Salutor

Good, Cheap Scotch

With the understanding that one's tastes have to have become sufficiently skewed as to consider $25.99 cheap, the WSJ's Eric Felton ["Scotch Terms Scotched" - subscription required] throws a line to those of who love Scotch in the form of a recommendation:

Far more satisfying were the blended malt whiskies I tried from the Famous Grouse, a house making something of a specialty of vatted malts. Yes, there is still the basic Famous Grouse, a mainstream blended whisky that is the most popular brand in Scotland. But now the Grouse has a range of malt blends, aged 10 to 30 years. It doesn't hurt that the brand belongs to the Edrington Group, which owns two of the most celebrated distilleries in Scotland, the Macallan and Highland Park, and uses whisky from both in its blended malts. In my blind tasting, the 10-year-old Famous Grouse malt was one my favorites, well-rounded and admirably structured. And at about $25 a bottle, it is a terrific bargain.

Thanks, as usual, to Cyril for catching this. For reasons I cannot now recall, I stopped reading this week's Saturday WSJ with the financial section.

Online Liquor Store And More

This is an odd week for alcohol-related links since I'm not actually drinking much at the moment, but because two good sites have come to  my attention over the past 24 hours it would be foolish not to jot them down:

BeerLiquors.com
This site sells a terrific collection of liquors, beers, cigars, and other miscellany over the Internet, including some great gins (one favorite that has been hard to find here lately, Boodles), and some very expensive Scotch whiskeys.

24 Great American Craft Beers You Should Be Drinking (from the Bachelor Guy)
I can't vouch for the integrity of the list as a whole, as there are so very many craft beers these days to choose from, but it includes a couple of brews that I have really enjoyed, including the Dogfish Head 90 Minute Imperial IPA.

A few months back I did what struck me as a reasonably comprehensive Google search for beer and liquor sold over the Internet with no results, even though wine over the Internet is quite common. This struck me as odd, but I chalked it up to arcane rules and regulations. [I should add, as well, that my search was prompted in part by the lame selection and prices offered by the state-controlled liquor monopoly here in North Carolina, although the beer selections have gotten exponentially better since the passage of a new law in 2005.]  Either I was searching badly or something has changed recently.

Related links:

• Where to buy beer online (Beer Advocate)
• BeerGeek.biz