Alan Bishop

Different people will have different preferences for a palate cleanser when tasting different spirits. One suggestion is to stick with bland foods like unsalted crackers and good filtered water, or to use your normal habits as a baseline. High-end tortilla chips with no salt and high-quality water is also a great option.
 
Transcript: "So when tasting different spirits is their preferred palate cleanser? Well it really kind of depends on who you ask and you're gonna get two different answers more than likely depending on the category of person that you ask. So if you ask someone who is doing a spirits competition they're probably going to tell you to stick with very bland foods as a palate cleanser. Things like unsalted crackers etc and good filtered water, RO water in particular. Something with as little chemicals or minerals in it as you possibly can so you can get a good read on that spirit. If you talk to a distiller like myself however you're probably going to get a slightly different answer. Something I learned a long time ago in the industry from a renowned Kentucky master distiller whose name I won't say here was that you need to kind of stay with your baseline. So if you are a distiller and you're gonna go in and analyze say 20 or 30 barrels to put together for a blend for the bourbon that's gonna go into the bottle for the consumer you want to approach that with some comfort level right. So if your habits include having coffee in the morning or even a smoke in the morning you go ahead and you do those things because that's a baseline that your palate is used to working with. Now those aren't really so much cleansers as much as they are a way of sort of grounding yourself to some degree in what you're used to tasting one way or the other whether you're distilling or you're analyzing those barrels those flavors those bottle samples etc. One thing I found a long time ago that has helped me out especially with bourbon in particular that I love as a palate cleanser is high end tortilla chips. They're made out of corn and bourbon is obviously based in corn whiskey. So you want to have some baseline for what that grain raw ingredient is before you start tasting through those bourbons. If you can find them with a little salt or no salt that's better. Again high-end quality water to go with it and use that to cleanse your palate before you switch samples. It's fantastic advice try it you'll thank me."

Charring and toasting the barrel is a filtration process used to get rid of impurities in the whiskey. The toast level is what gives the whiskey its unique baking spice aromas and flavors, while the char provides a heavier filtration. Low Barrel entry proof and lower ethanol levels help to better oxidize the whiskey, giving it a different flavor profile.
 
Transcript: "So what do the various levels of toast and char in casks actually accomplish? Well, interestingly enough, most people think that the flavor comes primarily from the char. That is not at all the case. That char level is actually there as a filtration device. And we've known about char as filtration devices for a very long time in human history, including in barrel manufacturing, where the inside of barrels were commonly charred for water and things of that nature to filter it to make sure that it was healthy for human consumption. It's actually the toast level in the barrel that is going to give you those wood sugars that you're after, those unique baking spice aromas and flavors that you're familiar with with bourbon whiskey, rye whiskey, et cetera. That's where that's actually coming from, is that toasted layer of the barrel where all that sugar resides. The char, the reason for a three char or a four char amongst the bigger distilleries, is because they need a heavier filtration device because the low-ret Kentucky column stills that they use, not even just necessarily Kentucky column stills, but low-ret column stills in general, that are commonly in use in the large distilleries, are unable to pull out as many of the impurities as they would like to be able to pull out during the distillation. Therefore, the char actually works as a filtration level to get rid of some of that stuff. This is also true of pot still distillation, if you distill a little bit on the dirtier side for more flavor. It's the toast underneath there, again, that's going to give those flavors that you want. A two char, which is what I commonly use, I use because I can do those heavy cuts off the pot still from the very get-go, get the alcohols that I want to keep into the barrel and have a cleaner product from the get-go. And that two char leaves more lignin, which is actually going to give more of a toasted coconut, toasted hazelnut sort of flavor. As well, I do low barrel entry proof at 105 proof. Because of that lower proof, the alcohol oxidizes a little bit faster. It doesn't age faster, it ages differently. And water is actually a better solvent on wood than what ethanol is."

The two glasses most recommended for tasting bourbon, whiskey, or scotch are the Glencairn and the neat glass. The Glencairn is best for drinking and the neat glass is best for analyzing the aroma of the spirit.
 
Transcript: "Is there a proper glass design to optimize the bourbon, whiskey, or scotch tasting experience? Man, that's a personal question, but I'm going to answer it the best I can. So the sort of industry standard is the Glencairn. You might be familiar with these. This one's a pretty special one. It's crystal and it was given to me by Jeff Moeller of the Scotchy Bourbon Boys. The reason we love these glasses is because of the shape of the bowl at the bottom and then the nose at the top, which you might be able to notice is flared out a little bit. You don't ever want a glass that's flared in because when you're smelling spirits, the aroma being 90% of what you taste, you're not sticking your nose in it like wine and you don't want all of those aromas concentrated. You want them to be able to air out a little bit, particularly if it's a pot distilled spirit. As such, you want that slight little flare right there. These are great to drink out of. However, if you're a distiller, these are not great sensory glasses for checking spirits off the still or out of the barrel with the aromatics in particular. They make another type of glass, which I unfortunately don't have on me at the moment, called the Neat Glass. I personally think it's terrible to drink out of because it is a very widely flared mouth on that particular glass. But as far as the sensory approach, that's exactly what you want. Now this isn't a Neat Glass. This is a Whiskey Witch Nation glass, but it's somewhat similar to what the Neat Glass kind of does. Again, it's flared out. You don't want all that ethanol being pushed up a chimney right up into your nose. And when you're actually smelling spirits, you want to actually breathe in through your mouth and out through your nose. You also find that you have a dominant nostril, believe it or not, just like you have a dominant eye. So the two glasses I recommend for drinking, the Glencairn. For analyzing, the Neat Glass or something similar to it, such as this. Alright guys, there you go."

