How do you rate your whisky

It's a hard question as everyone has their own likes and dislikes. I tasted Old Pulteney 21 and wasn't a big fan yet Jim Murray loved it. The way I rate in my reviews is mostly comparison based. For instance I loved Aberlour 10 ... but its older brother 12 was better and so deserved a higher rating. One thing to keep in mind is its not just the flavours involved but the experience and where a particular whisky takes you! If a whisky tastes perfect but doesn't excite or change my perspective then it is not worthy of an exceptional score in my view. I'm a new comer myself so this may be entirely wrong but if you can't be honest with your friends and peers then who can you be honest with !!

@wtrstrnghlt It's always going to be a comparison game as how else will you know what you think is good or unpleasant. That being said whiskies that grab my attention, that beg me to nose them for ages, that cry out for another sip, just one more minute spent with them, will always score quite highly with me as I feel that's the mark of a good whisky.

@SquidgyAsh but do you rate using the 4 components Nose, Palate, Finish, Balance, each with a maximum of 25 points. Or do you only give it a single overall score.

And why?

I came across an interesting article on Dramming.com which explained the difference between the two types of scoring.

dramming.com/2009/11/…

This covers my question to you guys pretty well. I'm just looking for your point of view on this, so I can make a good decision on which way to go.

Also because I feel I can make this choice only ones, if I wat to compared ratings in the future.

O, and it is not my intention to compete over who has the best way of rating a Whisky. Just your thoughts about your own way, what made you choose this method, pro's and con's.

@wtrstrnghlt loving the site... they have some interesting views on there. The 4 category way is the one I use only because I find it hard to rate a whisky out of 100 without first analysing its flaws and strengths individually. The categories just make this process easier for me.

@wtrstrnghlt, how do you put numbers up to record sensations, impressions, metaphors, and feelings? Some on Connosr choose to avoid this subject altogether, and just don't do reviews in part for this reason. There is not an exact science here, but we do it the best way it occurs to us. A couple of years ago there were long impassioned discussions on this or that system or scale to rate whiskies. What is currently used on Connosr by most members, by convention, so that we can understand one another, is something similar to Robert Parker's scale on wines, or Michael Jackson's similar scale for whisky. Almost everything rates in the 70s and 80s, unless it is abysmal or thought to be a rare paragon of brilliance. Some, like myself, use something a little closer to Jim Murray, who gives a lot more grades in the low and mid 90's than would Parker or Jackson. I do that because I consider it ridiculous to say that a whisky is "perfect" and then score it 92/100, and because a scale between 70 and 89 does not to me give a lot of room for differentiation. Personally I don't like any of these scales, and, before they were established on Connosr, I preferred a wider, and lower, way of grading most whiskies. You can do the ratings any way you like, but if your scales are too very different from the way others use theirs, others will have a difficult time interpreting what your numbers mean, and our ability to communicate using common language will be seriously strained.

No doubt it is wise to have experienced several dozen whiskies before one starts to evaluate and rate them. The larger your universe of experience, the more contrast you will have had the opportunity to observe.

If your rating system is set up upon defined criteria which do not coincide with your own personal enjoyment preferences, then you can very definitely get a gap between how much you enjoy a whisky and how you would grade it according to critical criteria. As an example, complexity is often considered a basic virtue in the critical evaluation of whisky, yet many people will often enjoy a simpler whisky with good quality flavours more. George T. Stagg bourbon is extremely complex, but I am only in the mood to do the work to enjoy it very infrequently. For pleasure drinking I would usually prefer something more simple.

I like to maintain flexibility in the way I evaluate a whisky. The time sequential route: "first we nose the whisky and here's what I thought of that, next we taste the whisky, and here is my grade and comments for that...etc." is simple and the quickest way to do a review. It is very easy to do a snapshot review of a sample this way. If I have a LOT of experience with a whisky and I want to go deeper, I will often detach the review from the time sequential perspective. A component parts framework for a review structure is also workable. I summarised and contrasted these three review styles in one of my reviews I did, for Royal Canadian Small Batch.

