Grouse season
Dave looks at the famous bird’s new clothes with an eye on past trends
Snow Grouse, eh? To begin with I thought it was a new ad campaign for its more famous cousin: you know, a blank white poster with âSâNo Grouseâ as the tag, but apparently not. This, the latest addition to the Grouse family, comes in a frosted bottle with instructions to serve âseriously chilledâ. Itâs a âblended grainâ. (Does anyone else think that looks, well, wrong? âBlended with what?â âGrain.â âNo, with what?â âMore grain.â âOh...â) Anyway, the lovely PR department at Edrington talks about it being for âconsumers looking for something new and different.â of how it is âa light, delicate and vanilla sweet whisky [sic] with a uniquely smooth taste,â that itâs been âsmoothchill filteredâ (TM) and has a âsweet gloopy mouth-feelâ [sic] and a cool taste sensation when served âseriously chilledâ.â The words seem to echo another whisky, long forgotten, one Iâd shelved in the dustiest corner of the mind, until it seemed to leap into my hand when I was faced recently with the remnants of Michael Jacksonâs whisky library. If it was hard to believe that itâs a year since that great heart stopped, then this sight brought that fact home with depressing finality. Is this collection of halfempty bottles all thatâs left of my old friend? Can I read them like runes, trying to piece together the man from these liquid fragments, these puddles of spirit?
Then one bottle seems to levitate out of a box filled with nondescript m.....
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By Dave Broom
Section : A dram with Dave Broom
Page number : 12
