14 February 2016

Unboxing a Bruichladdich gift set

I had a lame excuse to buy a gift set of Bruichladdich whisky! 

The excuse was that Chistmas was in the past and all the gift sets were sold out! 

So the only place the Bruichladdich gift set with two glasses was still available was at the Bruichladdich online store.

So that said the order was placed and the waiting started. No that long a anyway! Islay isn't that far away from the Netherlands. 

Ones in the Unboxing can begin. 

Bruichladdich always ensures good quality sturdy boxes to go around either their bottles, or in this case, their gift sets. 


Ones out of the box the gift set is also wrapped well with plenty of bubble wrap! My kids love playing with that stuff and it's way better then styrofoam thingies. I use the universally recognised "thingies" when I have no clue what I'm trying to say. You know those annoying little white balls that stick to everything and go everywhere. So thumbs up for Bruichladdich not using those!


Ones the bubble wrap is unwrapped the gift set is in its original plastic bag.


All in all the box comes out pristine MISB and it is probably better send by Bruichladdich then picked up in a shop where it got damaged by Christmas shoppers. 

MISB is a collectors term for Mint In Sealed Box. When I typed it I had to smile while looking at the color of the Bruichladdich Classic Laddie bottles.


So, to conclude, the way Bruichladdich packages their products is excellent and ensures MISB delivery of your whisky. 

I ones said that supporting my favourite distillery by buying at the distillery itself is a good thing. It is! It feels good and that makes the whisky taste even better! 


5 February 2016

Whisky Bottle Photography

Next to exploring whisky I also have photography as a hobby. 

I took some time today to make photos of two bottles of Caol Ila's and a bottle of Lagavulin. 

Last weekend I already made photo's of a bottle and container of Bruichladdich Laddie Classic_01 

Lagavulin 16 year old


Bruichladdich Classic Laddie Edition_01



Caol Ila 12 Year Old



Noah's Mill Bourbon


Corsair Tripple Smoke Single Malt USA Whiskey


Corsair Tripple Smoke Single Malt USA Whiskey


DenHool Dutch Single Malt


Compass Box Spice Tree


Compass Box Oak Cross


Turv Exloo, Prime Whisky


Buffalo Trace, Experimental Collection


Port Charlotte Valinch

Port Charlotte Valinch

Port Charlotte Valinch

Port Charlotte Valinch




1 February 2016

Nespresso vs Whisky prices

The reason for this blog entry was to find some calculated way to use money spend on daily intakes, by your partner, on coffee as an excuse, a motivation, anything really, to allow you to spend the same amount of money on whisky ;)

There are multiple ways to "motivate" the purchase of a dram based on comparing to coffee price levels. I will try some and see if they "work"!

So first up are the Nespresso drinking partners. 

I want to find out how many cups of Nespresso I, ehm my partner, would need to drink in order to spend just as much money on lets say an Ardbeg 10yo, 700ml. 



In Holland the price of 700ml of Ardbeg 10yo is about €37,50. For 1000ml the price is €51,50. 

At a price of €0,39 per pod the Nespresso can be ordered per 10 pods, €3,90 per 10.


So, at €3,90 per 10 pods, you can buy 13 packages for the price of 1 litre of Ardbeg. That's 130 cups of Nespresso. At 40ml per cup, that works out to a total of 5,2 litres of coffee for each litre of Ardbed. 

Let's see how many servings a bottle of Ardbeg would give. 

Depending on the location a standard serving is anywhere between 20ml and 35ml. So out of a 1000ml bottle one would get between 50 and 28 servings. 

Per glass that would cost you about €1,- to €1,80. 

I was hoping to find a calculated argument that drinking coffee is more expensive then having a dram, but that only works out if you happen to drink 4 cups of coffee a day! 

Hey! Did I just make the argument I was looking for? I .....erm, no no, "my partner" drinks about 6 cups a day! Ok ok! At "her" work it's free ;) argument down the drain! But if she was actually paying for each cup, you could work out an agreement for yourself. 

One could argument democracy and equality. How many weeks would it take for "your partner" to drink 130 cups of Nespresso. 

Let's be modest and say two  Nespressos daily. 130 / 2 is 65 days. So that would mean the break even point would be about bi-monthly for you to buy a bottle of whisky. If "your partner" happens to drink more Nespressos even better! 

Now let's see! I, I mean "my partners" spends €2,- for a cup of coffee each morning while commuting to work. 


At 5 cups per week, 52 weeks a year that works out to 5x52x€2,- = €520,- per year! 

Wow! That kind of money can buy me just about any dram I could think of! This will help me to motivate buying a bottle monthly! Or an expensive one at a lower frequency!

So, here are the morals of this blog! Have "your partner" save money on coffee so you can spend it on whisky! 

Or, encourage your partner to drink more Nespressos and use the "quid pro quo" excuse to motivate a dram or two ;)