Benromach 10 Year Old 100 Proof

I'm glad you liked this one. I was really looking forward to it when I finally landed some in the UK. At well < $100 per bottle, but $117 will get you one of the few remaining at the LCBO if you want one.

My first bottle is empty and I'll wait a while before opening another, but I'm reassured by looking at my review and finding that I tasted some similar things to you. Not surprising, as we tasted from the same bottle.

Cheers!

So how do you calculate proofs in British? US we just divide the proof by 2 to get abv. 100 proof is 57%? how does the math work?

@casualtorture Somebody else on the site might know better than me, but I think it comes from the idea that, to prove that the whisky (or actually rum at the time) wasn't diluted by the officers who were giving rations to the British sailors, they would ignite it with gunpowder and if it flared up (ie. was at least 57% ABV) that was "proof" that it was undiluted (ie. the sailors weren't getting ripped off). If anyone has a better explanation, please share!

@casualtorture, it is sometimes referred to as "navy proof". You'll be hard pressed to find a friendlier answer than @talexander's.

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@paddockjudge very interesting. i love knowing the history behind everything. I wonder why they changed it?

@casualtorture the UK still uses Navy proof as a term for the 57% ABV and @talexander is spot on with his explanation. Pussers sell a rum at that 54.5%ABV referred to as Gunpowder proof and Woods 100 Navy rum is readily available in U.K., both claim a long history of same recipe and blended from different Distillers Pussers is West Indies and Woods Guyana. Neither have a lot of age to them but they deliver plenty of flavour I find a lot of liquorice especially on the Woods with usual sweetness associated with rum.

Anywhere around the 55% ABV hits the mark with the gunpowder test but 57 is the magic number for the British Navy Ration as it is "100 per cent proof" the rum is not diluted. The rum ration was removed in the 1970's by the Navy but the terminology is still popular.

Do you all really think that the British navy worried about maintaining the quality of the spirits they gave their sailors because they gave a damn about the sailors? That makes no sense whatsoever. 57 % ABV plus a fraction was the alcoholic strength at which the British Navy could be certain that potential spillage and contamination of the spirits onto the gunpowder of their naval cannon would not endanger the ignition of the powder. Pure military expedient. That spirit would likely have been at 40% abv, 30% abv, or lower, if they could have gotten away with it.

What could be more logical (not) than defining the standard for strength of your spirits by what it takes to ignite 18th century naval gunpowder???

@Victor Good point - then again, watered down rum could have caused a mutiny the likes of which Captain Bligh could only imagine!!

@Victor that is a good point but the Royal Navy started diluting the rum around 1740 when it became known as Grog, the norm being two parts water to one rum with citrus juice added to prevent scurvy, at which point the spillage would effect the powder. The Royal Navy was renowned for its prowess at sea no doubt because even in the highest seas they were all so drunk they felt like they walked in straight lines on a pitching deck, the daily ration originally being half a pint of neat rum.

@casualtorture, it was changed to allow for ease and accuracy when calculating proof/degrees. It is referred to as the "American method"...I think the Navy Proof is way cooler!

Granted, I've only just skimmed the Wikipedia article, but I don't see the point of "proof" to begin with.

OK, I'll buy the fun gunpowder story. But what's the point of the American system where you just double the ABV to express that same idea in a different unit? I don't double my car's speed to put it in an alternative measure. I don't double my age. I don't double my number of children. (Except on my tax forms—shhhh!)

"Proof" is industry jargon, and an unnecessarily redundant parallel system of measurement.

That said, why did the US develop the 'proof' standard it has? Probably for two reasons, both of which serve the industry and not the general public, per se: 1) historically 50% ABV was the Bottled in Bond standard for US 'full strength' straight bourbon and rye whiskeys. "100 proof" became a measure of full (100%) strength against that measuring stick, and 2) some of the US whiskey industrial standards use the 1/2% abv increment, e.g. straight bourbon and rye must be barreled at no more than 125 proof/62.5% ABV. 1/2 of 1% gradations served the industry guys.

@Victor , those sound like some good guesses.

I will further speculate that the jargon caught on because it sounds cool. It's way more fun and showy to say you got "a bottle of 90 proof" than you got "a bottle at 45% ABV."

@Ol_Jas Yep, I've never heard a southern rock or hip hop artist brag about is 50% jug of moonshine. But to quote Yelawolf,

'Motormouth, make a wave, yeah, Roll Tide You're playin' golf in lightning? So am I Dressed in a tin man suit Drinkin' a tin can too, that is 110 proof.'

It is cooler.