Compass Box Hedonism Review - Coconut cream vanilla perfume eau de vie.

I've had the opportunity to taste Hedonism several times recently - particularly paired with Pacari Lemongrass chocolate.   When I attended the event at the St. Giles I took the opportunity to pour myself a 50ml sample from Compass Box brand ambassador Robin Robinson's own bottle of Hedonism and I finally got around to pouring it for critical review.  That's why I have no bottle pictures - just lots of pics of my dram of Hedonism in the lovely fading light.

Hedonism is, quite famously, a blend of grain whiskies - not malt whisky.  That's part of the iconoclastic fun of Compass Box.  They turn a lot of things on their heads.  Peat Monster is a blend of 3 malts - but only one is from Islay.  Orangerie is *gasp* flavored.  Spice Tree and Oak Cross use a unique and spicy kind of oak in the barrel finishing.  They slaughter sacred cows ruthlessly.  Having their highest priced semi-regular expression be a blend of grain whiskies is iconclastic because we've all come to believe grain whisky is cheap - and is what's wrong in cheap blended whisky.  We say of a lower quality blend that it tastes "grainy".  We praise better blends for their higher percentage of malt (and thus lower percentage of grain).  However, as The Scotch Noob pointed out in a recent post called "What does Grain Whisky Taste Like":  the problem with cheap blends is CHEAP grain whisky.  Good grain whisky is a whole different ballgame. 

There are actually a whole bunch of grain whiskies where nicely aged examples can be had that have nice flavors: Invergordon (check out Ralfy video log #256), Carsebridge (Ralfy #255), Cambus, Port Dundas, North British, and Cameronbridge come to mind.  However, the business of vatting - blending - them is almost unknown in the current marketplace.  Other than Hedonism, only Famous Grouse's Snow Grouse expression is a blended grain whisky - to the best of my knowledge. 

So, what's in Hedonism?  The contents, according to the Compass Box cut sheet for Hedonism says:  "Will vary according to batch but typically whiskies from the following distilleries: Cameron Bridge,
Carsebridge, Cambus, Port Dundas or Dumbarton".  That "vary according to batch" part is important.  Unlike the other regular issue Compass Box offerings, each bottling run of Hedonism is a one off.  When the batch is gone the next batch will be a different blend.  FYI - there are two fancier expressions of Hedonism in the Compass Box lineup too:  Hedonism 10th Anniversary (120 bottles made worldwide) , and Hedonism Maximus (1500 bottles made worldwide).  Good luck finding them.  Park Ave Liquors has the Maximus - but it will set you back three benjamins.  Let's get on with the tasting:

Hedonism 43% abv

First fill American oak.  Non chill filtered.  No colors added.

Color: Pale Gold

Nose: Cocoa butter, white chocolate, unsalted butter/Devonshire cream, oak vanilla, medicinal alcohol, faint citrus (tangerine). Subtle, yet rich and dessert like.

Creamy bright opening with sweetened whipped cream. Then the expansion begins with toasted coconut. A bright brassy note that is hard to put words to: citrus or acid without the acidity. The mouth feel is light but has some oil thickness - it's silky. Then more creamy notes with a big floral bouquet of oak vanilla.  Pepper heat arrives late with some warm almost prosciutto fat flavors for a moment, but they disappear as the finish begins. The finish lingers nicely and exceedingly gently: egg custard and birch wood and then finally gentle oak at the fade out.

The dominant impressions here are subtle, off dry, elegant, and tasty. Coconut cream pie eau de vie.  This isn't a big booming dram.  It's more like a 1000 thread count silk pillow.  Silky, rich, buttery, and sweet like a cloud.

Adding a couple of drops of water releases spirit heat in the nose which clears in a moment and amps up the coconut and a slightly meaty and also a slightly herbal note in the nose. The water increases the sense of sweetness as well as the floral and herbal flavors.  I'd definitely recommend experimenting and adding 2-3 drops.  But be careful - Hedonism is very light and subtle.  Only add a little bit of water.  Over dilution is just around the corner.

