When single-malts were a novel idea

[kiltedsawyer]

Several years ago my favorite way to enhance cheap blends was to make it a Rusty Nail - add Drambuie. It is a nice drink, but clearly not for every day.

Only because the Drambuie is so expensive, (it costs more than Dewars,) Drambuie is still my favorite with blended scotch. I have read recently that a Rusty Nail was Frank Sinatra's drink of choice,..................he could afford it.

Cheers,

David

[Troglodyte]

Only because the Drambuie is so expensive, (it costs more than Dewars,) Drambuie is still my favorite with blended scotch. I have read recently that a Rusty Nail was Frank Sinatra's drink of choice,..................he could afford it.

Cheers,

David

A teaspoonful of heather honey mixed into a dram is the simple alternative to Drambuie - and with equal measures of hot water it makes a delicious hot toddy.

And it cures all ailments known to man, I believe...

[MacKenzie]

A teaspoonful of heather honey mixed into a dram is the simple alternative to Drambuie - and with equal measures of hot water it makes a delicious hot toddy.

And it cures all ailments known to man, I believe...

Add a squeeze of lemon and we called that a Bee Sting when I was in college.

And it was my grandmother's go-to for cold, cough, runny nose, etc. Mind you, there was never any "hard likker" in grandma's house, but when someone got a cold, cough, runny nose, etc. some mysteriously appeared.

[BobF]

One of the less expensive (roughly $25 here in Connecticut) blends that I enjoy is Islay Mist. Not nearly as peaty as most of the delectable Islay single malts, but there is a detectable amount of smoke.

I’ve been tempted to try dropping one of those charred oak spirals I see on eBay into the bottle of Famous Grouse. Anyone have any experience with doing such a thing?

[stickman]

I turned a white oak dowel about .50 inch dia. with a .125 bore. It was long enough to reach the bottom of the bottle with about 1 inch extra, bore stopped .5" from the end. I then chard the outside. Drilled a .5" hole through the cork and cap. Inserted into a bottle of affordable stuff and left for about six weeks it improved the taste. So my nephew clamed, I couldn't wait that long.

[stickman]

Some of the comments on this thread got me remembering long forgotten tipples. North Carolina has state controlled liquor stores. South Carolina does not. Just across the state line there is a place called FRUGAL MAC DUGALS. Now FRUGALS prices are way cheaper than the state stores. When they first opened the state stores sales in Charlotte went down about 20%. Now at that time there was a law in North Carolina if you bought more than a gallon you had to get a transport pass from the state store. If you didn't have a pass and you got pulled over you were charged with bootlegging. The police set up a sting at FRUGALS, one would watch people to see how much they had and as soon as they crossed back in to North Carolina they got busted. The main office I worked out of was in Charlotte I had standing orders from the guys in the band to get them a bit of good stuff of their choice, whenever I was down that way. One of them was a blend called Desmond and Duff, it was quite good, but is no longer available. Needless to say I had way over the limit. So what I would do was drive down into South Carolina stop and eat lunch, then take a back road to the office. I don't know if that law is still in effect, but a lot of people got busted.

[BobF]

We had/have something similar here in New England, but in reverse. The State New Hampshire liquor stores are cheaper than the stores here in Connecticut, and New Hampshire has no sales tax. There are stores right over the border and right off the highway, and reports were that Connecticut tax officials would sit in the New Hampshire parking lots watching for cars with CT license plates.

What makes things even worse here in CT are some absolutely arcane liquor sales laws that limit what is available by county (even though CT hasn’t had county governments since about 1963). The only Scottish pub in Connecticut is here in my hometown. Dave, the pub owner, has been unable to get certain whiskys, like Talisker Storm, from his distributor in months. I can find it on the retail shelves locally, but he is not allowed to buy it from a retailer and serve it in the pub. Even worse, the next town over is in a different county, and the distributors there carry brands he’d like to serve (I think Bunnahabhain is one) but they can’t distribute here. It’s frustrating.