Category: Food

How to taste whiskey

Much like wine enthusiasts or microbrew beer fans, whiskey connoisseurs have strong opinions, and a lot of them. They will debate endlessly about subtle differences and argue about whether a particular whiskey has flavor notes of leather, or vanilla, or peat. Then there are drinkers who don’t know much about whiskey. Maybe they remember drinking something that they enjoyed once, and somebody told them it had whiskey in it. Now they want to learn more about whiskey. Where does somebody even get started figuring whiskey out?

According to Rachel Manna, a manager at Tamworth Distilling in Tamworth, a good first step is narrowing down the number of whiskeys you want to learn about at first.

“We always ask people what their preference is,” she said. “Some people are bourbon drinkers, some people are rye drinkers, some people just don’t know. So we really like to kind of walk them through and, you know, talk about the differences between the different types of whiskeys, talk a little bit about flavor notes.”

Somebody new to the world of whiskeys might not know that there even are different types of whiskey, she said, so learning a little bit about the differences between Scotch, bourbon, rye and any of the other types of whiskey will help a new whiskey drinker wrap their head around the general flavor profiles.

“They’re all a little bit different,” she said. “You’re going to get the aroma, you’re going to have the taste, you’re going to have a finish; ultimately, you’re looking for a balance of flavors.”

“For instance,” Manna continued, “our [Tamworth Distilling’s] bourbon is a ‘high corn’ bourbon, and it’s 100 proof — and the proof factors in as well — so you’re going to get completely different notes than you’re going to get from our straight rye. That is a little bit of a lower proof [a lower percentage of alcohol]. And then when you go into something like our William Whipple Winter Wheat Whiskey, that has toasted chocolate and caramel malt in it, those are going to give you completely different notes as well. So a lot of it is just trying [different types of whiskey], and working it through your palate and seeing the different notes that hit when you’re tasting them.”

Manna explained that even the act of drinking a whiskey will affect its flavor. Taking a long pull from a favorite cocktail is physically different than cautiously tasting something new.

“Our recommendation is to breathe it in through your mouth,” she said, “in a sense, versus your nose; put your nose in the glass, and then take the breath in through your mouth. That’s where you’re going to really pull out those different flavor notes. And then where it hits on the tongue and showcases the different notes that are in the whiskeys. Even adding a little drop of water to a whiskey really opens it, can change it a little bit.”

Manna said that in New Hampshire distillers are only allowed legally to offer a few choices of whiskey at a time for guests to compare.

“There are state regulations,” she said, “so, realistically, when you go to tasting rooms, you can’t have any more than five half-ounce pours in a ‘flight.’ A professional taster might see it a little differently, but on a small-scale personal level I think that five is a good amount. Especially a higher proof, it’s all going to stick over time, and the tastes will blend together. And you need to cleanse your palate between tastes. For us civilians, the standard is we just drink water. Our distillers, when they are tasting stuff, they drink a lot of soda water — a really strong soda water — to cleanse their palates as well as unsalted crackers, because sometimes they’ll be tasting through 20 barrels or more [of whiskey]. They use droppers so the droppers hit the middle of their mouths when they’re tasting. And then, they can spit it out afterward, because clearly that’s a lot to taste after a while.”

Whiskey tasting
The tasting room at Tamworth Distilling (15 Cleveland Hill Road, Tamworth, 323-7196, tamworthdistilling.com) is open Thursday through Sunday, noon to 5 p.m. In addition, Tamworth Distilling is present at the Concord Summer and Winter Farmers Markets. There will be a fireside tasting of Tamworth’s whiskeys at the Blue Bear Inn (534 Mountain Road, Francestown, 808-0174, bluebearinn.com) Thursday, Feb. 26, at 6 p.m. Tickets are $55.20 through eventbrite.com.

Featured photo: Photo courtesy of Tamworth Distillery

Slightly Crooked Pies gets a brick-and-mortar spot with hopes to open by Pi Day

Lauren Cline was very excited. She had just taken delivery on a special toy: a commercial sheeter capable of rolling out large volumes of dough — in her case, pie dough.

“It just got delivered today!” she said excitedly.

Cline, the owner and operator of Slightly Crooked Pies, has run a homestead bakery for several years, baking bespoke pies for individual customers and filling wholesale orders, but she has made a leap of faith and will open a brick-and-mortar pie shop on Elm Street in Manchester within the month.

“A series of factors all came together and told me, ‘It’s time,’” she said. “I always wanted to be in Manchester. I always wanted to be on Elm Street, and a place with a kitchen became available in a building that matches the aesthetic of my business, which just was amazing. And I think right now, with the nature of the downtown businesses, you know, we work together, we support each other. I have so many mentors just on this one strip. I just have to pinch myself over being a part of that ecosystem.”

The new pie shop, also called Slightly Crooked Pies, will offer more than pies, Cline said; this will be more of a conventional bakery.

“In addition to our full-size pies, we’ll be offering mini heart and hand pies,” she said, “both large and small hand pies. We’re going to feature either cookies or bars of the month. We’re going to carry [French-style] macarons. We’ll have frozen chicken pies to take and bake, and we’ll have a freezer of our take-and-bake pies so you can make your house smell good and take all of the credit for yourself.”

But the focus will remain on pies, Cline said.

“We’ll have staples that will be always available year round — cherry, apple, blueberry, pecan, and chocolate-bourbon-pecan. And then, I’ll be able to work with creams and custards,” she said. “So I’ll be able to have lemon meringue, Key lime, and chocolate cream pies. The chocolate cream will actually change three times a year. I’ll have traditional chocolate cream, and in the summer we’ll go to a s’mores [pie] — it will have a graham crust and a marshmallow. cream top. And then in the winter months I’ll be making a peppermint hot cocoa [pie], which has got a little touch of mint in the chocolate, and then a marshmallow-whipped cream top and a chocolate cookie crust.”

Cline’s plan is to offer fruit pies in season, she said.

“For instance,” she said, “from May through late June we’ll have a strawberry-rhubarb. In the middle of the summer we’ll have peach. And in the fall we’ll have something I call SweaterWeather — an apple-pear [pie] with cardamom in it. And the top is braided so it looks like a sweater, because it has a very warm, comforting flavor. We’ll also be rotating in our award-winning varieties that we have. We’ll feature one of those a season — blueberry-lavender, maple-pecan, and, of course, SweaterWeather.”

Cline said she has surprised herself with how calm she has been at taking the big step of opening an almost-all-pie shop. She sees a real demand for homemade pies (in her case, rolled by machine, but made by hand.).

“When I tell people I’m opening a pie shop they get really excited in a way that surprises me,” she said, “even after doing this for many, many years now. Almost everyone says either, ‘I love pie!’, or, ‘Oh, man, my grandmother….’”

Slightly Crooked Pies
Slightly Crooked Pies (slightlycrookedpies.com) will be located at 1209 Elm St. in Manchester. Owner Lauren Cline hopes to open her doors on March 14, Pi Day.

Featured photo: Photo by John Fladd.