The Rob Roy and the Pleasure of Cheap, Delicious, Blended Scotch
Two ways to make the Scotch-forward classic.
Lower-proof January is behind us. Welcome to full-proof February.
We’ll start with a simple, delicious, three-ingredient variation on the Manhattan. If you have the ingredients on hand, you can make this boozy, enticing drink in a minute or two. It will warm up even the coldest winter night.
The drink is the Rob Roy, and it’s just a Manhattan — but with Scotch instead of rye whiskey. Yes, it’s really that simple.
As is often the case, however, simple doesn’t mean slapdash, nor does it mean there are not better and worse versions. Indeed, although this three-ingredient drink is easy to make well, it’s also a cocktail that is surprisingly easy to make badly.
Even more than Manhattans, careless Rob Roys are likely to fail. In the course of testing recipes for this newsletter, I made several that were borderline undrinkable. But a good Rob Roy is sublime.
The good news is, there are multiple ways to make an excellent Rob Roy. As with all such simple classics, there are many permutations, many slight variations, many tips and techniques and supposed hacks to improve your version of the drink. The range of outcomes from the same underlying formula is quite wide. In this week’s newsletter, we’ll look at a pair of Rob Roy specs that work at both high and low price points.
But for the most part, what I want to focus on today is Scotch whiskey. And not just any Scotch, either. No, I want to direct you toward the very good, not-quite-great, surprisingly satisfying, blended, deliciously cheap stuff — and in particular, a single brand: Famous Grouse.
That’s because the Rob Roy is, above all, a cocktail that benefits from your choice of Scotch. And while there are certainly expensive versions that work quite well, this is a drink that demonstrates the virtues of a well-chosen bottle of affordable, available, unshowy whiskey (or, in the case of scotch, whisky without an “e”). What’s remarkable is how unusual such offerings have become.
Where Has All the Good Cheap Whiskey Gone?
The world of American whiskey is currently in the throes of an obsession with single-cask, barrel-proof, one-of-a-kind, limited-release, high-proof, toasted barrel, sherry cask, individually selected, hand-numbered — and so on and so forth — bottlings.
That is not a criticism. I count myself among the obsessives, or at least the near obsessives. I have a separate shelf cart, apart from the bar, that is occupied entirely by sipping whiskey that is not primarily meant for mixing, including many limited or somewhat difficult-to-find releases.
The price of this sort of bourbon and rye has skyrocketed in recent years, and the effects have trickled down to less rarified offerings. Even old stand-bys in the world of American whiskey that used to be widely available and priced less than $30 have spiked: At the very end of last year, whiskey journalist Clay Risen wrote in The New York Times about the disappearance of bargain bourbon. That piece featured the following quote from Dixon Dedman, the creator of Kentucky Owl — a “luxury” whiskey with multiple expressions that sell for several hundred dollars: “Today, $75 is the new $35.”