You are in a bind with whisky reviews, because there is always more to know about a whisky. Like it or not you have to go with the limited experience you have. Sure it is great if you've been through 10 bottles of this same whisky over 20 years and can write a grand tome about that whisky, but if that is true and you do write that wonderful depth piece, you will not write many reviews. Some do only 'quicky reviews'--snapshots in time on a sample. I like to do depth analysis, but I do not know all of the whiskies I want to review equally well to do so. So I do some reviews of each type, the quick-take, and the in-depth observation.

There is no one "right" way to do any of this...but any honest attempt to shed some light with useful information on the whiskies you drink will be well-received by your fellow Connosr members.

@wtrstrnghlt I do use the 4 categories, Nose, Palate, Finish, Balance as you can see by my reviews, but what I mean is something similar to what Victor said. How does one define a single moment in time? If you want to be completely subjective then all you should post in my opinion are tasting notes because in my opinion everything goes into a tasting. What was your mood, how had your day been, who were you with, everything goes into it!

That's why I generally do longer reviews usually detailing who I'm with and what I'm doing. As someone who sells alcohol for a living and watching people try different beers and spirits over the course of many different events and moods and seeing how they perceive what they're drinking.

When I say that a good (great might be a better term) whisky to me cries out to be nosed forever, begs to be sipped again and again, I don't mean a whisky where you sit there and go "yeah that's not bad" but one that sits there, slaps you across the face, tells you to ignore the wife, put the kids to bed, the fur balls go outside, grab the bottle and the glencairn and just dig in! That's a great whisky.

Number systems are great, but I've seen reviewers give a whisky a 90+ that I gave a 50, and a 50 where I would have given it a 90+. If you were to go for specifics I'd say that I tend to score along the lines of Jim Murray: 0 to 50 Evil! 51to 65 nasty, 65 to 70 meh could be worse, 71 to 75 It's alright, 76 to 80 good, 81 to 85 that's excellent! 86 to 90 You should own a bottle of this, 91 to 94 Stunning, worth the money, 95 to 100 pure perfect (I've never given a whisky a 100, off the top of my head the highest I'd go is 97 and that just means I've never tasted anything better, 95's to 97's are bottles I'll actively hunt out and try to purchase.

I hope this helps.

@Victor - absolutely brilliant post! Without a doubt you have captured the spirit of connosr. Also., your review(s) of Royal Canadian Small Batch is a rubric for whisky review posting on connosr. thanks for keeping real.

I do the classic Nose, Taste, Finish, Balance (because most of us understand it) scoring each out of 25 points, however my "Balance" rating takes into account complexity and overall quality as well.

I'm careful to not bias my scores unduly by personal preference - I may rate a whisky at 90 points but it doesn't necessarily mean that I enjoy it more than a whisky I rated at 86 points - because my scores are (intended to be) given purely on merit. I'm able to recognise a good whisky when I see one, but it doesn't automatically mean I would prefer it over another, especially if doesn't challenge me or leave a lasting impression.

As a point of illustration - one of my favourites, a G&M Glen Scotia, only rates 81, but it's so interestingly weird that I have a huge soft spot for it. I'm sure others would absolutely hate the acetone and peaches combination, but there's just some "X" factor about it that makes it an unforgettable whisky which, on a given day, I would easily choose over that technically excellent but otherwise uninteresting Speysider that scores 90/100 on merit.

Sometimes the two intersect, though - scoring highly both technically and experience-wise and that for me will always be a great whisky.

I was hoping you would see this discussion @Victor. Thank you for your extended answer and your view on this. Great 3-way-review by the way, had not seen that one. Although I won't make it a habit to be rating that way, because I still have a day job, girlfriend, daughter, house and other non Whisky related activities with friends. But maybe one time, just like you, I'll do one, for the challenge.

@systemdown I can understand how you want to rate objectively, taking into account what is generally likable. But why not rate according to your own preferences. It is your rating isn't it? And  aren't you making notes and scores for your own memories in the first place? (No criticism intended)

@SquidgyAsh Yes this helps. And you are right that time, place and company is a factor in the overall experience. Best would be if a definitive review and rating is made from several tastings. This won't be a problem if I own a bottle, but what if all I have is 6cl sample. And bar samples would be even more unreliable.

I agree with you all that the NTFB is preferable so that we can exchange our views easier. I think I'll use that one as we'll. However, as mentioned in the Dramming.com bit, I'm in doubt wether I want to give them the same weight in the overall score. Are Nose, Palate, Finish and Balance equally important to me?

