Recently, Irish whiskey has been returning to prominence after decades of spending time in the whiskey doldrums. One of it’s current key players is Writer’s Tears, distilled by Walsh Whiskey. In this instalment of the Five After Five, we’ll outline the top 5 (at the time of writing) Writers Tears whiskey expressions.

Right or Write?

Just a thought:  What if we used write instead of right?

You’d be write as rain. You’d give your write arm for something. You’d be write back. You’d get off on the write foot. You’d have your heart in the write place. The customer would always be write.

(Sudden and unexpected tangent coming…)

Now, the world has read the works and words of many incredibly talented Irish writers (no doubt you can clearly see that I’m neither. Am I write or am I write?). In fact, George Bernard Shaw is repeatedly quoted: “Whisky is liquid sunshine.” Of course, he also did say: “Aw, crap.” after knocking his dram over that one time.  Which would have led to real or metaphorical tears.

(Point finally arriving…)

Here’s the thing:  Ireland has given us a lot of these two delicious exports – writers and whiskey. It only seemed the write thing to do was blend both together. And that’s what happened when Walsh Whiskey launched Writer’s Tears Whiskey in 1999.

(Sudden disclosure coming…)

Before you right off this article as completely subjective, let me agree with you that you’re write: My taste buds are apologetically subjective and Canadian.*

So far, all of Writer’s Tears whiskies are NAS expressions. However, every expression is distilled in pot stills exclusively. Bernard Walsh’s objective with Writer’s Tears was to look waaayyyy back to the 1800’s and how Irish whiskey was done then – hence the absence of column still distilled grain spirits. While most Tears triple distilled blends made up of single malt and single pot still, there’s more for you to explore with the finishes: Cognac, American oak, French oak, Mizunara, and Marsala casks are used for Tears’ current lineup of six whiskeys.

(Sudden other disclosure coming…)

Marasala casks sit in a warehouse

Walsh Whiskey is non-distiller producer.  They have divested themselves from their distillery.  This may be a point of contention for some and that’s cool.  However, it’s written on Tears’ front labels that the whiskey was: “Distilled, matured and bottled in bond for Walsh Whiskey.”

The Last Word

And to think, I wrote an article about Writer’s Tears and made it all the way through with one reference to Ozzy or Wooderson.

*Renaud hasn’t received any Writer’s Tears samples, full size or otherwise to sample for this article or any past or future whiskey endeavour. But if some were to show up unannounced in a plain wrapped box on his doorstep, he wouldn’t ask any questions, write?

Cheers.

– Renaud Timson