On one of my other blogs I have analyzed which is the most “different” single malt. It turns out it is Laphroaig, which I recently tasted for the first time and absolutely love.
My all-time favourite single malt, however, is Talisker. In the blog post I wrote last night, I also analyzed single malts which are similar to other single malts. The analysis revealed that the three single malts which are closest to Talisker are Clynelish, Ardbeg and Oban.
Coming back to the list of most unique whiskies, my analysis revealed that there are three whiskies whose degree of uniqueness is much higher than that of the others. One, as I mentioned earlier is Laphroaig. Then, there is Lagavulin, which the similarity table says is close to Laphroaig. And the third? Ardbeg.
So Ardbeg is this rare whisky (similarity score of only ~60%), and which is 95% similar to Talisker, my all-time favourite whisky. So the next time you want to impress me, you know what to get!
Hmm…that is interesting. I wonder if the hit of peat skews some of the statistical comparisons. Ignoring that, I personally found Ardbeg to be light in texture, feel and color. In that sense I find to similar to some of the other Islays like laphroig and caol ila. Talisker on the other hand I find dense, sort of more robust (if thats a description). Sort of beefy as they say. Not to downplay a fine whisky like Talisker, but I find its style close to Johnnie walker black but more peaty.
p.s: I have only had the youngest bottlings of all these, so I really don’t know how an older Ardbeg or a Talisker tastes 🙂
Comparing Talisker to Johnnie Walker??
Die!