]

Sounds like dangerous territory to me, the whisky in my collection is far to valuable to me to start blending them, especially with my lack of knowledge. Have fun.

[Gov]

Not single malts, but I currently am drinking a small vatting of mainly Teachers with JWB and Grants Family Reserve. Pretty good I think. As far as SM, I have been afraid to try it

[Deactivated Member]

Afraid?!? "Oh, Bluto, we're afraid." Huh. I often mix the malt I'm drinking with the residue of the malt I drank last night, or two or three days ago. Or last week. Bachelor housekeeping.

[oldrip57]

It is, in fact, what master distillers do all the time, whether we're talking about Scotch whisky, bourbon, Irish or Japanese.
Unless you're drinking a single-cask or single-barrel whisk(e)y, you're enjoying the result of blending. And don't believe for a minute that the folks here, though not possessing the Master Distiller title, don't or can't do it expertly. If I may be so unabashed, I might qualify myself with such skill.
An example (and certainly not the only one): a couple of months ago I opened a c. 1950-bottled W.L. Weller 100-proof (Bottled In Bond, actually) 7yo 4/5-quart with great expectation, only to be disappointed by an old-bottle, old-wood (as in, first-growth) menthol sense which was WAAAYYYY too prominent. After mixing and tasting through about half the bottle, I finally just vatted it with an equal amount of today's W.L. Weller 7yo/90 proof -- and the result is a very fine bourbon, better than either individually.
Now, that last statement IS the goal -- you want to improve each element you add to the blend. When it works, pat yourself on the back.

[Deactivated Member]

You have a point, rip. My one experience with intentional vatting came about because I had two bottles of Highland Park which disappointed for opposite reasons. One was the duty-free 16yo, a terribly flat and flavorless dram. The other was the Blackadder Old Man of Hoy, which was a heavily peated HP, horribly sharp and unbalanced. A mix at a ratio of 4:1, 16 to OMoH, turned out to be a very drinkable drop. And still single malt! I have some left, and think it could still use a little more malt balance; maybe I'll try to throw in a bit of the 12, or something else that happens to be fairly simple and sweet.

[Deactivated Member]

I put a little of my semi-port-finished Glen Grant 5yo from my cask into some Ardbeg Almost There last night. And damn tasty it was too..! The sweeter GG took a little of the smoky and high-strength edge off the AT.

[lincoln imp]

My daughter mixed some Talisker 18 with Johnnie Walker Green Label.My son called it Green McTalisker

[Matheus]

This is an old post but really hit one out of the park tonight. both separate components on their own are amazing. Caol ila 12 and bunnahabhain 12. Was drinking the bunnahabhain tonight and although an islay very little peat. It is for me really savory dram with sherry highlights and drinks much older. I added a teaspoon of caol ila to an ounce of bunnahabhain and man it really adds a nice non iodine peatyness, unlike laphroig and more so lagavulin.


I agree with previous post that two and max three malts for the layperson otherwise risk a mishmosh of flavors.

any other vatting of malts you would recommend to your peers fellas?