Conclusions:  Tasty.  Surprising.  Eye Opening.  Excellent.  A whole new world.

*****

Hedonism is $90 at Shopper's Vineyard.  It's between $80 and $110 in general.  That's pretty expensive.  I'm not sure where Hedonism fits on a the value scale.  It's a very unusual item.  I suggest you try it.  If it's your thing, you'll definitely know it.

Compass Box - Pacari Chocolate pairing tasting event at the St. Giles Hotel Court Bar.

Hedonism and Lemongrass chocolate

Last week I posted about the press preview for the Compass Box - Pacari Chocolate pairing event. Tonight the event went down. I have already described the pairings in detail, so in this post I'm going to make two key points: 1) the event was FUN! I have been a shy family oriented stay-at-home-Dad for years. Attending the event was a really entertaining experience.  It was a way to get out and play at a cool venue and have some new experiences. And 2) my experience of the tasting match ups changed - and were different this time - which was a real surprise with a significant lesson.

Francisco Vivar discusses chocolate

As before the event was captained by Robin Robinson, the US brand ambassador for Compass Box Whisky and by Francisco Vivar, the importer of Pacari Chocolate.  The event was held at the St. Giles Hotel Court Bar - a cool room on Lexington and 39th, near Grand Central on the slopes of Murray Hill.  The bar was the setting for the tasting event - and is pretty well stocked.  A lot of nice malts were visible behind the bar.  I might have to go back.

Before the event began I hung out with the interesting and sophisticated NYC crowd.  I met a number of fascinating people including George Gensler, a co-founder of the Manhattan Chocolate Society and frequent reviewer on seventypercent.com - a very cool woman who dashingly sports a very male name, and Henrietta of the hip http://henriettashungry.com  Bloggers and epicures - my kind of crowd.

Robin Robinson lights some peat.

When the show got going Francisco Vivar presented the ecological and community focus of Pacari Chocolate - which is very focused on  sustainability, fair trade, organic cultivation, and use of local Ecuadorian ingredients and manufacturing.  Robin Robinson, by contrast is a whisky showman of the first order.  This time he had props: a model of an oak barrel with a charred interior, samples of oak staves, a bottle of caramel color, and a lump of peat.  Each of the props was introduced at the appropriate time.  The peat, for example, came out when the Peat Monster was poured.  Robinson explained what peat was (colorfully) and then lit the peat and let it smoulder.  The intense smoky aroma vividly brought home where the peatiness of peated malts comes from.

Having already written about the specific pairings took the heat off and I could really relax and enjoy the whisky and the chocolate.  Somehow, a number of things struck me differently:

• Asyla is more than just floral and super thin and blonde.  It has  lychee and citrus herb notes in the nose, a velvety mouth feel and a sweetness, herbs, more lychee, malt sugars and mineral notes on the tongue.  The 70% chocolate it was paired with is smooth if you suck it and not chew it.  It has a rich heady cocoa fermented winey flavor.   This pairing was working better for me today.

•  Great King St. Artist's Blend with golden berries paired nicely again - the lemon in the Artist's Blend picking up very nicely the citrusy sour/sweet of the golden berries.  It's a citrus note harmonic reinforcement.  The dark chocolate blended nicely with the malt foundation and bakery notes in GKSAB.

Robin Robinson loves what he does.

• Hedonism was much more intensely flavored for me today.  Coconut and cocoa butter dominated the nose.  I noticed less of an acid brightness in the flavor - it seemed more smooth and elegant and I got a lot more cocoa and toasted coconut in the flavor as well.  This made me enjoy the Hedonism more to sip - but less as a pairing with the excellent Pacari lemongrass chocolate.  This time the lemongrass dominated the succulent cocoa and coconut flavors of Hedonism and it didn't meld into a new flavor for me today.

