Whisky experiments: strawberries

Since it is the summer and during this season strawberries are at their best, it is the reason to experiment a bit. For those, who are impatient: don’t do it.

I’ve been always keen to try out new tastes, when it comes to whisky. So far this journey is just beginning, but hopefully I can share some results as time passes by. I see no reason, why there would not be a good combinations of various whisky and food.

Strawberries.. They are very sweet and there is a very fresh taste when they are at their best. In this case, those were picked on the same day as tasted, and they were also organically produced.

I gave a few different styles of whisky a chance:

• Springbank 14yo single cask. This was a very much sherry flavored dram, but I must say this combination did not work out at all. It was all very bitter and tastes conflicted on the elemental level.
• Highland Park 16yo. Similar experience, than with Springbank 14. Sherry and strawberries just don’t work.
• Ardbeg Galileo. Perhaps Marsala wine would help? Perhaps a bit, but not much. I didn’t try combination with dark chocolate and strawberries, but I suspect it might just do the trick with Galileo.
• Bruichladdich Islay Barley 2006. Nope, didn’t work. The summery taste of Barley was lost and the result was a conflict again. Not that unpleasant, but not a good one either. No luck here.
• Benromach Peat Smoke. This was almost a ok mix. But still, I would not offer this to anybody as a delicacy. Peat did work out a lot better than sherry, however.
• Wasmund’s bourbon. This actually worked out the best. Strong tastes, but from a different world helped out. The result was much more in alignment with strawberries, than it was when tasting a Scotch whisky.

The result is.. Unless you really want to – strawberries and whisky are not a taste that go together as raw elements. Bourbons however, might do the trick to some level but it was not nearly as good as mixing strawberries with a sparkling wine. But I will continue experimenting, and check out if – by a cosmic chance of the vast universe  - some tastes do actually lock in to each other like tar to your favored cloth.

Summer continues! Slainté!