| #024 Johnnie Walker Blue Label NAS Blended Scotch | |||||||||||||||||||||
| This cost is what I found the likely shelf price for a 750ml bottle to be, based on an average of costs throughout the USA. Your price may differ significantly. This is not an advertisement of sale, this bottle is likely empty by now anyway Cost | $21000 |  | |||||||||||||||||||
| 89 | ||||||||||||||||||||
| The whisky's score as weighed against the cost of a bottle. Adj. Score | 22 | ||||||||||||||||||||
| ABV | 40% | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Awards |  | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Tasting # 125: Friday Leftovers VII: Top Shelf (11-MAY-2007) | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Notes | I finally get to post a retaste of two of my very top taste scorers:  JW Blue and the last of my mini Balvenies: the 21 Portwood. Ah, what pain it is to know the price of these! These aren't “practical” unless your definition of practicality differs wildly from mine but if you love whisky you should find a way to have a taste of something at this level. | ||||||||||||||||||||
| 1st Impression | This second tasting came from the same bottle, so loathe was I to finish this. There's nothing like knowing you have the king of blends in your cabinet. | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Smell | Mellow, complex. Tiny scents of sherry and smoke and malt. Flowery on top and smooth without barely a hint of alcohol. | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Taste | Malt and a touch of peat open, warm and smooth. These fade slowly to grains and woods and sherry and honey and smoke that then linger on and on. A second sip brings more smoke and spice, a bit of salt and pepper, a bit of cream, more complexity. No water needed, this is powerful and potent but smooth and easy to drink. I could see me having a bottle of this around as a shelf icon if it weren't so godawful expensive. Still, it stays on the list as a benchmark, the highest priced bottle, king of the blends. I'm going to bump this to 89 points. JW Blue is just the perfect, rounded blend, lacking only some bit of excitement or character that you oft find in single malts. I'm setting it as my benchmark, to get 90 points, you have to beat JW Blue. | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Tasting Score | 89 | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Tasting # 24: Archive Review: Johnnie Walker Blue Label (29-MAY-2006) | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Notes | Archived Review | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Smell | N/A | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Taste | I would like, nay L-O-V-E to be able to rip JW Blue apart here, telling you that it's swill or tainted death water or some other thing because honestly, who doesn't want the highest and mightiest to fail just a little? Who wouldn't want to stand in a liquor store in front of the most expensive bottle in the place and sniff their nose in derision? A two hundred dollar bottle of whisky torn down to size and kicked in the shins would make for a spectacular review. But.... I can't. JW Blue is certainly legendary for its outrageous cost, but apparently those ducats are going somewhere. In perfect honesty, JW Blue is probably the smoothest whisky I have ever had. Like its siblings, the smoke is there, but milder and warmer like pipe smoke to JW Red's cigarettes. There's a layer of wet wood, honey, plenty of peat and a touch of malt and nuts and a finish of vanilla. I've drank each glass slowly and deliberately, trying to understand the nuances of this whisky and simply put, it's fine stuff. In the end, I'll never buy a bottle because I can get several great bottles (hell, a dozen good bottles); of something else for the price, but whatever the JW boys are doing to make this whisky, they're doing a damn fine job of it. | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Legacy Score | 85 | ||||||||||||||||||||
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