The size and shape of a pot still can impact the final flavor of whiskey. A small, squat still will produce a less desirable flavor and a tall still will allow for more natural reflux, which helps to remove impurities while preserving desired aromatics and alcohol content. The shape of the head is also important as it affects how much vapor comes into contact with copper, which impacts the body and volatility of the distilled spirit.
 
Transcript: "So how does size and shape of the still impact the final flavor of the whiskey? Well for this question we're gonna stick strictly to pot still or batch distillation and not Kentucky column still because there's two different ways of looking at distillation and what we are concerned with here is our expertise in batch distillation. So pot still distillation is all about the retention and concentration of flavor and it is affected by every variable that you can imagine. Temperature, barometric pressure, the mood of the distiller, what the distillers eating that day will determine how he runs that still and makes his various cuts of alcohol that he he or she would like to include in the finished product. As such the height of the still has a lot to do with it. So small squat stills do not produce great quality ethanol. So what they tend to do is produce a very heavy bodied spirits which may not taste great to the consumer to the extent that in Scotland at one point in time the lowland distillers were actually producing such terrible distillate from their squat stills that the highland moonshiners were able to sell their distillate for a much better price despite the risk. On top of this how tall the still is determines how much natural reflux you get. Reflux is basically what happens when water falls out of solution and ethanol rises you get higher proof impurity. So even without forced reflux on a taller pot still what you have is the top of it takes longer to heat up and subsequently you get a little more natural reflux. So all those water of not all the water but some of the water and some of those impurities are falling out while the alcohol and the aromatics that you want to keep are coming across. The vapor path very much so affects the way something is distilled. The speed of distillation will affect the quality of what is distilled and the shape of that head is super important. So depending on whether or not you want to hold on to more or less of the volatility of the raw material you started with the shape of the head is going to affect that by how much the vapor comes in communication with the copper. The more of those heavy bodied elements that you may or may not want in the distillation will be removed. Hope that answered your question."

The angel share phenomenon in which whiskey evaporates during aging affects the final product by cleaning up the product through the char layer of the barrel and concentrating the flavors that are in the barrel. Additionally, it also changes the constituent chemical compounds of the white dog spirit that went into the barrel into something chemically entirely different.
 
Transcript: "So how does the angel share phenomenon in which whiskey evaporates during aging affect the final product? Well there's a couple different ways that it can affect the final product. The first thing that I always tell people about barrels is the following or about casks is the following. They make excellent ingredients and really terrible storage devices because they are living ingredients to some degree. They do breathe. Barometric pressure affects them, evaporation affects them. You're actually evaporating some amount of the product which is what the angel share is called during the maturation process and depending on the type of cellar and or barrel house that you actually have the barrels in and the humidity thereof, you're either evaporating more water or you're evaporating more ethanol. Either way two things are happening. The first is that you are getting some filtration and cleaning up the product through the char layer of the barrel first of all and secondarily through that evaporation because if you are evaporating some of the ethanol, the ethanol's that you tend to be evaporating are the more volatile or the low boiling ethanol's that you should have gotten rid of most of during the distillation process particularly with pot still distillation. So A, you are cleaning up the product. B, the other thing that's happening is because you're reducing the volume due to that angel share and or that evaporation, you're actually concentrating a lot of the flavors that are in the barrel and particularly if you're evaporating water as opposed to ethanol depending again on the humidity, you're actually concentrating more of that distillate and the flavors of that distillate. The same thing is happening here basically with micro oxidization via evaporation as well as air entry and exit from the barrel. You're changing the constituent chemical compounds of the white dog spirit that went into that barrel into something chemically entirely different from what entered the barrel when it exits the barrel. That is true alchemy right there. Hope that answered your question guys."

A pot still is a batch system that is legally required to make certain products, such as single malt scotch and cognac. It produces a more reflective and percussive product than a column still, which is a continuous system used to make more efficient whiskeys, brandy, etc. Hybrid devices are technically still pot stills, but with added rectifying columns for natural reflux without forcing it.
 
Transcript: "So what's the difference between a pot still and a column still? Well there's a little bit of overlap here and there and it's not as straightforward as a 120 second answer could make it be. But the easy way to think of it is that most column stills, especially what you'll see in the very large distilleries in Kentucky, bourbon distilleries particularly, low-rep column stills, those are a tool of industrialization. They are a tool of efficiency. Those are continuous systems that are fed a continuous feed of alcoholic beer, mash, wine, etc. to make your various different whiskeys and or brandies versus a pot still which is a batch system. Meaning that it can only hold the capacity of wash or mash or wine etc. that will actually fit into the boiler of the system. The pot still is by far the much older of the two systems and it is still legally required in single malt scotch for example or in cognac to use the pot still to make those particular products. And even though bourbon was born on a pot still, it's primarily now made on Kentucky style column stills. That being said, I personally feel like the pot still makes a better quality product. It's more reflective. It's more percussive of the person who's running it. Everything in the world affects a pot still from the mood of the distiller, whether or not he's in good health or bad health, barometric pressure, etc. Storm fronts, they all affect pot still distillation. Now in between you have devices like this. This is still technically a pot still, although they're called a hybrid because it does have a rectifying column. This however does not work like a continuous distillation column does in Kentucky. In other words, we are not feeding beer, wine, mash, etc. into the top of that allowing it to drop through and steam come up and flash distill it. We are using this simply for natural reflux off of our pot still without forcing any reflux, although we could force reflux. It is still a batch system. Hopefully that answers your question."