Ardmore & Cohiba Pairing

Geoff and I only made it until Wednesday this week before we broke down and had a, um, strategy meeting.

We accompanied our musings with a couple drams of Ardmore Peated Highland Single Malt Scotch Whisky, and a Cohiba Cigar.

To be honest as a pairing these two particular vices don't exactly complement each other, but taken separately they are both recommended. Let's start with the Scotch.

The Ardmore Peated Highland is fairly interesting scotch, and most of make makes it interesting is in it's name. Generally one doesn't look to highland scotches for that deep smokey flavor. They tend to be sweet light and clean. Ardmore is certinally sweet, but is nothing remotely close to light or clean.

The clover and honey nose is not betrayed by the initial sweet--almost a hint of vanilla--start, but that is immediately consumed by a massive alcohol conflagration that eventually subsides to its roasty smoky finish. It's color is a medium to deep caramel, and it has a body / legs / mouth feel that conveys glycerin without being "slippery".

A drop of water exploded this nectar a bit. It pushed the fire into the swallow, and lets you taste a couple of floral notes before the smoke and after-burn obliterate your pallet... In a good way. 

All told the fire and the smoke keep out out of the realm of "beginner scotch" but if you are looking to impress someone who has their feet wet, this could be a nice eye opening diversion.

The Cohiba on the other hand is a fairly straight forward affair. It's has a darkish Cameroon wrapper with Indonesian binder and Dominican filler. It has a fairly complex initial flavor. A lot of wood-smoke and nuttiness. My burn took a little bit of maintenance. It canoed once towards the beginning and I had to relight it once, but that was likely my fault.

It's ash is not as solid as some others, but the flavor kept up until just about the end of the smoke when it turned just a wee-bit harsh.

Final thought here: Not a good first smoke, but a good stepping stone if you are trying to advance your palette to some of the more full flavored cigars.

I'm ranking the scotch a 4.2 and the cigar a 4.4.