I ran into a frequent reader of this blog who suggested starting a series of articles on beer or scotch. I immediately repaired to Pop's to check out the possibilities. Where to start? I don't suppose anyone is  interested in my opinion of Bud Light, but there seems to be an infinite number of craft beers being produced in the bathtubs of every neighborhood in America. Everyone wants to become an American success story like Samuel Adams, that's the contemporary beer brand not the failed colonial brewer, but rather than produce a brew to compete with Bud, they've decided to focus on single bottles with a sticker price of $4 and up (and up). Now, just to be sociable, I do drink my fair share of beer even though as a diabetic I should be limiting both alcohol and carbohydrate consumption. Still, it doesn't strike me as a healthy project to undertake an in-depth study of beer.

My Uncle George introduced me to scotch whisky. Uncle George had gotten into the wide world during that little dust-up with Germany. Family legend notes D-Day was delayed until Uncle George got to England-he was a quartermaster sergeant on the last ship out to supply the invasion. After the war he stayed on in Washington ostensibly in the Department of Defense. He never said much about his job beyond mentioning he worked out of Langley, Virginia if you catch my drift. If you don't, let me mention that scotch doesn't have to be ordered "shaken not stirred."

In honor of Uncle George I have a small collection of single malts with a few bourbons and one outstanding Irish thrown in. I've continued the family tradition of scotch by running a tasting for the younger cousins at a recent family reunion. Sadly, outside my family, too many younger folks don't like booze that tastes like anything other than fruit juice so fine scotch is becoming more of a niche market for musty professors hanging about in dark paneled rooms in tweeds. That's OK, I  guess, I've always wanted a tweed jacket with leather elbow patches, a pipe, and a cultured British accent, but scotch distillers have started to "dumb down" the flavor of their drink to attract a younger audience.

Despite the exorbitant cost of a 750 ml. bottle of whisky, an occasional series on scotch (and other whiskey) is possible since I can try it by the glass. I know that restaurants make a lot of money on liquor sales. A particularly fine sherry at a local tapas restaurant goes for $8.50 a glass while the bottle, when it can be found, costs under $30. Still, the mark-up on scotch seems particularly bad-I once had a special edition of Oban that ran to $30 a glass and a blend, Johnny Walker Blue, goes for $26 a glass at the Stone Forge. Neither lived up to the cost. The best price to taste value I've found is Midleton, a Irish whiskey found at McGuires for $15 a glass and worth every sip. If anyone knows where to find 200 ml bottles of single malts let me know that would help cut costs on this project.

I love my Midleton, Clynelish, Glenmorangie, and Lagavulin and will share the taste, history, and geography of these interesting brews some day, but my drink of choice is a blend of 15 year old single malts called Johnny Walker Green. Explaining the difference between single malts, blended whisky, and blended malt whisky is probably a good place to start a study of scotch. So tomorrow one more note on the subject before return to the pattern of complete randomness that is the key feature of this blog.