Whisky : Johnny Walker Red Label

Country/Region : Scotland/Blend

ABV : 40%

Cask : Unspecified

Tasting : Neat in a Glencairn @ Home

Nose : An opening blow of rubbing alcohol assaults the nose, but beyond it lies vanilla, honey suckle, and a wet ashtray of cigarette butts and miscellaneous trash.

Palate : The wet ashtray washes across the palate reminding one immediately of the taste of the air in a smoking section of a 24 Hour pancake restaurant. The liquid itself is thin and weak with vague hints of more pleasant sweet floral notes that float on by.

Finish : None. Sort of like the after taste of fruit infused water, you feel like there should be something lingering, but just as soon as you try to pin it down its gone.

Score : 1

Notes : I do not posted a whole lot of F’s as I typically I do not bother drinking bottles that I suspect will score that low nor do I always feel the need to post the reviews I write up of those drams. They sit untyped in my little leather notebook, forgotten quite intentionally. It almost seems unkind to remind people that hey, “Red Label is a dumpster fire of a scotch to drink straight up.” I imagine you are already aware that its virtues are best found in mixed drinks or deglazing a pan for a whisky sauce/gravy.

Red is cheap and widely available— it is most popular in cultures where red is particularly auspicious color or with college students and anyone who wants the cheapest level of Scotch sophistication possible. Hence how I came into this bottle when I first began my scotch journey, I knew Johnny Walker was famous and I knew the colors meant something about quality, but I had no idea how all that worked so I adopted a bottle of Red. A decade later I still have the same bottle and not because I have been saving it for a special occasion. But then you already knew the bottle was full of thin fool’s gold colored liquid.