The year is young, but Gadzooks we think the award for whisky idiocy has already been earned. Behold this lede to a column: “Canadian whisky has enjoyed a noble reputation for quality ever since Hiram Walker founded his distillery in Walkerville, Ont., in 1858. But it was Canada’s ignoble supplying of bootleggers such as Al Capone during American Prohibition, from 1920 to 1933, that firmly established our country’s reputation for fine whisky.” This is exactly backwards. For a time, Americans were fooled into thinking the thin whisky made with lots of neutral grain spirit by Hiram Walker, the Bronfmans, and the rest was fine stuff. But consumers wised up and now today mostly heap scorn on Canadian whisky, feeling rightly that it is third rate swill. That said, Canadian whisky is making a comeback, thanks to smaller producers making good whisky. But on the whole, few Americans (or English men, or Irishmen, or…) would choose a glass of Canadian whisky over Bourbon, Soctch, or irish. Canadian whisky assuredly is not possesed of a “noble reputation.” Read more in this January 26, 2012 Victoria Times < a href=”http://www.timescolonist.com/life/Canadian+whisky+deserves+good+name/6054242/story.html”>http://www.timescolonist.com/life/Canadian+whisky+deserves+good+name/6054242/story.html.