• The Peat Monster was even more monstrous with Robinson burning peat and waving the aromatic smoke around the room.  The pairing with the incredible Pink Salt and Nibs flavor of Pacari was amazing again.  The salt air of the whisky and the vivid salt flakes in the chocolate aligned, as did the smoky richness of the cacao and the rich smokiness of the peat in the peat monster.  These two simply work in harmony. 

• Orangerie and Chili chocolate emerged as my favorite this time.  The wicked heat and glorious dueling orange and coriander seed aromatics from the scented whisky and chocolate.  Just a brilliant combination.                                                                                 

The fact that so many things struck me differently shows how mercurial the process of tasting is.  Influenced by mood and perception, and also semi-tangibles like temperature, time of air breathing etc... a multitude of factors bears on subjective enjoyment.  This stressed in my mind the importance of repeated tasting before coming to hard conclusions.

This issue of variability didn't get in the way of my fun, however.   I enjoyed most everything tremendously.  It was a tasty experience that confirmed what I had previously discovered: that food and whisky can pair brilliantly.  It is a lesson well worth learning.

Spice Tree is a fierce but elegant excursion into the deep wood.

An homage to G-LO.  Can you identify the hero?

This will be my third consecutive post boasting the latin name of the sessile oak:  quercus petraea.  Compass Box features this spicy French oak in a number of their whiskies - but it takes total center stage, and indeed provides the name for the flagship of their regular issue malt whisky line: Spice Tree.  The story of how John Glaser's first two editions of this expression were banned by the Scotch Whisky Association for being non-traditional has been told often.  The gist is that Glaser lined the barrels with interior staves of quercus petraea, but was told to desist by the SWA - with threats of legal action.  Then Glaser produced the work-around of using quercus petraea to form the head (the ends) of the barrels used - the same as in the Oak Cross expression (although Compass Box's web site says that Spice Tree is aged longer in Oak Cross casks that have been more heavily toasted).  This is a blended malt - thus it is composed of a mix of single malts.  The web site specifies that it is "entirely sourced from northern Highland single malt distilleries, primarily malt whisky distilled at the Clynelish distillery.  All 10 to 12 years old."  Clynelish has a wonderful aroma and gingery, almost curried flavor profile - so it's a good fit for very spicy oak - at least in theory.  As far as I know, no one else is using sessile oak to age Scotch whisky - so this is an attribute unique to Compass Box

Spice Tree:  46% abv; $65 at Shopper's Vineyard.  50ml sample proved by Robin Robinson at the chocolate pairing tasting event preview. 

Color: light amber with some greenish tints.  A nice rich color.

Lovely light amber with greenish tints.

Nose: malt, honey, demara sugar, a bit of meaty note - like Christmas ham (roasted salted pork with cloves and a sugar glaze), a touch of herbal vegetal sap (parsley, cress or burdock), some sherry, and a distant hint of fine leather (as in nice gloves, not cowboy saddle). Classy - very poised.

Opening is sweet and bright with plenty of sugar and also a pronounced herbal note - like a cross between parsley and black mint.  Then it is suddenly and dramatically spicy. The first hint is a complex oaky balsa wood perfume flavor that rapidly broadens into a spike of spice heat that is prickly and numbing on the tongue in the same manner as clove or cinnamon (without actually tasting a great deal like either). At the same time vanilla perfume and a rich sherry note provide a sweet and floral counterpoint.  The transition to the finish is marked by a melding of the sweet and heat which combine to form a flavor reminiscent of ginger.  Then the oak takes over and the lingering finish is a drying and elegant wood fest.  This is the longest finish in the regular release Compass Box line and it's a pleasure.

The heat doesn't build up on repeated sipping, like it would with actual clove, cinnamon, or ginger.  Instead it forms a continuous backdrop to the complex array of flavors balancing sweet and dry, sugars, herbs, spice, and wood essences in a shifting interplay from nose to opening to midpalate bloom to finish to afterglow over and over.  It's a highly engaging and thought provoking and richly flavored dram.  The heat might be a bit much for some (my wife, for example, didn't like it at all - but she's not much for whisky generally).  But those in for a bit of gustatory challenge will be rewarded by John Glaser's excursion in a totally new flavor direction.  This amping up of the wood note is an inspired and entertaining new direction for Scotch - another face card in the loaded Full House hand that is Scotch's extraordinary variability.  Not only is this the archetype of a new flavor profile - it's also a delicious and extremely drinkable success.  Loved it!

