Where has Green Spot gone?

[mawhinney]

I am troubled. I have just bought and sampled a bottle of Green Spot (2014 bottling) and it is nothing like the Green Spot that I have known and loved for 20 years. It is a different whiskey altogether. It is sweet, lacking any character and with no length of taste.

I thought: "It's me. Fading memory, advancing years and a romantic view of the past are combining to spoil my current whiskey tasting."
In search of truth, I reached out and unscrewed the cap of a small treasured noggin of the old Green Spot and poured a drop. Yes! This was TRUE Green Spot - rounder on the tongue, filling the mouth with that long lingering after-taste.

What is happening? We are in need of a bench-marking system to ensure that the characteristic and defining taste of a particular whiskey is retained and maintained, and doesn't slide sideways in to becoming something else. We are talking heritage conservation here.

Alas, Green Spot has now dropped off my list of desiderata.

[IrishWhiskeyChaser]

Hi Ken, I am dissappointed to hear. If the naggin in question you mention was from Mitchels tasting a few years back I have one also and I even felt that that had changed a bit from even prior to that.

I too feel that the greenspot has changed, and I don't think I'm being unfair but has changed, verging on dramtically over the last 10 years.

Is it Younger whiskey? Less of the more fuller tasting matured components??? I don't know but I have to agree with your asertion. And it's getting dearer

or maybe it is just a major batch variation ???

Black Bush is another that I feel has been dumbed down too pretty much below it's former glory.

Are they looking to make these more accessible to the masses ???

We'll have to wait and see .... a pity if this is the path it is going to take though.

[Good Whiskey Hunting]

Hi Ken & Adrian,

I hope Fionnán reads this topic, he has been saying this since the new one was launched. I remember Peter Dunne hosted a tasting a few years ago for the society and we had a chance of tasting the new and old side by side.

IDL claimed they were the same product but a first glance the older one was lighter in colour. Caramel was added to give it a more consistent colour. We all thought that the two were different in taste too.

I think Fionnán told me that Green Spot was his first Pot Still Whiskey so he, like yourself Ken, holds it dearly to his heart. We tasted the old one again in March and most would agree that it was different to the newer version.

[mawhinney]

Thank you Adrian and Willie
Unfortunately I missed the pot-still tasting earlier this year and so was unprepared for the shock of drinking the new Green Spot. I do recall the difference between the old GS and the new GS at Peter Dunne's tasting a few years ago but, though discernible, it didn't seem to be as marked as it is now. But it was a very relaxed and enjoyable occasion and this may have had a bearing on my judgement!
Reflections of a wider nature have been prompted by this experience. Redbreast, through its rising price, has now moved from being my every-day drop, to being my weekly pleasure, to being my monthly (almost) treat. So what with Green Spot being metamorphosed into another whiskey, and with Redbreast being slowly priced beyond my reach, it has has brought home the truth of the dictum, "Be careful of what you wish for." For us devotees - over the past decade - our wish for the revival and general availability of Pure (later Single) Pot Still Whiskey is being answered - but with a diabolical twist.
My current wish is that from the multiplicity of new distilleries now being initiated,surely there will emerge a range of Irish pot-still whiskeys, of traditional taste, at the ages of seven, ten and twelve years old, that will be available for every-day sipping. Older pot-still whiskeys would be treat, of course, but I can't wait that long.
Cheers.

[Good Whiskey Hunting]

I find myself just buying a bottle of John's lane when I'm in Dublin. It's cheaper than Redbreast now and I can't get it in Wexford.

I like Writers Tears too, its a good value pot still blend that never disappoints.