Whisky: The Gateway to Mindfulness (part 3)
Only now are we ready to taste the whisky.
In part one of our 12-step guide we fostered an acuity for the contexts that shape and influence experience (including our own disposition). In part two, we took the time to gently attune ourselves so as to notice complexity and nuance. And now—glass hovering at lip height—we can take our first sip.
How to Drink Whisky (in 12 steps)
Verily: the whetstone of curiosity.
9. Just the sip!
No quaffs, no gulps—and certainly no shots. We’re tapping into a slower kind of experience here. And besides—some whiskies cost north of $30 a dram: we need to make this last. So: savour the experience.
Your first sip ought be of a small volume, roughly proportional to the amount of saliva in your mouth. This is to acclimatise mouth to the ‘burn’ of the alcohol. Many miss this step, burn their tongue and throat—and then judge the whisky harshly.
First, you want to silently sip the whisky (no need for a dramatic ‘wine tasting’ slurp—an audible sip will flood your mouth with ethers anyway).
Once the whisky is in your mouth, cup your tongue and gently nestle the whisky into the roof of your mouth. Hold it there for a while to let the alcohol diffuse whilst breathing for your nose. Do not judge this first sip. Hold it until the burn goes, then swallow.
Congratulations: you are now ready to begin to drink your whisky.
10. Drink your whisky
Take another sip—only this time do not worry so much about saliva ratios. Just take a sip in a proportion that is comfortable for you.
Again: hold it nestled to the roof of your mouth. Once the alcohol ‘burn’ has diminished, you can sort of roll it around your tongue for a bit, before letting it slide down your gullet. Your mouth has been closed this whole time and you’ve been breathing through your nose—but now, as you swallow you can play with the way you exhale. Try a slow open mouth exhale, and take note of the ‘finish’.
At this stage it is a very good idea to make an attempt to translate the experience into words. Why? To deepen the experience and your own acuity for nuance.
Some folks recoil at this step, instead preferring to simply ‘know what they like’—without curiosity or introspection. But it’s a step worth persisting in—for if we struggle to articulate the complex, we resign ourselves to a kind of simplicity that knows no nuance. A world of black and white delineations between what is known and liked, and what is unknown and unliked. Bah!
Exercise your curiosity—hone its edge.
Whisky tasting typically covers three arcs: the nose, the palette and the finish. We have already ventured into the territory of first arc—but why not return to the nose? You may discover new notes, now that you’ve had a taste.
Have another sip. Now what are you noticing on the palette?
Sweetness? Okay great—what kind of sweetness? Honey sweet? Nice—what kind of honey sweet? Are we talking dark honey, light honey, or creamed honey? Or is it a more maple kind of sweetness? Or treacle? Or toffee? Burnt toffee? Salted? Burnt butter caramel? Brown sugar? Sticky date pudding? Burnt raisins?
And how is the mouthfeel? Is it dry, soft, round, rough, crisp or creamy? Or is it something else entirely?
And what of the finish? Does it linger on a note, spreading its warmth through you? Or is it a tad perfunctory and brash?
Take more sips in this slow fashion. A healthy dram will give you 3–5 such sips (beyond the first), with each sip offering its own package of insight.
11. Take (poetic) note
A good whisky tasting is both honest and artful. The Scotch Malt Whisky Society provide excellent tasting notes. Here are just a few.
Sea, Sand and Soot | Mineralic sea air came laden with the sweet smell of vanilla ice cream cones and cinnamon on seaweed. Coal dust and soot sprinkled down onto a sandy beach as driftwood and the frayed remnants of ship’s rope washed up on the shore. The sweet fragrance of hibiscus flowers drifted into earl grey tea and spicy sandalwood like a lucid dream whilst a whiff of the medicinal delivered tea tree oil and salted blackcurrants. Sticky cherry cola and pink wafer biscuits became balanced by the tartness of cumquats and lime pickle with a suggestion of turmeric and lemongrass. A combination of salty rocks and gravlax returned us to a maritime mood as the finish wrapped our senses with warm butter and pepper.
