Tasting as art, science, and commercial enterprise — from flavor wheels to the chemistry of a good pour.
The tasting wheel is bourbon’s borrowed language. The format was popularized by Scotch and wine — Dr. Ann C. Noble’s Wine Aroma Wheel (1984) is the ancestor — and now we can barely describe coffee, chocolate, beer, or bourbon without one. The Council of Whiskey Masters publishes an official Bourbon Flavor Wheel; its hallmarks are caramel, vanilla, brown sugar, clove, cherry cola, and sweet corn.
Anyone can write tasting notes. The first rule of the craft: don’t say “smooth.”
The 100-point scale dominates spirits judging — a habit borrowed from wine and Robert Parker’s influence in the 1980s, adopted to feel familiar and translate across beverages. Competitions like the San Francisco World Spirits Competition split their 100 points across nose, palate, and finish, and lean on blind tasting to keep it honest.
During fermentation, distillation, and aging, a whiskey develops a wide range of flavor compounds. Yeast throws off esters (fruit), aldehydes and ketones, while the charred barrel contributes phenols, vanillin, and oak lactones over years of seasonal expansion and contraction. Together they build the complexity a good tasting note tries — without saying “smooth” — to name.
Beyond the glass, taste is also commerce: taste-makers, rankings, and marketing shape what we chase as much as the liquid does. Which brings us, inevitably, to the hunt.