Canadian Club 100% Rye

I'm still looking for good, affordable, available whiskey and it's hard to get more affordable than this. Canadian Club's 100% rye is distilled at Alberta Distillers (the distillery that makes most of the Canadian rye available in the US - Whistlepig, Masterson's, Jefferson's, Alberta Premium Dark Batch, etc.). This one comes from the actual owner of the distillery: Beam Suntory, and I picked it up for a whopping $13.

Canadian Club 100% Rye, 40% abv ($13)

The nose is botanical with lots of herbal notes and some honey sweetness. The palate is very light with some black tea, a very slight mint note and pepper leading into a peppery finish.  Overall it's quite bland.

This is a very light and soft compared to the bold mint and pickle notes in the American bottlings of Alberta rye. My guess would be that this is a blend. (You can have a 100% rye blend because Canadian blends combine base whiskies distilled to a very high proof with lower proof, more flavorful whiskeys). This could even be one of those base whiskeys. There's just not much to it. The saving grace is that I'm only out $13, as opposed to the $85 I frittered away on the WhistlePig Farmstock.

Whiskey Wednesday: Drink Like Draper

If you're a fan of Mad Men, then you know that the preferred tipple of Don Draper, when he's not out at a bar drinking Old Fashioneds, is Canadian Club. Founded by Hiram Walker, Canadian Club has a long and storied history, but is now owned by an American company, Beam Global. While it might have been a premium sip in the '60s, these days, Canadian Club is a pretty standard Canadian Whisky which retails for around $12.

Is Don onto something? Is this the whisky you want in your office bar? Let's see.

Tasting

Canadian Club, 6 years old, 40% abv.

The nose is light and sweet with honey. This is very sweet stuff even for a Canadian. The flavors are honey and flowers with some hay and grass. There is a bit of metallic bitterness on the finish along with apple juice.

This might have been the stuff in Draper's time, but it's too sweet for me. Luckily for the denizens of this century, we have a lot more whisky to choose from.