You can’t blame the Canadians for this crap, at least not completely. There’s a team of clowns in Oregon who water it down and put it into bottles, too. I would blame them first, despite how this spirit was distilled and aged in Canada. Even the Hood River Distillers’ website is more interested in peddling belt buckles and talking about the rodeo they sponsor than pitching their awful whisky. Though there is a whole lot of info about their team of models, it all seems to say, “Don’t ask us about the quality of whisky you’re drinking. You and I both know it’s awful. Could we maybe offer you a free softcore boner, instead?”
The word blended on the label doesn’t mean the same thing it means on US whisky labels. In Canada, they use a higher proof neutral spirit than US law allows, so when they push it over the border, the US law also dictates that they must label it blended. If you ask me, style is a scapegoat that Canadian distillers hide behind when they make the purely economic decision to cram more spirit into a cask, because that’s what it really boils down to; a cask at 190 proof will yield more 80 proof bottles than a cask of 160 proof will.
Nose: Strawberry wart remover. Lots of ethanol and aftershave. Sandalwood, pine sap, chlorine and gunpowder. If you’ve ever gone camping in the desert this smells a little bit like that desert funk that comes home in your clothes. Rancid macadamia nuts. Some maple syrup if you water it down.
Palate: Wart remover again. Spent cigar butts. This is what I imagine tumbleweed tastes like. Pool water cut with moo goo gai pan. Pine sap and a weird, woody taste. Numbing like Listerine with Murphy’s Oil Soap that sticks around after you finish drinking it.
This one gives me mental heartburn. I would rather listen to ten hours of that nasally, DayGlo shrew, Nicki Minaj, prattle on about how obsessed she is with pink glitter than ever drink this again.