*****

Great King St. Artists Blend is a solid effort. Is it a Johnny Walker Black and Chivas killer?

Great King St.'s bottle is Edwardian elegance.

When Compass Box turned ten they announced their intention to launch a new line of blended Scotch whiskies for the mainstream market. The initial product in this new "Great King St." line is the Artists Blend. This inexpensive blended whisky is meant to appeal to first timers, people who don't normally drink Scotch, drinkers of mainstream blends, and anyone looking for an inexpensive easy drinking dram that has a bit more character than the mainstream usual blends (y'know, Johnny Walker, Chivas, Dewars, Passport, Ballantines, Teachers, Grants, Grouse, etc...). I'll weigh in, not only with tasting notes, but also with head to head tasting match ups with market leading blends Johnny Walker Black Label and Chivas Regal 12.

Here's what the Great King St. Artist's Blend (GKSAB from here on in) is made of, according to the Great King St. page on the Compass Box web site:

Whisky Spirit Character Amount (%)

Lowland Grain Whisky Fruity/perfumed 51.4%

Northern Highland Single Malt Malty, Fruity 23.2%

Northern Highland Single Malt Grassy/Perfumed 17.7%

Speyside Single Malt Meaty 7.7%

Cask breakdown:

Wood Type Flavour Impact Amount

First Fill American Oak Barrel Vanilla 62.3%

New French Oak Finish (New-Headed Barrel)

Grilled Marshmallow, toastiness, roasted coffee 27.7%

First Fill Sherry Butt Wine, dried fruits 10.0%

So, GKSAB is almost half malt, and mainly aged in oak but over a quarter aged in the spicy oak cross sessle oak barrels discussed in my previous post. There's also 10% sherry butt - a new thing for Compass Box. Let's see if we taste all this careful blending and barrel management:

abv: 43% Price at Shopper's Vineyard $37. At Union Square Liquors $43.

Color: yellow gold

Nose: Green apple, lemon curd parfait, cake batter or raw pie shell dough, a yogurt or yeast note, and a hint of sherry.  There's a bit of rawness in the uncooked bakery stuff that I don't love - but the lemony aspect is really nice.

A lovely light gold color.

Entry is sweet with soft baked fruits (apples / pears) but then a firm bright note pops up at the midpalate. Sprit heat, but also a bit of Spice Tree clove and nutmeg - but faint; more like just the tingle with little of the aromatics. There is also a note I recall from Hedonism: an acid almost like citrus, but without the tang which evolves into a touch of coconut and candy. It all rides on a firm grain body and a fairly rich mouth feel - almost creamy. At the turn to the finish there is the lemon parfait note again. It arrives with a suggestion of sherry sweetness that communicates "Scotch" to me. The finish is moderately long. It has an oaky quality, but fades to a slightly bitter finish that doesn't fit well with the rest of the presentation. It's a complex flavor profile, but a soft and gentle presentation overall.  My subjective impression is good.  It's interesting and pleasant to drink.  The complexity is clearly emerging for all that barrel management and blending.  There is oak, there is some spice from the quercus petraea spice oak.  There is the whiff of sherry.  There's a lot going on for a light and sweet dram.  This could hold your interest. 

GKSAB (left) JWBL (right)

So, how does GKSAB fare against Johnny Walker Black Label (JWBL) head to head? First of all, I'll admit that I'm rooting for Compass Box. It's a young iconoclastic artisanal company that has a clear way with grain whisky (look at their Hedonism offering). Johnny Walker is a staid old guard that has sold this flavor profile for a century (could it be coasting?) and makes a fairly nasty lower blend (Red Label).  Red Label shows me that Diageo doesn't have that way with grain whisky.  Costs are close:  GKSAB is $37 and JWBL is $34 at Shopper's Vineyard.  This is close enough to not be a factor, but Johnny is a little cheaper.

