Love is blind

MARCEL PASCHILKE, GERMANY

Decide early on how much “blind tasting” you want – if you only want to keep the distillery unknown or if you don’t want to see anything of the whisky in the glass then coloured glasses are worthwhile.

I prefer blind tastings where you can still see the distillate, as examining the colour as well as the legs in the glass is great fun and can give further clues to the age of a whisky.

I remember a blind tasting at a whisky regulars’ table where I had absolutely no hits due to exotic cask combinations. At other blind tastings (both bourbon and Scotch worldwide), you can tell exactly what you have in your glass and which region or distillery it might come from. Blind tastings, however, remain an insanely powerful task for the brain, as the senses are always working at their limits to perceive smell and taste.

KELLY CARPENTER, CANADA

The Canadian branch has been doing their monthly Outturn tastings blind for years. After doing it once just for fun, our members loved that their expectations and assumptions were turned on their head, so they asked us to continue the blind format. It’s been standard practice for almost 15 years and every single month brings a revelation.

BOB WENTING, BENELUX

Hide what you have to hide! You’d be amazed how people can recognise bottles and brands with only a little information. Socks are excellent bottle hiding tools, although the shape of the bottle may give away some information!

Either have someone else make the line-up and pour the whiskies or have people bring their own bottle (blinded of course) if you want to have the blind tasting experience yourself too.

The second tip I have would be to be bold and do something people do not expect. For instance, put in another spirit in between whiskies, put in six bottles of whisky from the same distillery or put one of the whiskies in twice. This is not to trick people but to have them experience how great blind tasting is in discovering your own taste, prejudice/preoccupations and learning to be fully open to what you experience instead of overthinking.

JUTTA UNTERGUGGENBERGER, AUSTRIA

Blind tastings are a standard for us. Members enjoy the mysteries that come along with this set up. It's a way of sampling the whisky without any prejudices or a specific liking to a whisky lover’s favourite whisky. It opens up new horizons and new flavours. Members are at least a little disappointed when we are not having a blind tasting. It’s always great fun for the participants to guess the correct flavour profile, age, the cask and even the distillery.

OLAF MEIER, UK

Blind tastings are an interesting way to think only about the liquid in the glass, no distillery name, no age, no price and ideally as well no colour – if you use cobalt glasses.

That is the theory, but in practice people taking part will start guessing which distillery, what age etc. which is very unhelpful and takes away the focus completely from the spirit. So one has to be very disciplined in the team.

As I suggested in a video on SMWS Silverscreen the best way for me is let people sniff, write down two or three descriptors, let them sniff again and let them write down another two or three descriptors which must be different to the first. Then let them all smell a third time and then discuss the aroma with the participants – but without using the descriptors they wrote down.

Then taste and do something similar but not quite as rigorous as when nosing. Do not discuss where the flavour is coming from, ie. possible distillery character or possible cask influence – just discuss what you nose and taste with each other. Right at the end of each I would then ask the question: what would you be happy to pay for a bottle of that, if indeed you would like a bottle of the one you just tasted?

If possible, take samples which are not typical from the original bottlings from this distillery or indeed use samples from distilleries which do not offer a single malt on the market.

THOMAS KORSGAARD, DENMARK

I find blind tasting the best way to sample new whiskies. When I started as an ambassador, I had an experience with myself finding bourbon-matured whiskies from distilleries traditionally matured in sherry odd. This was simply my brain playing tricks with me, as I knew how these were supposed to taste. My colleague Terje then served these whiskies blind to me, and not being biased, I enjoyed them in a whole new way.

In Denmark we have Casual Days, where members can sample the new Outturns, and more and more members ask to try the Outturn in random order, not knowing what is in the glasses. In terms of organising it, it is simply me pouring the whiskies for the members to try.

I have also often participated in private events, where everyone brings two whiskies, and then noses and tastes everyone’s whiskies blind. It is often very entertaining to hear people guessing for region, distillery, age and abv. The most expensive one is not by definition the best, and the cheapest one may not end up last. I can only encourage members to do more blind tastings!