BalvenieGem

Sweet!!

ScotchNSniff found themselves on a last minute adventure last week to the Hill Center at the Old Naval Hospital just down the street from the Capitol building in DC. This Balvenie master class was a fun tasting as always but the more interesting things that happened had little to do with whisky and everything to do with people. 🙂

As we do at most whisky events in DC, we ran into Jennifer Holm and her crew from Momentum Worldwide. Momentum is the branding agency that Balvenie uses in the DC area and they do a great job hosting events like this. The last event we enjoyed with them had Monkey Shoulder spiked hot apple cider and this time we were greeted through the doors with a small Balvenie 12 cocktail. [I don’t remember the specific cocktail but it was TASTY! -Sniff]

The hors d’oeuvres were also delicious. A specific standout was the miniature BLTs! Bacon and small pieces of greens inside of a cherry tomato! What genius!

We enjoyed these cocktails and finger foods with some local friends also! Peat from Whisky + Architecture was there and so was DCWhiskey!

(Scotch, DCWhiskey, and Peat)

The giant reason this class even existed (and the whole reason we went) was the new east coast brand ambassador for Balvenie! Gemma Paterson! Her and her husband have moved to the big apple all the way from their home in Scotland! She’s as geeky about whisky as David Laird was so though we’ll certainly miss David, we know he’ll be having even more fun on the west coast.

Gemma’s never met a scotch she doesn’t like and her favorite happens to be the Balvenie 12 thanks to some awesome childhood memories. Her backstory is as fun and interesting as David’s and should you get the chance, do ask her about it.

She came to teach a class knowing that everyone had already been to whisky tasting classes before so she didn’t waste any time talking about the basics. Instead we dove into the science of whisky creation and nosing and nose blindness and water! It was really refreshing to get such detail both about whisky and the ghost at Balvanie’s malting floor (lol!).