Color: GKSAB pale gold. JWBL rich dark gold - granted JWBL uses caramel color and GKSAB specifically states that it uses no colorings and is not chill filtered.
Nose: GKSAB: Lemon yogurt parfait and buttery cake batter and faint sherry. JWBL: Malt toffee, hint of peat, clear sherry note.

Flavor: GKSAB is distinctive and has complexity, but the slight thinness in the body and slight bitter note on the finish do not compare well head to head with JWBL which has a slightly thicker mouth feel and a firmer malt body through the midpalate and a more lingering wooded and graceful finish.  JWBL feels denser and tastes like it has a higher proportion of malt.  (I'm not saying that it actually has a higher percentage of malt - just that it tastes like it does).  It has a sophisticated balance that comes off as more mature.  Part of this might be the peat and bit of smoke in the JWBL flavor profile.  GKSAB feels a bit younger and thinner and more grainy.  So, JWBL wins hands down on price, density, and on hitting the archetypical "Scotch" flavor profile. GKSAB succeeds in being soft, sweet, original, and different. The difference doesn't serve as a better introduction to the segment in my opinion.  I have no problem recommending both - but Johnny Walker Black retains its place as the mainstream default pick in my opinion.  This reminds me of a survey of the ketchup market I read a few years back.  Interesting new artesanal ketchups didn't beat boring old Heinz because Heinz nailed the center of the ketchup flavor profile everyone expects and loves.  JWBL just nails the archetype of the Highland Scotch flavor profile.  GKSAB is something totally new.  It's really not a straightforward comparison at all.

GKSAB (left) Chivas 12 (right)

How about head to head against Chivas Regal 12? Here GKSAB is the clear winner. Chivas is slightly richer in color, but has the thinner nose and less richness on the palate.  Chivas' mild sweet nose is too simple by comparison with GKSAB, there is less going on.  The cake batter note in Chivas puts the flavor profile in the same light sweet doughy region as GKSAB, but with less flavor density, complexity, and heft.  GKSAB has far more interest and complexity, as well as better flavor density, more grain body, and a longer, more interesting finish.

So, in the context of the both Johnny Walker and Chivas we see Great King St. slot squarely into the pack - but clearly very close to leading.  But the uniqueness of its flavor profile and it's elegant poise makes it a compelling pick.  The lightness and softness of Great King St. is part of the family trait of Compass Box - but it works better with the floral lightness and body-tautness of, say, Asyla than it does here.  I applaud the Artist's Blend for the many things it does right - but I want more heft in the middle and a bit more oak in the finish.  Still, I can't help feeling that these are quibbles.  Great King St. Artist's blend is on my short list of recommended blended Scotches for new Scotch drinkers.

"Artist's Blend is soft and full on the palate"

***

---------------------------
Update 4/5/12:  Two weeks later I find I'm enjoying Artist's Blend even more with time.  The brightness and firmness hold up to repeated drinking.  It's a new flavor profile - but with familiarity comes affection.  Great King St. Artist's Blend is working for me.

Oak Cross Blended Malt Scotch Whisky from Compass Box - an absolute original.

I'm all over Compass Box this week.  Compass Box is an innovative maker of eclectic Scotch whisky blends.  Many of these are on the gentle and sweet end of things.  I'm a big rough tough man who takes his whisky big and neat and preferably undiluted cask strength and my first instinct is skepticism.  I like my whisky to shoot cannons.  In that spirit, let's proceed.  First up, the remarkable Oak Cross:

Color: glittering light gold with amber tints.

Nose: soft sweet vanilla floral notes lead off. Sweetness joins from below to yield a hard candy quality. A touch of veal aspic. Some distant sherry. Some nice mature oak. The nose is a little like Grandma opening a nice old fancy wooden box of hard candies and offering you one. A gentle and soothing nose - but not a lush fragrance that invites deep extended exploration.

