". . . the luxury of ice . . ."
Bring the luxury, no matter what the no-ice purists say!
Mark Rippetoe gives a primer on different types of alcohol, brewing and distillation methods, and their history.
Transcript & Episode Resources
". . . the luxury of ice . . ."
Bring the luxury, no matter what the no-ice purists say!
I'm going to have to try making some cider at home. While I prefer whisky, this sounds like fun. Now I wonder about freeze distilling some apple jack...
Thanks for the explanation of why whisky opens up with water. I knew it did from my own experimentation with some cask strength whiskies, but never thought about what was actually going on.
I think the only thing that may have been left out were the various liqueurs.
Enjoyed the ethanol podcast. Good summaries of alcoholic beverages without going off into the weeds.
I'm an all-grain home brewer but know nothing about whiskey.
Why is single malt whiskey so desirable while single malt beer is usually somewhat bland depending on the hops?
I've never seen a single malt beer advertised as such. Single Malt Whisky is primarily noted for 1.) not being blended, i.e. no vodka added to it, and 2.) having characteristics of the regional style in the area of production, like Islay or Spey.
There are a number of commercial SMaSH beers (single malt single hop).
It's a great way for homebrewer to sample either a new hop or a single variety of malt. I've brewed plenty of single malt beers, usually pilsner malt or Maris Otter.
One of my favorite commercial SMaSH beers is from Lone Pint Brewery in Texas. Yellow Rose IPA-single malt with only Mosaic hops.
Founders makes one called Mosaic Promise (mosaic hops and Golden Promise malt).
The thing about Single Malt Scotch (in addition to what Rip said) is that it's the product of one distillery. So unless you're getting a single barrel product, it's still a combo of a variety of aged stocks and finishes from that distillery. It really has nothing to do with the actual barley. You can't really compare it to a single malt beer, which actually is specifically referring to the malt they use in its production.
Several years ago, my wife and I made a point of developing a taste for gin. If anyone is interested, I’ll throw a vote for Citadel. Hendricks is really nice, but Citadel was something special.
Rip didn’t talk about tequila or mezcal - not your thing or just an oversight?
Not an interest of mine.
There are some good quality blends, what used to be called "vatted," that are 100% barley blended from different Scotch distilleries. Wild Scotsman was my favorite, but I've had difficulty finding that lately. Wild Scotsman also sells various bottlings of single barrels that have been fantastic. Jeff Topping -- the man behind Wild Scotsman -- has great taste.