Auld acquaintance far from forgotten

Scottish salute to the year's end was the national drink, whisky. It

still holds pride of place in our minds but is less secure in the glass

with younger tipplers, who have switched to vodka (usually tasteless in

itself) and new exotica, like cream liqueurs, where the success of

Bailey's Irish Cream has inspired copycats; or Malibu, which uses

coconut. An age of experimentation possibly leaves whisky looking staid.

Its promoters were slow to espouse the cocktail image naturally

exploited by gin.

This last is changing, and not just for whisky: makers of Cognac and

Calvados, good year-end warmers, both recommend mixing at least their

lower categories with various components to provide long drinks with a

reduced alcoholic kick. Courvoisier often serves visitors to its famous

chateau a complicated cocktail which contains passion-fruit, and goes

down pleasantly. One smaller Cognac house does a fine combined Pear

Williams and Cognac which I found entrancing last September but which is

not yet imported to the UK.

The essence of spirits is intensity, however; and something is lost in

too much dilution, though it can be said that adding rather a lot of

water to a strong-tasting whisky like Laphroaig produces a delicious

long drink which should be a revelation to those for whom its remarkable

Islay intensity is too much. Incidentally, the water should not be iced,

for a low temperature reduces the ability of the tastebuds to enjoy the

full measure of the flavour.

If anything other than water is being added to whisky, there is little

point in using rare and costly single malts. Green ginger wine was added

to whisky in our house on Hogmanays half a century ago, but that was

probably to eke it out rather than dilute it in days when half-bottles

were enough to evoke envy. A common dilution in the west of Scotland is

sweet lemonade. This always seems an abomination to connoisseurs but it

remains popular, a continuing example of our famous sweet tooth (for

whisky is sweet itself even without being made into post-prandial

stickies like Drambuie and Glayva, and their somewhat lighter competitor

produced by Glenturret).

Blended whiskies have been pushed out of the limelight by the

astonishing rise in demand for the finer malts whose qualities uplift

the grosser grain spirits. Malts were always dearer than grains, and

less plentiful. They delivered complexity as well as personality which

survived being cut by mass-produced, and so cheaper, liquor, something

true even of subtle and gentle Lowland singles, like Bladnoch or

Auchentoshan.

Blenders will tell you how many different whiskies go into their

blends, 40 into Lang's Supreme at the moment, near 100 into Ballantine's

a generation ago. The proportion of malt to grain is, of course,a trade

secret, no doubt lest the finished product is assessed by rather crude

arithmetic and not its taste, which should be the only arbiter, though

the blenders themselves depend far more on smell.

The alternatives to whisky are

legion. Many drinkers favour rum, which certainly keeps the cold out

equally well, as fishermen testify. Clever advertising keeps Black Heart

before our eyes but, like whisky, rum boasts some additional delights at

its higher and more expensive levels: a smooth, complex, and lingering

taste is delivered by Appleton Estate.

Port and sherry are not spirits but wines reinforced by brandy. Sales

of each seem to benefit from a surge of seasonal buying. Lots of houses

(Taylors, for example) are now offering tawnys in half-bottles; and many

supermarket sherries are also in half-bottles which helps to ensure that

we drink soon after opening rather than inflicting slow death on the

contents of half-empty bottles. Few should encounter that fate at New

Year.