Entry is initially soft and sweet and then zowie - a big midpalate explosion of spice hits. My initial notes described berry acids like jujubes and also bright candy and plum brandy flavors. Those notes were from a pour from a half full bottle (extensively aired). Today, from a fresh sealed miniature I'm getting spicy wood. Maybe that's because now I know what it is.

Oak Cross is, according to info from Compass Box, a blend of 10-12 year old single malts from Teaninich, Brora (they must mean Clynelish) "for fruitiness" and Carron "for weight" (Dailuaine - I imagine). It is blended from malts aged in first fill ex bourbon white oak casks and American oak casks specially fitted with caps made of a spicy french oak called Quercus Petraea - Sessile Oak. (Robin Robinson, US Brand Ambassador for Compass Box, explained this part to me personally) This mixture of oak types is the "oak cross" - as in mixture of oak types. This Quercus Petraea is the "spice tree" in the darker, bigger Spice Tree expression Compass Box also offers. So the explosion of spice in the midpalate is wood - Quercus Petraea oak. G-LO on the Booze Dancing blog calls this spicy aspect "cinnamon altoid" - but the heat I'm getting isn't cinnamon - it's clove, and allspice. Maybe some Mace or even nutmeg in there too. These spice notes mingle with the entry's prominent vanilla floral sweetness and join a honeyed lightly sherried malt richness in the yummy heart of the midpalate glow.

Give this one a lot of time to open up. The entry becomes richer and more honeyed and the spicy explosion becomes bigger and more spicy and aromatic. Those jujube notes are dancing on my tongue now but it took a half an hour of air for them to bloom out of the sealed bottle.

The finish is gentle and brief - a feature of most of the Compass Box offerings that alternately delights, mystifies, and frustrates me. The rich spicy oak fades for a moment into a sandalwood scented incense and lingering sherry sweetness and then as the tannins almost form a bitter note - poof - like a sorcerer - it's gone. There's a faint whisper of flavor after two minutes, like after you've taken chewing gum out two minutes earlier. But the palate is left clean and refreshed - almost as if such a potent dram never happened. Is this a plus? A minus? I can't decide. It's a bit of both. I have the ingrained bias that a "good" whisky has a titanic long finish. Yet clearly Oak Cross is quite good indeed across all phases of it's game; yet it has packed its gear and fully left the field while I'm still panting from the last play... I've wrestled with this and decide that no penalty is called for here. So much of Oak Cross is new - utterly unlike any malt I've had before - that I must treat it as its own animal. The relatively short finish is, at worst, a sin of omission. At it's best it makes it easy to drink, easy to pair, and easy to live with.

Oak Cross is gentle lamb in the beginning, a raging tiger in the middle and a vanishing artist at the finish. It is graced with a delicious and very unusual flavor profile. Will you like it? I did. How do you feel about cloves and mace? How do you like cinnamon altoids?  Ultimately, Oak Cross is true to the gentle and floral "family DNA" of Compass Box but gives me some cannons!

Four stars. Bravo Compass Box! Original, ground breaking, and very very tasty.

****

Update - I neglected to mention how Oak Cross plays from a value perspective.  Oak Cross is $44/750ml at Shopper's Vineyard (a deep discounter in the NYC greater metro region - the source of all the following prices).  This is the low midrange of malt pricing; the same price class as The Macallan 12, Balvenie Doublewood 12, Dalmore 12, Highland Park 12, Glenfarclas 10, Tomintoul 10, Glen Goyne 10, Isle of Jura Superstition, Arran 10, etc...  In my opinion Oak Cross is a solid fit, value-wise, with this crew.  There are awesome malts here - but these tend to be the introductory expressions in their lines.  In the Compass Box line, Oak Cross is the 3rd most expensive expression behind Spice Tree ($65), and Peat Monster ($50) and ahead of Asyla & Orangerie ($40) and Great King St. ($37).  The whole lineup seems well priced - good value for what you get. 

