Sporting wildly curling hair and freckles most can guess what my heritage is. Finding out that my last name is Hart and my first name is Gaelic for Catherine it becomes even more obvious. Although it might date back to when my ancestors came over in the potato famine, I have always been connected with my Irish roots.
So for St. Patrick’s Day, what better way to water those roots than to drink one of the drinks of my people: Irish whiskey.
Irish whiskey, or usige beatha as it’s called in Gaelic, differs from other forms of whiskey because it is distilled three times instead of the typical twice for Scotch whiskey. Irish whiskey as a result typically has a smoother finish due to not using peat, which gives Scotch whiskey a smoky flavour.
Drinks are usually picked on the basis of taste profile and previous experience, not silly things like names. Flipping through an issue of LCBO’s Food and Drink magazine, I came across an Irish whiskey named Writer’s Tears. No, it is not actually made with the tears of writers.
As a journalism student, I have vivid memories of long nights staring at my keyboard trying to formulate sentences with no luck. Writer’s block is an occupational hazard in my line of work.
I could see it now: me slaving over an article, deep in the night, with a glass of Writer’s Tears by my side to aide the process. Talk about good marketing.
Not to mention the fact that I feel like crying many times while writing out of sheer frustration, so Writer’s Tears is a spot on name for a whiskey.
Typically I am not much a whiskey person, I am a beer girl through and through. But for this I made an exception. As a writer, and a person of Irish decent, I simply had to at least try it.
The one set back: one bottle ran for $50, not really in my student budget.
Apparently my constant yammering about this wonderful Irish whiskey paid off, because under the Christmas tree was none other than Writer’s Tears.
The poet in me loved the fact that written on the label was a little poem “I traded my tomorrow to remain in yesterday, whiskey tears are falling here and each one cries another day.”
This poem is likely inspired by the fact that many Irish writers indulged in whiskey as a means to help with writer’s block. It was said if they cried their tears would be made of whiskey.
The bouquet, to use a wine term, of the whiskey is of vanilla, butterscotch, and a hint of citrus.
I took cues from watching my dad sip scotch and swilled the whiskey, sniffing at various intervals. Whiskey, especially the expensive stuff, is something to be savoured.
The whiskey goes down with a caramel smooth flavour and a hint of honey.
For those like me who want to live out their inner Irish poet, this is the drink to have by your side. And if nothing else the name will give all writers a chuckle.
