Celebrate Robbie Burns with an approachable single malt

Nae man can tether time or tide.

– Robbie Burns.

As usual the Ploughman Poet is right. We are approaching his 256th birthday.

If you haven’t noticed, Burns is a poet who inspires an extraordinary amount of adulation. As far as I know there aren’t any “Keats nights” celebrated in Canada. Mind you Keats only wrote odes to pots and what not. Burns had the great good sense to rejoice in food and drink.

There will be a number of celebrations of his birth between here and February. His birthday is Jan. 25 but the celebrations tend to be scheduled up to two weeks on either side of this. Sons of Scotland in Regina held their party last week on the 17th. Bushwakker Pub has an evening worth attending on the 24th.

Part of the reason for Burns’ enduring popularity is his love of scotch and haggis. (And before you sniff at haggis, it’s a sausage, and I don’t know about you but I’ve never met one I didn’t like.) If you can’t make it down to the various celebrations, lift a glass to Burns this weekend.

A good place to start is Laphroaig Quarter Cask. It’s a cask strength whisky (48 per cent) that has gone through two barreling regimes to mellow and tame it.

Laphroaig is a fairly extreme set of flavours, beloved by peat addicts. Quarter Cask keeps Laphroaig’s seaborne aromas of smoke and iodine, but the palate is a little tamer than some of the Laphroaig portfolio. It still has that famed peat but it is more approachable. If you’re new to single malts or just looking to branch out, this is a good place to start. Laphroaig Quarter Cask. $70 **** More wine in Monday’s paper and as always on Twitter @drbooze.