Whisky - The Wandering Palate

Nothing quite like a wee dram on a cold winter’s night in Melbourne. Starward is a new brand, the latest addition to the growing number of Australian whisky producers, and I came across it due to one of my many personal failings. As the wise people say, the definition of a gentleman is someone who knows how to play the bagpipe, but doesn’t. The Production Manager of New World Distillery, Ian Thorn is accordingly not a gentleman; nor am I. He did however furnish me with a sample and a tour of the distillery. Read More >

Buying Wine, Produce | Related to: Australian Whisky, New World Distillery, Starward, Whisky |

Andrew Jefford shares his pain and an anaesthetic to the tortures of flying long-haul economy. Read More >

Travel | Related to: Economy, Travel, Whisky |

From a lost play by Eubulos, (c.405 BC - c.335 BC)
‘For sensible men I prepare only three kraters (large vase used to mix wine): one for health (which they drink first), the second for love and pleasure, and the third for sleep. After the third one is drained, wise men go home.

The fourth krater is not mine any more - it belongs to bad behaviour; the fifth is for shouting; the sixth is for rudeness and insults; the seventh is for fights; the eighth is for breaking the furniture; the ninth is for depression; the tenth is for madness and unconsciousness.’

"In many ways, the work of a critic is easy. We risk very little yet enjoy a position over those who offer up their work and their selves to our judgment. We thrive on negative criticism, which is fun to write and to read.

But the bitter truth we critics must face is that, in the grand scheme of things, the average piece of junk is more meaningful than our criticism designating it so. But there are times when a critic truly risks something, and that is in the discovery and defence of the new.”

As uttered by the vitriolic restaurant critic Anton Ego, in the film “Ratatouille”, after his epiphany.