A moment to myself with some “Dew”

Tullamore Dew Irish Whiskey

The Daily Pour (or sip in this case): It has been a long day of programming, technical documentation, dinner preparation for a three-year-old and covering a wine dinner. It can be fun covering wine dinners. You meet really nice people enjoying themselves and really nice people who actually put the dinner on. I was really impressed with the staff at the Partridge Inn. From the manager to the servers….excellent!
But the bad part of covering a wine dinner is that you see all this great food and wine being served……water, water everywhere but not a drop to drink…. if you know what I mean. I seldom get to participate in an event because of time. Why have a website if you can’t post what you’ve covered quickly. Donna, of Ninth Street did manage to sneak me a taste of the Mount Veeder Cabernet Sauvignon and the Simi Russian River Chardonnay. Both most excellent. I just wished I had an opportunity to try the fried lobster on a stick. It is well known that if you put meat on a stick, even if the meat is lobster meat, and fry it, men will eat it. It’s in our genes. When I was on RAGBRAI in 2000 and 2003, if you fry it, they will come. They were selling fried meat on a stick on the side of the road just about everywhere. I digress.
I made it home by 8:15 where I was greeted by Mr. Ben who decided that grapes were dingleberries and he wanted dingleberry juice. In this case the dingleberry juice was cranberry juice and he managed to spill it all over him and Mrs. Dan, who was working at the computer. Luckily no keyboard or mouse was harmed in this industrial accident.
But it was straight to the bathtub for Mr. Dingleberry. So, why have a website if you can’t post the event in a timely manner? Giving your son a bath and reading him “One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish” is one of life’s best pleasures and quite frankly, more important that posting something on a website.
He’s now sound asleep, Mrs. Dan is sound asleep, I’ve posted the photos and copy from the “Evening on the Verandah Wine Dinner” from the Partridge Inn and it’s me time.
While in San Francisco for the Filemaker Developer’s Conference I took a trolley car ride (the cable cars were full of tourists) to Fisherman’s Wharf where I ventured up to near Ghiradelli Square to the Buena Vista Cafe. They claim to be the American Home of Irish Coffee. Back in July 2005, me and Mrs. Dan stopped there while on vacation/business and had some of their Irish Coffee. I’m not a coffee drinker but I could drink me some of those. We bought an Irish Coffee kit, complete with the little official Buena Vista Irish Coffee glasses and a bottle of their custom labeled Irish Whiskey. Shortly thereafter Mrs. Dan was pregnant with Mr. Ben and alas, not able to drink any of the said whiskey. I was on a mission to purchase her a new bottle to replace the one I pretty much drank by myself (over many months you understand).
But times have changed. The clerk in their gift shop said that they had been importing the same green bottled Irish Whiskey blend since 1955 through an importer in Florida (I still have that bottle… it has the instructions for making Irish Coffee on the back). It was blended and bottled in Ireland by Cooley Distillery. For some reason, the clerk said, the importer stopped importing it and they had to switch to Tullamore Dew in November of 2008. The original whiskey was almost clear. This new whiskey is amber colored. Both are very good. I just poured myself a little bit of what’s left of the original and compared it to the Tullamore Dew. The Dew has a much more pronounced finish, leaving a tingle on your tongue. The original is a bit more smooth, with a more refined flavor. Not to say the Tullamore Dew isn’t refined. There is a difference despite what the clerk said. But once in the Irish Coffee only a purist would know the difference and by the second glass wouldn’t care.
I’m sitting here at the kitchen counter with my trusty Mac laptop, enjoying the end of the day with a new friend, Tullamore Dew. Mission accomplished. I got the new bottle home and me and Mrs. Dan enjoyed a taste of it this past weekend. The old green bottle has the instructions but the kit had an extra bit of info…. how to properly prepare the whipped cream that tops the Irish Coffee. It has to be made days in advance and allowed to come of age in the fridge. Days? Hmm. Not now. I’ll just sip it straight.
From: Tullamore, Ireland
Distillery: Tullamore Dew, established in 1829
Purchased: The Buena Vista Cafe, San Francisco
Cost: $More than I can normally can afford (around $28 plus a damn $20 to Delta Airlines by forcing me to check my @#% luggage)
Size: 1L
Notes: Triple distilled using “the finest grain and purest water. It is then patiently aged in specially seasoned oak casks to full develop its distinctive smoothness. The result is a double gold award winning whiskey with well balanced notes of spice, citrus and caramel.” (plus it is imported by a San Francisco Importer who probably won’t dump them down the road)