One other thing is that I appreciate the natural bottlings. I'm thinking about bonus points for CS, Non Chill Filtering And No Coloring.

@wtrstrnghlt, I am very happy that you posted this discussion topic, because the EPISTEMOLOGY of whisky tasting, and the HUGE challenges of effectively COMMUNICATING to others our very subjective experiences with whisky are at the very heart of what we try to do on Connosr. These are tricky and important subjects to discuss. And they can be very touchy subjects as well. People have very strong feelings about what they like and what they do not like.

Another example of depth analysis is to do time studies about how a whisky changes after the bottle is opened. I try to incorporate significant information related to this topic when I have it and it is useful to further understanding of the whisky being reviewed. I believe that I was the first person in Connosr to take this subject seriously and to really start talking about how whiskies change in flavour with air exposure. I am happy to currently see many observations being made by many members which reflect the subtle and not-so-subtle changes in the whiskies over time once you start exposing them to air. Capturing those changes in a very detailed and systematic way requires an INCREDIBLE amount of work and discipline, and turns your one review into, basically, muliple reviews over time. There are several masterpiece reviews written by @systemdown which reflect tasting notes and ratings for the same bottle of whisky at different intervals of time. This is great stuff and I love it, but, just like doing each review in three different formats, the amount of work is so prodigious, that anyone but a professional-whisky-reviewer-scribe-monk would not get many whisky reviews completed in that multiple-time-perspective format....or at the very least, each one would take so much work that the total number completed would be on the order of 10 or 20% of what it otherwise could have been.

I DO understand, what @systemdown was saying about having two different sets of criteria for critical analysis vs. choosing what you like. It IS possible to separate them, and it is something which I do also, as I alluded to above.

For me a good example is Canadian Whisky. I usually rate Canadian Whisky HIGHER THAN I LIKE IT. I just like the combinations of flavours in most Canadian whiskies the least of all of the GENRES of aged whisky which I have sampled. That said I want to be fair in evaluating them, despite not being attracted to their typical flavours. So what I usually do when reviewing Canadian whiskies is to give two sets of scores, one, for comparing them with all whiskies and a second set of scores comparing them within the universe only of other Canadian products. Even the "all whisky" scores I give still retain a bit of a bias giving more credit and higher scores to those Canadian whiskies than would reflect what I would usually be attracted to drink.

The subject at hand, though, is not Canadian whiskies, but in how you do justice to communicating your impressions and your preferences.

An example for me on the other side, that of grading LOWER than I like it, is Old Grand-Dad 114. The wood flavours could be much better than they are on Old Grand-Dad 114. So, critically, it rates 87 from me (I could justify 88). BUT this is one hilariiously fun whisky, and the flavours are so big that I really don't care that the wood is so-so, and there is no orderly and beautiful finish present. For fun and in an exuberant mood, this is easily a 95 whisky for me.

So, @wtrstrnghlt, as clumsy as it sometimes is, the attempt by someone like @systemdown or by me to do our best to rate a whisky DIVORCED from WHAT WE LIKE is an honest attempt to take into consideration the differing realities and preferences of OTHERS. It is well-intentioned, even though it is sometimes a bit clumsy.

@Victor I wouldn't dare to call you or @systemdown clumsy :)

I have the utmost respect for people like you and a few others who have educated me over the last year here on Connosr. It is those objective reviews that are indeed telling us some extra about a bottle.

Same goes for the development over time in a bottle. And like said earlier, also time, place and company is of influence in the experience. A good review tells me something about this development and thus is a review based on multiple drams.

Therefore I decided to 'capture' these moment in time early on in my 'whisky journey', by decanting several 10cl bottles. Not all at once, but at different stages in the life of a bottle. If I remember correctly, you even suggested this in the discussion I started on this topic. I'm almost at the end of my A'Bunadh batch 42, it was opened February 2013, but I think every new dram I take is the best one so far. Really sad to see this one go.

However I would still like to hear from others what their thoughts are. As some people don't rate 4x up to 25, but a single score for the overall experience. And how about the weight of the 4 components

My method of scoring goes along with what Squidgy Ash said above. I would go for a range of 65 to 91-92 considering overall evaluation, but I can't use the 4 components method. I can describe nose, taste and finish with simple words, but not score them. And yes mood makes all the difference! Here's an example: Once I tried the Laphroaig 10 yo and thought it was so bad I left some in the glass!! I wrote a review and gave it a 55.Then I tried it again about 6-8 months later and it was amazing. It had me thinking of sea breeze and beach party fires, I felt ashes in my mouth...then I had to fix my review and give a higher mark. Have fun exploring....