The Shaman Will See You Now | Sauternes! Exclaimed the panel in unison upon first nosing. This is a total smorgasbord of stewed prunes and figs smothered in ancient petit champagne cognac, old boal madeira, botrytis, herb encrusted game meats, camphor, an ocean of rancio and sultana compote. Water tames things a little but it’s like trying to pin down a lithe and stubborn old wrestler. There’s pine resin, precious hardwoods, exotic spices, graphite oil, minerals, cloves, pencil boxes, old ink wells and ancient balsamico. Neat, in the mouth, there is a slick of soft tannins, blackcurrants, bramble jelly, long-aged herbal liqueurs, walnut wine, more rancio, tar liqueur, waxy lemon rind, menthol tobacco, sage and damp dunnage notes. Water brings pressed wild flowers, cinnamon and a wealth of aromatic teas: chamomile, jasmine, lapsang souchong. Beyond this there’s heather, biltong, aged pinot noir, cured meats, red liquorice and old plum wine. What a ride! In a bourbon hogshead for 26 years before transfer to a fresh Sauternes barrique.
War Seahorse | This powerhouse of a dram opens with lemons charring on the BBQ. Beyond there is smoked and peppered mackerel and hot smoked salmon. Enough to induce hunger! There’s also a cognitively jarring briny and ozone-rich quality about it. A whole shellfish platter has been placed before you. Notes of chopped dill, polished metal and some exotic fruits hiding underneath. Water reveals camphor and hessian with notes of chalk and smoked whelks. The palate unfolds with a mighty, crashing wave of peat on a shore of sandalwood, wet rocks, mineral-encrusted creel nets and then hay, smoked earth and silage. With water the farmy aspects are heightened with notes of dried herbs and some smoked butter. Stonking stuff!
It’s probably worth noting: I have no affiliation with The Scotch Malt Whisky Society. I’m not even a member anymore—but I do love their tasting notes.
Tasting notes needn’t be all nice things. Whisky and Alement—a local haunt of my own—provide shrewd and succinct tasting notes. Here’s their take on the Lagavulin 9 year old Game of Thrones House Lannister (wtf?):
★★★★ Tasting Notes: Pickled green beans, cumin seeds, betadine and bandaids, spearmint and vanilla on the nose. A palate of bitumen, burnt rubber, mint and petrichor with an odd finish of artichoke hearts.
Bitumen, bandaids and burnt rubber—yum! Not.
(Gosh I haven’t done a ‘not’ joke in over a decade. I’m ‘not-proud’ of myself.)
The thing to observe here is: the descriptions are qualitative. And of course they are! All nuance would be lost if these tasting notes were instead a quantitative assessment. So cold, clinical and pointlessly pseudo-objective.
12. Reflect
Whisky is different to many other beverages. It’s best approached gently, slowly—with perspicacity and calm wit. It rewards the patient and curious—and punishes the rest.
Well now: what have we learnt?
Perhaps we’ve learnt to be mindful of the many domains of context—and how it shapes our experience. And perhaps we’ve become mindful of our own inner world—and how our psycho-physiological state likewise influences our experience, and the meaning we make of things.
We have soaked in all the visual information presented—while taking nothing at face value. We entertained narratives and indulged in imagination—knowing full well we were playing with fiction. But there was an honesty at play, and we were able to hold to our own perspective fluidly and with depth.
We learnt to willingly invite information from a multiple sources, and to take our time to appreciate and unravel nuance. We’ve reminded ourselves of the quality of slow thinking—giving time to emergent phenomenon. And we made efforts to articulate our experience—knowing that we could never quite capture it accurately (but that we could make the attempt nonetheless).
We have learnt to notice what we notice—and to be curious at that.
These lessons are transferrable to other domains.
Ergo: whisky is the gateway to mindfulness.
I’m on some fool quest to share 50 insights in 50 days. This is day 5. More at drjasonfox.com
