While its author likes to call it a ‘vlog’, we’re quite happy that it should sit amongst our favourite blogs. Anyone who spends time perusing the whisky web will be familiar with the flat-capped Glaswegian-in-exile, Ralf Mitchell – or, Ralfy, as he prefers to go by.
His two-hundred-and-fifty-and-counting(!) video reviews and discussions of whisky speak eloquently of his love and respect for the water of life. He’ll regale you with distilling anecdotes as a dram opens up in the glass, then give comprehensive and thoughtfully considered reviews that never fail to feel like a fireside chat. Ralfy takes you into his confidence with each review, sharing secrets and opinions (of which he’s plenty), and has the happy knack of making each vlog akin to a conversation with a friend. The lack of artifice or hauteur is a joy, and he demonstrates time and again that an enthusiastic amateur can contribute with the best of them.
His well-populated YouTube channel provides the material for his comprehensive list of whisky reviews and marks, and to cap it all he’s a separate blog. His ideas for distillers include some real gems that distillery managers would do well to adopt, and such a lively range of inventive suggestions that it’s hard not to think he should be managing a distillery himself! We should all be thankful for the shoulder injury that kept him from his day job (as an undertaker), eventually driving him to record the first video review, of Glen Breton. His pragmatic enthusiasm and palpable love for whisky are wonderful to see.
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