Islay's Whiskeys vs American's

luminimattia · January 4 2016 at 12:14PM

Hi I'm an italian whisky passionate :smile:
I drink almost all whiskeys from ISLAY's companies, I really like the deep taste
Lagavullin and Laphroigh are my favs... I'd like to taste some American Whisky or some Bourbons ... could you tell me something similar to my tastes?
Thanks

ben_2 · January 5 2016 at 8:58AM

Last year I have been to America and to Islay and visited nearly all the distilleries there were. The aroma profile are very different.
Islay has a lot of peaty smokiness with sometimes fruity sherry influences.
American whiskey is usually sweet with vanilla and caramel. If you do get fruits you get pear, bannana or other tropical fruits. This is the Bourbon side of Whiskey!
But there is a totally different type of American whiskey: The Rye Whiskey. Its not made of majority corn, but Rye. Rye is much rougher and spicier than corn, wheat and barley. This would be the closest to Isley malts.
So my advice would be to try a Knob Creek Rye, Woodford Reserve Rye or a George Dickel Rye.

luminimattia · January 5 2016 at 9:48AM

Really thanks for this complete explanation... I'm going to buy & try
Where can I buy online?

schnazola · January 12 2016 at 2:48PM

"luminimattia" wrote:
I drink almost all whiskeys from ISLAY's companies . . . Lagavullin and Laphroigh are my favs... I'd like to taste some American Whisky or some Bourbons ... could you tell me something similar to my tastes?

Many, if not most, of the Islay malts are loaded with phenols and meta-cresols. That's why they are peaty and (some would say) medicinal. There are very few New World whiskies that have those traits.

However, two smoky whiskies come immediately to mind, although neither of them are "peaty" like Lagavulin, Lafroaig, Ardbeg, etc. One is Corsair Triple Smoke Single Barrel. The other is Bowen's Small Batch Handcrafted American Whiskey.

The first one uses three different malts that were roasted over three different wood fires. The second one is aged in barrels made of oak wood that was reclaimed from a forest fire in the mountains of California.

That is the extent of my personal American-whiskey knowledge regarding recipes that are smoky. For what it's worth, I liked both of those whiskies VERY much.

ben_2 · January 14 2016 at 7:53AM

Do these distilleries have a website?

schnazola · January 14 2016 at 4:56PM

"ben" wrote:
Do these distilleries have a website?

Corsair Web Site

Bowen's Whiskey Web Site

ben_2 · January 15 2016 at 8:49AM

Thanks. Now I'm a bit disappointed that I didn't visit them in TN. I was driving right past Nashville.