We’ve worked with a ton of brands over the years, but Diageo was a tough nut to crack as we couldn’t get a consistent contact to work with. Diageo distilleries showed up frequently in our line-ups as independently bottled expressions, but never OBs. We picked up a bunch of LEs from a local collector and decided we’d just run an event on our own without … Continue reading Diageo LE Mega-lineup
We first did a Laphroaig/Bowmore event with Matt Jones way back in 2018, and as many members love these brands, we felt it time for a revisit 7 years later! Working with James Neil and Mike Mclean of Beam Suntory, we pulled together an incredible line-up for both brands. We started with a trio of Bowmore 15 expressions, all showcasing different styles of sherry influence. … Continue reading Laphroig & Bowmore Re-visited
So after a full day of tasting, finding winners of 4 categories and 2 sub-categories, We had to determine our overall winners. 7 finalists were compared blind head-to-head and re-ranked to find our winners for the year. Congratulations to Macaloney’s, Two Brewers and Okanagan for having multiple entries each in the finals! Here are the winners: HONOURABLE MENTIONS RUNNER-UP 2023 CANADIAN MALT OF THE YEAR … Continue reading TWS CANADIAN SINGLE MALTS OF THE YEAR
These malts participated in other categories but were distinct in that they came from a single barrel before release. You can see the full details of this single STR Port barrel Macaloney’s release in the finished whisky category. the LMD release was a single barrel Islay cask finished whisky, which participated in the peated category. The Two Brewers Release 37 single cask was the big … Continue reading Single Cask Malts
We had two cask strength malts submitted, from the Yukon and BC. Release 37 from Two Brewers is a single cask release made from standard barley plus Honey malt and Vienna malt. It was aged 8 years in a second use white oak barrel. This Okanagan Laird of Fintry Black label is cask strength, aged 5 years in white oak and finished for 6 months … Continue reading Cask Strength Malts
In 2017 we first launched the Annual TWS Canadian Whisky Awards, handing out medals across multiple Canadian whisky categories. Our process was an in-person blind tasting of whiskies by category, collaboratively aligning on which were the best. We continued this in 2018 and 2019, with fantastic results. When COVID hit in 2020, our in-person process wasn’t feasible, so we cancelled the awards for that year, … Continue reading 2023 Toronto Whisky Awards – Canadian Single Malts
This year has been quite a challenging one for many distillers, but potentially even more so for Ontario distillers. It’s been a hard 18 months of pandemic restrictions with not a lot of payback on the governmental side of things. Yet, whisky keeps flowing to the mouths of Canadians willing to support their domestic industry. Among those distillers are one of the big players in … Continue reading An Interview with Master Blender, Bill Ashburn | Forty Creek Distillery (Grimsby, Ontario, Canada)
Alberta Premium has long been that diamond-cut bottle of rye on the bottom shelf at the LCBO – a decent Canadian rye that has a loyal following, but little attention paid by the connoisseur community. Many in the know were aware that a lot of AP’s older barrels were sold south of the border to companies like WhistlePig and others. In 2019, either due to … Continue reading Alberta Premium Cask Strength & 20yr Limited Editions
Many of our members have been fans of the Northern Border Collection all the way back to when it was just a twinkle in Dr. Don Livermore’s eye, and we’ve had the good fortune to try each of the rare range releases over the past three years. For the inaugural line-up, we had Dave Mitton come in and introduce them to us. Last year, we … Continue reading 2019 Northern Border Collection Rare Range Tasting
For our 2nd event of the year, we went with an “oddballs” line-up of young Signatory Vintages bottlings. The pictures below all look the same, but be sure to click on them to see the variety of whisky we drank, and stay tuned for the reviews which will be posted here! Continue reading Oddballs 2019 – Signatory Vintages
Redbreast 12 Cask Strength, Batch No. B1/16, 57.2% ABV, $110 CAD. Malted and unmalted barley. Triple distilled in copper pot stills. Matured in sherry casks. Non chilled filtered. Nose: Very fresh nose with apples, apricots, creme brulee, fudge, figs, raisins, and chocolate. Taste: Chocolate fudge, malt, barley grain, toasted wood, cantaloupe. Finish: Long. Chocolate, burnt wood, malt and grain notes linger. Thoughts: Everything works well … Continue reading Redbreast 12 Cask Strength
Macallan Cask Strength, 58.2% ABV, $300 USD Nose: Walnuts, almonds, marzipan, figs, grape jelly, very slight oak, little bit of chocolate-orange, fruit punch flavored Kool Aid powder, Flintstones Vitamins, strawberry and grape bubble gum. Taste: Grape bubble gum, marzipan (big time), cherry syrup, slight oak, strawberry jam, orange marmalade. Finish: Very long, very viscous. Grape bubble gun, slight oak, and chocolate-orange linger. Thoughts: The best … Continue reading Macallan Cask Strength (My 50th Review)
Toronto Whisky Society 