Compass Box Whisky and Pacari Chocolate Pairing event preview

 There's been a growing zeitgeist of chocolate whisky pairing lately in the whisky blogosphere.  Part of it is that there is a growing appreciation for excellent whisky and a growing interest in high end chocolate - particularly ultra dark and high cacao offerings.  But, more than that, there is a growing awareness that fine whiskies can go with food - both to the enhancement of the whisky - and the food.  Here are a couple of recent blog posts that explore this synergy:

http://www.scotchdrammer.com/2012/02/experiment-pairing-chocolate-and-scotch.html
http://www.connosr.com/distilled/issue-2/pairing-whisky-with-chocolate/

Now - that's the zeitgeist.  It isn't me.  Personally, I normally detest having good whisky with food.  I don't want anything to distract from the pure flavors of distilled spirit.  I also find that distilled spirits wallop the palate which pretty severely alters the experience of the food.  However in a carefully wrought pairing, that's the whole idea.  The flavors combine into something new.  I'll admit I was skeptical about this chocolate/whisky pairing thing until I had a first hand experience.  If you're in New York next week, you can too.
 
A fun whisky and chocolate pairing event will be going down on the evening of March 27, 2012: the Pacari Chocolate & Compass Box Whisky pairing event at the St. Giles Hotel in New York from 5-7pm.  Tickets are $35 on line.  That's a pretty decent price to taste an extensive flight of nice whisky - and a group of very tasty chocolate bars and enrobed exotic fruits.  But this is going to be a bit more than just a flight of whisky and some chocolate - some real thought has gone into the specific pairings in this event.

How do I know?  In my capacity as a whisky blogger I attended a press preview of this event and I'll give you the full lowdown (thanks, Whisky Woman, for providing the opportunity!). 

Amanda Diepeveen of ays by the cornucopia of Compass Box whisky and Pacari chocolate.

The whiskies here are the Compass Box range.  These are John Glaser's iconoclastic collection of delicious concoctions of blended malt and grain whiskies, or just blended malt whiskies, or just grain whiskies.  There is some careful barrel selection going on here - but the real magic seems to be in the barrel aging of the blends - in first fill American oak.  The floral vanilla oak notes are a thread which binds the line together.  Another common attribute is a deft light touch and smooth, short, non-bitter finishes.  It's this latter attribute that make Compass Box whiskies so well suited to a chocolate pairing.

The chocolates in the pairing are the organic fair trade Ecuadorian Pacari chocolates.  This company specializes in raw, ultra dark chocolate that has the clear flavor signature of the nibs.  They utilize local and characteristic Andes fruits and spices in their products to bring a sense of terroir.  As a man who regularly eats raw cacao nibs, I really appreciate how closely the flavor profile of Pacari hews to the flavors of whole raw cacao.  It's masterful stuff.  If any chocolate has a chance at standing up to a mouth full of straight whisky it's this stuff.

The show was MC'ed by Compass Box's US brand ambassador Robin Robinson and Pacari's Francisco Vivar.  They are a couple of jovial and informed showmen.  I've caught Robinson's act before.  He's particularly engaging and entertaining.  If you come to the March 27th event you will be entertained and will probably learn something too.

Here how the pairings go down - full tasting notes of the whiskys and pairings:

Robin Robinson, Compass Box Ambassador, 

pours Asyla.

1) Asyla Malt & Grain blend paired with Raw 70% Cacao: Asyla is pale straw colored with a lightly vegetal (sweet parsley?) and honeysuckle floral nose. Entry is sweet and light with gentle demara sweetness while midpalate brings some malt body with a touch of apple and a chalk mineral almost sauvingnon blanc note and a light flush of spirit heat. Finish is short and gentle. Robin Robinson called it "feminine". I'd agree - she's very blonde and supermodel pretty and supermodel thin. The chocolate pairing is the unflavored most raw and elemental 70% cacao raw - which has the big winey heady flavor of raw cacao nibs and is so packed with raw nibs that the texture was a bit gritty. This is beautiful chocolate for people who like raw nibs because it keeps that flavor and elevates it. The pairing however was the weakest - only adding spirit heat and a bit of malt glow to the more powerful cocoa flavors.