Reading this thread has been thoroughly enjoyable. The insight and wisdom in the posts are brilliant, and they're absolutely devoid of judgment or criticism. Wonderful stuff, and the thoughtful discussion has reaffirmed for me why I still don't rate whiskies.

Some years ago I dismissed ratings by any reviewer. I considered them so subjective that I found little value in the words or scores. I began to force myself to better understand my interpretation of "the standard" of a few well known reviewers, but I still find their words so very different from my impressions of a given whisky.

Serge, for example, used the phrase, "clean wet dog" in his review of the first Kilkerran Work in Progress. Having never given a dog a bath, I didn't have the experience to let me "get" that.

The numbers, too, are useless to me. One of my perennial favorites usually gets ratings between 75 and 79 by the professionals so I don't let their perceptions sway me when I'm deciding which whisky to buy next. Alternatively, many rate one particular Ardbeg in the mid-90s. It's my least favorite Ardbeg.

Since there are so many sources for reviews and ratings I've come to think that somebody relatively new to whisky might feel a sort of "need" to rate each expression they try. It seems to have become one of the rites of passage for membership in the society. From my vantage it seems to add a certain pressure or expectation that just doesn't need to exist.

A sort of contemporary philosophy about being "good" at something (anything) suggests you have to have done that "thing" at least 10,000 times. Serge surpassed his 9,000th spirit review this year so he's nearly ready to be good at it. I've only recently tasted my 400th single malt Scotch whisky so I've a l-o-n-g way to go. I'm actually too wound up in the enjoyment to put much thought into ratings.

@wtrstrnghlt You're welcome to call me clumsy, by all means, be my guest! I see what you're saying in that yes, as I'm the one reviewing, my natural biases would be included to a certain extent and hence my reviews can never be truly objective. However as @Victor points out (in his typically eloquent and succint style) - the point that I failed to make myself - is that by attempting to separate out my bias it IS an act of well-intentioned moderation which aims to take into account the readership of a potentially wider audience and maybe, just maybe, produce a review that contains enough objective elements as to paint enough of a picture to inform on whether it's something that may appeal to them or not.

Of course, there is no telling if my review approach has been successful and I may never know (although @Victor's misplaced use of the word "masterpiece" in describing my time course reviews gives me some encouragement! Thank you.. you're far too kind) - but as a model, it works for me presently and as long as the outcome is also useful to someone else I will continue to do it (keeping in mind - "all models are wrong, but some are useful" - George. E. Box).

And on this discussion of review models - @wtrstrnghlt I encourage you to do all those things that you wish to try and see what works for you e.g. in weighting your review components as you mentioned, and also the inclusion of extra parameters to factor into your final scores, as you see fit. There's nothing that says your reviews should be compatible with anyone else's or against any kind of "de-facto" format (there is no universal "truth" after all) - and I know that you know this already, but I really would enjoy seeing some new review formats being published here on Connosr. Who knows, this community may invent the next "de-facto" review style that will be taken up by the "professional" reviewers out there (not that such should ever be used as a yardstick of the "right" way to do something mind you).

I also appreciate @two-bit-cowboy's take on things - nobody should feel compelled to review whiskies, ever. It should never form the basis of credibility although it does seem to be the case "out there" e.g. when you think about the Jim Murrays and the Serge Valentins of this world who have sampled thousands upon thousands of whiskies.

As for myself, reviewing is a personal challenge and a way to occupy myself in a pursuit directly related to my love and appreciation of whisky. That a written record of my whisky adventures is created is secondary and also allows me to share my thoughts, however valid or invalid, with anyone who is interested. When whisky is your primary hobby, it is seldom tiresome and never a "chore" (I would quit if that ever happened).

And a final thought - whisky, like life itself, is not significant. We don't need to go out of our way to make it so; although if some of us choose to indulge, to fill that time from the present until our end, with meaningless pursuits like reviews of whisky - then so be it. As long as we had a good time doing it.