Damblat 15 year old Armagnac
FUI
So, you’re driving along in your car, minding your own business when you see the flashers go off behind you in your rear view mirror. You pull your ’98 neon over to the side of the road, turn down your favorite kid rock song playing on your car stereo and you wait for the officer to appear beside you asking for your license. You have a couple minutes while you’re waiting for that officer and you start to contemplate life, which leads you to thinking; ‘did I miss that last stop sign?’ or ‘do i have my seatbelt on?’ or ‘was I speeding?’ or, naturally you think to yourself ‘oh shit!!’ and you instantly scramble around your glove compartment looking for that quarter ounce of royal Turkish cream. ‘fuck fuck fuck!’ you murmur to yourself as you start to sweat, and your adrenaline starts to pump you into a frantic flurry of searching in a desperate attempt to find your 7 grams of imported black hash.
The moments pass. All in the course of thirty seconds the realization, denial and then imminent acceptance that you’re going to be taking part in a lot of non-consensual prison sex because you got busted with a little smoke. But your thirty seconds are up. you found that little baggy, smile as you pull out that glistening piece of spicy euphoria and pop it right in your mouth. Chew twice and make a big painful swallow. That hash came right from a Turkish peddler from the storage room of a convenience store. It just cost you 200$, there’s no way you’re going to get pinched with that, let alone waste it.
You roll down your window and grimace as you swallow the last bit of your cold coffee and hand the police officer your registration before receiving a long winded chat about your license plate being too faded before being released and you go on with life grateful that Canada hires lazy police officers. You go home, pick up the phone and tell work you’re not coming in for the next couple days as you sit in front of the television giggling at an old documentary about the Cambodian killing fields and stuffing your face with takeout pizza.
That’s what you expect to happen when you down a piece of hash the size of your thumb. Same goes for….
Third wave jackass revivalist known only as mrs. Zhao was stopped by customs as she was flying en-route to Beijing. On her way home, she decided to pick up an extra old bottle of cognac, duty free. Who could blame her, duty free cognac is cheaper than retail, convenient and it’s delicious! Unfortunately for mrs. zhao, flight authorities informed her that the bottle was too big to be carried on to the flight, so they would have to confiscate the bottle or she could drink it(which is the gag answer). at the duty free, the bottle was priced for roughly 200 american dollars. American dollars! not those worthless poopoo dollars like Canadian dollars or Australian dollars(eww). American dollars, the ones that carry trace amounts of cocaine in their very fabric. Thems the money dollars.
Mrs. Zhao did the unexpected; she refused to waste precious spirit and in the words of NWA said ‘fuck the Beijing border customs, purchases and flight authority’ and gave them a metaphorical double middle finger and she drank that bottle of cognac, right in the airport security line. She was reported to have drank 750 mL of brandy in half an hour.
Just as you might imagine, like the time you had to eat all your drugs before you got busted by the police, and you ended up high for a couple days, mrs. Zhao, too, would not sustain the effects of double-missile-drop-kicking her guts by chugging a bottle of brandy.
Mrs. Zhao very quickly became erratic, hostile, unpredictable and violent before becoming quite sleepy, lethargic, then out right unconscious. Jet lag, am I right people? Eh?
Mrs. Zhao was informed that she was far too intoxicated to fly after showing possible signs of air-rage so, her family was contacted and she was escorted back home, with a paper bag being filled with her last duty free purchase, I’m sure.
All in all, the $200 was wasted, as was mrs. Zhao. However, she could have saved herself $100 just by switching from the ever popular cognac, to the underrated, unpopular and ever so superior Armagnac. In the 15 – 30 year range, in my experience, Armagnac is of higher regard than cognac. This bottle of damblat is of no exception.
Alc. 40%
Nose:
At first whiff, bruised banana and wood, leading off to some dank notes. After some much needed airing, the nose is of decomposed forest notes; turned earth, forest floor and mushrooms. There are some fantastic rotten fruit notes, leather, rubber and linen closet with some cigar tobacco. Perfume, vanilla and cedar make up some of the treble notes. Steeped saffron.
Palate:
A confusing, wonderful and unexpected mix of burnt wood, rotten berries, cola, exotic spice, fresh earth and bitter vegetation. Theres a light and uplifting bubblegum taste. Complex and pleasing with a smooth, long finish.
Overall:
Fantastic. Not to be missed.
Please note:
Armagnac is an aged spirit based on wine. The wine is produced from white grapes that do not make good wine, but rather distill well and are better suited for brandies.
Quite often, in the case of Armagnac we purchase in north America, wines are sourced out from farmers and distilled once in a column type of still and aged in limousine region French oak. The resulting brandy is often switched from barrel to barrel as the aging process continues. The first barrels used may be virgin or first fill barrels, which are then dumped into more used barrels, so not to impart too much oak on the flavor of the brandy. The barrels are never ‘topped up’ with younger brandy.
The collection of sourced, distilled and aged wines are then blended and bottled with a ‘house’ name(brand) and sold to the spirits market. Spirits obtained in this manner are often marked ‘negociant’. There are not many Armagnac houses that produce their own wine for distillation.
Often referred to as gangly and undesirable, Armagnac finds itself becoming superior at the 15 year age statement. At the 15 year age point, it is widely remarked that Armagnac can champion cognac.
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