2) Great King Street Blended Scotch paired with Pacari chocolate covered golden berries: Great King Street is a rich golden yellow. The nose is nice and rich with sweet and salted butter, butterscotch, and sultanas (rich golden raisins). Entry is sweet with toffee, midpalate broadens with slight sherry notes, some bakery notes (apple crisp) mild spirit heat and some oaky vanilla perfume. Finish is gentle and short. No grain burn or any trace of coffey still fishy oniony flavor signature detected. Very nice.  (Great King Street is a potential Johnny Walker Black Label killer and I'll be doing a full review including a head to head of that duo in the very near future.)  The pairing worked with golden berries that have a sultana-like flavor and an addictive crisp texture arising out of crystal sugars and the fibrous berry's dried body - nicely draped with a crisp thin shell of intensely flavored inky dark Pacari chocolate. The pairing put the vibrance of the berries in harmony with the soft fruits of the whisky. Great King has more malt body - so it holds up to the robust chocolate better - plus the berries have less chocolate so the flavors were more equally matched and neither overwhelmed the other.

Pacari's Francisco Vivar (left) and Compass Box's Robin Robinson

3) Hedonism grain Scotch whisky paired with Pacari Lemongrass chocolate bar.
Hedonism is pale gold. Light sherry with spiced notes of clove and allspice on the nose. Entry is bright and sassy with sweet white grape. Expansion is quick and light with coconut, cake batter and toffee. Body is very light. Finish has kiss of oak and vanilla floral note. The pairing here is inspired. The Lemongrass in the chocolate is citrusy and highly aromatic. The bright opening of Hedonism picks it up and their symphony is intensely vegetal, rich, tasty and unexpected. The best matchup of the day - but other good ones follow.

4) Peat Monster paired with Pacari Pink Salt & nibs bar. Peat Monster was even better than I remembered: pale gold in color with a rich nose that hits iodine first, then earthy peat and maritime brine with warm sweetness underneath. Entry is bright and toffee sweet like Caol Ila 12. Then smoke and a rich coffee (with cream and sugar) note followed by a salty ocean breeze. Some nice oak and vanilla on the short gentle finish. The pairing here was a scrumptious dark chocolate loaded with crunchy salt flakes and cacao nibs. The rich smoke, earth, iodine salt whisky meshed beautifully with the big smoky peat.  The brine air in the Peat Monster meshed with the mineral loaded pink salt flakes and rich dark cocoa to form a smoky salty rich chocolate caramel confection that hit my monkey bone - hard.

5) The finale was Orangerie Scotch Whisky (a whisky infused with orange zest, cassia, and clove) paired with Pacari Chilli-Spice bar.  Compass Box's Orangerie reminds me of a drier Cointreau (actually very high praise in my book - Cointreau is one of the finest liqueurs).  Pale gold in the glass with a nose full of rich blood orange, Orangerie keeps the spice hidden like a fan dancer.  The heat of the cassia (cinnamon bark) emerges with the fade of the finish as a cryptic glow.  The pairing here is darkest chocolate studded with chile pepper and coriander seeds.  You can see where this pairing is going, rich bitter orange bitter chocolate sherbert with a wicked kick of heat at the finish in both capsicum and cinnamon dimensions.   Another monster pairing.

Bottom line here - 4 out of 5 of these pairings were total winners in my book.  Personally I wasn't expecting to enjoy the combination of any whisky with any food - but I had my horizons expanded - big time.

The event didn't quite end there.  The full line of Compass Box whiskies were up at the bar and I enjoyed tasting Oak Cross Malt and The Spice Tree malt.  These were my hands down favorites (except maybe the Peat Monster).  I obtained samples so these will be the subjects of full reviews in the coming days.  I feel privileged to have had a preview of this tasting.  It was a great introduction to the concept and practice of whiskey-chocolate pairing.  If you can make it come to the main event on March 27th.  I'll be there.