I Only Used to Drink Bourbon. This Approachable Scotch Made Me a Whisky Fan
I grew up in a whiskey household, but Scotch always felt like it existed on a different, higher plane. Partially, it was its place in media—always in the hands of cartoonish fat-cat businessmen or else dangerously attractive, vaguely immoral sitcom urbanites of the Barney Stinson or Jeff Winger variety. But mostly, it was because my dad, the house’s whiskey drinker, simply preferred bourbon.
My parents settled in Suffolk, VA, near the Great Dismal Swamp, and while not natural southerners, they quickly fit into the community, sharing old fashioneds with other church deacons at the local “elevated” southern restaurant. I was brought up attending the old church, the old academy, and eventually Washington and Lee University. I had the background of a southern gentleman, destined to be a consummate bourbon drinker.
Despite growing up that way, I never totally felt at home within the southern milieu and bourbon crowd. While it was true that Suffolk was my home, it wasn’t my choice. It was my dad’s destination, but my starting place. In order to build a personality and palate that stood up to his, I would have to strike out on my own.
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After three years at Washington and Lee, I left for the University of St. Andrews in Scotland with a hard commitment to two things: writing as much as I could and converting myself from a bourbonite to a Scotch drinker. There was only one problem: I didn’t actually like Scotch at all.
Not like I gave myself a great place to start. My entry point was a sampler pack of Islay whiskeys that proved oppressively smokey and swampy to me at the time. Rushing immediately into peaty Scotch is like rushing into postmodern avant-garde literature without a grounding in something a little milder. You’re likely to gag on your first shot.
Things improved when I got over my initial shyness and desire to drink alone. Instead, I learned to drink at the ancient local pub, The Keys, which offered more than 300 different whisky expressions and boasted itself as “the best pub in Scotland.”
They were gracious in spite of my American accent, though maybe a bit condescending and sarcastic. Eventually, after sputtering through the recommendations I found from a Google search for “best real Scotch to try Scotland,” the bartender eventually suggested I try The Balvenie 12-Year First Fill Single Barrel, a relatively new arrival. I immediately connected. The Scotch was sweeter, lighter, and more approachable than most. It lacked fruit-centric flavors of a sherry-aged whiskey, yet retained the smoky dark depths that makes Scotch alluring.
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What was the secret? It was aged and drawn from first-fill bourbon casks, creating a Scotch that's as close to bourbon as it gets. Maybe I should've been insulted by the pointed connection to my past, the implicit clocking of my accent, but what would be the point? The whisky was damn good, anyway.
Bottled at 47.8 percent ABV with no-chill filtration, The Balvenie 12-Year First Fill Single Barrel's presentation is deceptively light, the amber almost looking clear in the glass. On the nose, the main notes are honey mixed with malt. But even in a Glencairn, it’s subtle enough that it borders on gentle.
While the nose is sweet, the whisky is more bitter on the palate, with a subtle, dark chocolate roundness to it—the essential Scotch darkness turned palatable. It’s ultimately still a sweet dram, as the honey and vanilla notes from bourbon casks come through on the finish and blossom even more with water or ice.
While the First Fill Single Barrel initially went out of production in 2022, The Balvenie brought it back for fall 2024. Even without the benefit of nostalgia, it’s still one of the best whiskeys to bridge that gap between America and Scotland, bourbon and Scotch.
Priced at $80, The Balvenie isn’t something I drink daily—especially on a New York budget—but it’s less expensive than comparable first-fill bourbon-barrel Scotches like the 12-year single malt from The Irishman. At the price point, it’s a good mix between the more traditional Balvenie palate and the bourbon flavor I grew up with, and one that appeals to drinkers on either side of the divide.
I left Scotland when my time was up and got my degree back at Washington and Lee. I tooled around Virginia for a while, and reconsidered Scotland, but ended up in New York, once again attempting to set my place and find my palate.
My life started because my dad was a northern transplant in the South, and now that I’m a southern transplant in the north, I still drink bourbon most of the time. But when I have the money and occasion to drink Scotch like a real metropolitan urbanite— vaguely immoral, dangerously attractive, or otherwise— The Balvenie is my Scotch of choice.
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