Magic Arrow – Tassilo Buckwheat Whisky

I thought long and hard on what to mix with Buckwheat whisky. First, I came up with a Blood & Sand variation. However, I also consulted my Flavor Bible and additionally found a great recipe to base my creation on.

First, let us take a look at the whisky: Ascaim grow their own buckwheat for the production of their whiskey. They mash the freshly milled pseudocereal at lower temperatures and slower than normal grains. After the distillation the new make spends three years in custom virgin oak barrels. The 200 l ‘Hirschen’ barrels are stored in a half-open warehouse. In the end, Ascaim bottle their Tassilo Whisky at 43 % ABV without colouring or chill-filtration.

Nutty and chocolatey

Since I tasted the spirit along its journey to become a whisky, I am familiar with the buckwheat whisky notes by now. The finished product closely reminded me of American Whiskey. Apart from that, I got buttery notes and a certain floral quality. The Tassilo Buckwheat whisky makes for a nice sipper and I am very keen to find out how it behaves itself in cocktails..

Based on Black Magic

I read in my Flavor Bible that banana and chocolate go very well with buckwheat. Furthermore, I found the Black Magic No. 2 by Roger Grueter on Difford’s Guide. So, I changed the Amaro Montenegro for Meletti and changed the ratios. Furthermore, I also added two bitters.

The ‘Magic Arrow’ obviously is on the sweet side of drinks. Yet, the combination of whisky, Amaro, banana and chocolate notes works extremely well. The orange bitters adds a bit of contrast and ‘freshness’ to the otherwise very complementary dark flavours. All in all, the flavours of the Tassilo Buckwheat whisky are very well accentuated by those flavours.

*The fact that I received a product reviewed in this article for free, did not – in any way – influence the rating of said product. The whisky was provided by Ascaim Destillerie.